Carpentries Instructors’ meeting
- Monday, June 1, 2020
- 9:30-10:50 AM
Present:
Albin, Brooks-Kieffer, Deakyne, Everman, Trana, Zipper
Agenda
- Speculate about practicing for and scheduling an online Carpentries workshop
- Observations from Mizzou’s online Software Carpentry in May
- Instructor training debrief and tips for checkout tasks
- Announcements
Discussions
Used a live shared document again; link upon request if you don’t have it.
Planning an online Carpentries Workshop
The instructor group has a lot of interest in doing an online workshop. Questions and discussion included:
Timing?
Early fall is a good time to catch incoming grad students who need a quick ramp-up on Python or R. This matches with the early August dates we’ve used in the past. This would also give us time to address some challenges of teaching Carpentries online, e.g.: software install and setup.
Traditional two-day or something else?
A lesson from Mizzou’s two-day online SWC is that it’s really hard to focus and engage in an online workshop for that unbroken amount of time. We also can’t ignore that learners attending from home may also be coping with other demands on their time during the day. Folks discussed several ideas for breaking up the workshop, including three-hour blocks over a month (this had been our plan for the canceled April workshop), multiple mini-sessions on each topic, and recording elements of the workshop to flip the learner experience. Recent Carpentries community discussions have pointed out that online workshops go slower than in-person for many reasons; it’s important to use the results of the pre-workshop survey to understand learners’ backgrounds. On the other hand, the slower pace of online may help new instructors feel more confident in the material.
R or Python?
Most recent in-person workshop (January 2020) was R, lightly attended. No SWC Python workshop offered for 18 months, so this will be the first choice. Another option would be to offer both languages, as OU is doing in their most recent workshop.
Audience?
Discussion that we will need to promote and possibly schedule the workshop differently to attract and retain online learners. Given inevitable professional development budget cuts, discussed an expectation that KU employees will have strong interest in free, remote learning opportunities on these topics.
Opportunity to practice?
This discussion bled into conversation about Mizzou’s May SWC workshop and possible ways of flipping some of the learner experience. We talked about recording topics such as software install and getting started so that workshop time could be focused on tasks; scheduling “office hours” for install help prior to a workshop; and using VoiceThread for introductions and possibly other material. All of these elements plus the use of Zoom as the “classroom” means that we need to prepare and practice for this workshop. Most instructors agreed that having a deadline in the form of a scheduled workshop would be helpful for preparing. Also discussed recruiting test learners to observe and provide feedback on a prototype session.
Observing an online Software Carpentry
JBK sent a full set of notes on an online SWC from early May - she attended as a helper for Bash and Git lessons. General takeaways include:
- Expect more learner drop-off online than in-person
- Two full days was really hard to pay attention to
- Plan and coordinate roles of instructors, helpers, organizers in the Zoom room(s)
- Practice and understand Zoom features ahead of time
- Decide in advance how helpers will help learners
- Decide in advance how/whether breakout rooms will be used
- Try to find out whether learners have multiple screens or just one
- Inform learners that they may need to share their screens to get help
Instructor training debrief
One person has very recently completed instructor training and is working on checkout tasks. Yay! Reference to the Midwest Big Data Hub, which came up during instructor training.
Announcements
- The Carpentries are hosting Community Conversations specifically about online workshops. JBK will send notes from the first conversation, held Monday, June 1.
- The Carpentries has a number of developing resources about online workshops:
- The Carpentries is also introducing a new instructor role for centrally-organized online workshops: “Supporting Instructor.” These instructors are fully certified but have taught fewer than 3 workshops since certification. Instructors meeting this description can volunteer for centrally-organized workshops at the Instructor sign-up spreadsheet.
Action Items
- JBK will look at dates on the KU calendar and propose some workshop timings for the instructor group
- JBK will send notes from the first Carpentries Community Conversation about online workshops
- PT will work on a list of possible practices for online workshops
Notes by SZ, posted by JBK