Blogs

By Julianne Morgan

Almost every conversation I had with instructors this semester was about student engagement. Students aren't coming to class, they're not engaging in discussion, they're not doing their work, they just don't seem to care anymore. 

I also saw this from the students themselves on YikYak. I know we all know that mental health is a real problem nationally for students ( . . . probably for staff, admins, instructors, and well, everyone, too), but seeing in students' own words their fears, their panic attacks, their nightmares - completely unfiltered and lost, I really felt for them. They reach out on YikYak into this anonymous void looking for something, anything, to just get the worries out. 

I wish I could say I had suggestions on how to help. How to help the students and how to help the instructors who seem to have really lost some joy of teaching. 

I don't know how to help. This is a bad preamble to this blog post, because I don't have any silver bullet solution. But, sometimes there are ideas or new things to try that seem to take the edge off, even just a little! The Tokens app we introduced in the Fall is one such case that just might alleviate these pressures (and from student and instructor responses, Tokens has actually met that goal). 

So, this semester, we offer another such solution - not a silver bullet, but maybe a rubber bouncy ball. The app this semester? Shoutouts!

We often talk about the importance of instructor feedback, but encouraging students to give each other positive feedback could enhance the classroom (both physical and online) experience and erode some of the walls students seem to be putting up lately. 

Here are a few tips to consider with Shoutouts!

How can you use sHOUTOUTS?

See a 1.5-minute video demo and our help documentation for getting started with Shoutouts. 

Explain the Purpose

Students aren't likely to use Shoutouts unless you introduce them to the tool and explain why you think it matters for your class. If you will be using Shoutouts to actually assess participation, include a section explaining how that will work in your syllabus. Here are a few examples of syllabus blurbs and reasons for using the tool. Feel free to use and adapt for your own class. 

• Did one of your peers do something outstanding in class this week? Let them know!
  The Shoutouts! tool in Isidore lets you give your peers badges for enhancing our class experience. If a classmate helped you understand a topic better, provided an insightful comment, gave you tech help, or even just made the class a more enjoyable place to be, take a second to let them know by giving them a Shoutout!
• I personally often find that giving someone positive feedback really helps me feel better for the day. Even if I'm having a hard day, just lifting someone else's spirits helps change my mood. It can be hard to do - but I also find it easier to give this kind of feedback from behind a screen, so I hope at least some of you find this to be the case, too.
• Providing feedback is a valuable skill that students don't often learn throughout their college experience. The Shoutouts! tool in our Isidore site is an "onboarding" to this skillset. I want you to regularly provide positive feedback to your peers - this way, you get some practice with the easy kind of feedback . . . which perhaps you can use in your future jobs if you ever need to "sandwich" constructive criticism in between positive comments. 
• I know it's hard for some students to participate in class in the "traditional" manner, so I will be using Shoutouts to allow students to participate in class through activities that are sometimes unseen. Because it may seem "easier" to just send a bunch of Shoutouts to peers than it is to actually do something to make the classroom experience better, I will give 5 points for each Shoutout you receive, and 1 point for each Shoutout you send for a maximum of 50 points as part of your participation grade. These points won't accumulate in the Gradebook automatically, but I will incorporate them at midterm and 1 week before the final exam. 
  
  

can this be used in a lab course? or a discussion-based course? AN ONLINE COURSE?

Yes! The existing Shoutouts are designed to be flexible and general enough to work for a variety of purposes. In general, though, here are the intentions for each Shoutout:

• Awesome Annotator: Specifically for students who provide annotations through tools like Perusall, or who share reading notes with the class. 
• Cool Collaborator: Someone who helps make sure group work/projects get finished. This could involve setting up group meetings, taking notes for the group, sending reminders, submitting assignments, establishing action items, etc. 
• Dynamic Dialoguer: For students who contribute impactfully to class discussions - both online and in the classroom. 
• Fabulous Flyer: This is a generic shoutout for enhancing the classroom community.
• Huge High-Five: This is another generic shoutout for recognizing any kind of contribution. 
• Idea Inventor: This is for students who are good at brainstorming, who come up with solutions, etc. 
• Impressive Includer: This is for students who try to include and engage all students.
• Legendary Leader: This is for someone who leads a group project, leads by demonstration, or takes initiative on an activity. 
• Marvelous Marianist: Specifically, this is for recognizing students who are exhibiting the Marianist charisms of Community, Mary, Mission, Faith, and Inclusivity. 
• Prodigious Presenter: This is for a student who conducted a great presentation. 
• Resourceful Reporter: This is for students who take class/lab notes, keep track of everything in class, and is very organized. 
• Rigorous Researcher: For students who excel at finding sources. 
• Terrific Techy: For students who help solve tech problems for the class. 

I'd like to Shoutout Dr. Adam Rathge in History for bringing to us the seed of the idea for this Shoutouts! learning app. He gets an "Idea Inventor" shoutout for sure!

Please don't hesitate to let us know how the Shoutouts are working in your classes! Feel free to share any feedback with us at onlinelearning@udayton.edu.