Follow the steps on this page for moving a traditional course online in case of an extreme emergency. This page provides resources to create the best quality online course for Nicholls students during emergency events.
Step 1: Talk with your departmental peers and the Office of Distance Education: Most departments have veteran online teaching faculty. Please use them as a resource. In addition, you can contact Nicole Cotten and Andrew Simoncelli for assistance.
Step 2: Consider additional online training: The Office of Distance Education offers several options to faculty that want to improve their online teaching skills.
- Online Course Design – a self-paced course in Moodle that assists you with teaching online
- Quality Matters – a third-party, 2-week online training course titled Designing Your Online Course (DYOC).
- Online Mentorship Program – a Nicholls’ faculty member is assigned to you as an online mentor over the course of a semester
If you are interested in any of the above options, contact Andrew Simoncelli or Nicole Cotten. Also, look at the CAFE calendar for upcoming events that might be helpful to you.
Step 2b: (Optional) If you haven’t used Moodle: If you have not used Moodle or are not familiar with Moodle, two courses on your Moodle Dashboard provide orientation materials such as uploading files and utilizing various Moodle activities: Moodle Basics 3.6 and Advanced usage of Moodle 3.6.
Step 3: Establish lines of communication: Without regular classroom meetings, communication methods with students must be determined and provided. Communication methods available include e-mail, various Moodle tools, or using a video conferencing instrument like Zoom. More information about Zoom and other video conferencing tools are available in the Live Video Lectures page.
Step 4: Update your Moodle course: Moodle will be the main resource where your students will go to get course content. You should put any PowerPoints or lecture notes here that will assist your students in absence of your live lectures. Use URL links instead of videos on Moodle. Distance Education has created a Moodle page with tons of information about how to build your own Moodle course. Contact nicole.cotten@nicholls.edu if you want to be added to this course.
Step 5: Add audio/video to your Moodle course: To give your course a more personal touch, consider adding audio or video to your online course. This could be as simple as adding an audio file of yourself talking to recording a video of yourself giving a lecture while also sharing your desktop. These can be easily recorded, saved, and uploaded to Moodle. Look at the Video Lectures and Audio Lectures in the Google folder. Once again, do not post videos to Moodle. Use YouTube and or Google Drive.
Step 6: Find good resource materials to aid in your course delivery: There are tons of free materials out there for you and your students to use in delivering/receiving an online course. Sites like Merlot and the Khan academy offer a bunch of free resources for you to use. Look at our Online Resource Materials document for some of these.
Step 7: Give remote assessments: Instructors can give all sorts of assessments through Moodle including discussions and papers. In addition, instructors can use the remote proctoring service ProctorU to provide secure test-taking for your students. There is a cost involved for the students, so we recommend that you limit the tests to four or less a semester. See the ProctorU Information page for more.
Step 8: Self Review Your Course: Compare your course with the Online Course Checklist created for developing online courses. See if your course is able to check off all of the items.
Additional Resources: Go to the Faculty Resources page to see guidelines for your syllabus and Moodle requirements. https://www.nicholls.edu/online/faculty-resources/page
