As classes at Harvard went online, so too did Bok Seminars, short courses for PhD students covering a range of topics in teaching and learning, from course design to public speaking, taught by the Bok Center’s senior staff and fellows. Reframing our own seminars informed our experience helping faculty and TFs make the transition to teaching remotely. Like instructors across campus, we worried about time zones and students' technical challenges, and gained firsthand experience figuring out how to achieve our core goals under new circumstances.
In the first meetings after spring break, we helped orient Bok Seminar students to teaching with Zoom. We designed interactive activities for our sessions to maintain community while simultaneously teaching Zoom features – such as having students select a virtual background or profile picture and use it to tell a story about themselves. In Foundations of Teaching in the Humanities and Social Sciences, the session on discussion leading (originally planned around teaching discussion skills for in-person sections) shifted to focus more broadly on the goals of discussion and how to achieve them in a virtual setting. Students explored discussion strategies with peers in Zoom and received practical feedback before they led their own discussions as TFs later that week. The final session of Foundations also proved to be timely as we facilitated a conversation about grading and responding to student writing under the new Emergency SAT/UNSAT protocol.
It was reassuring to stay connected with our community through this transition. As Bok Seminars are supplemental professional development opportunities, we wondered whether some students might choose not to finish them in the midst of the crisis, but the vast majority of students stayed with us. Their commitment speaks to the vibrancy of our community, for which we are so grateful! Comments we have received show how students appreciated the chance to come together, talk about shared challenges in this new environment, and continue to develop and reflect on their own teaching practice:
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Thank you for being an awesome resource during this particularly challenging semester. Really appreciate all of the work that you are doing.
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It was nice "seeing" you today in the seminar! It was the first time I used Zoom and I really enjoyed it! (The breakout room was cool!) I want to say thanks a lot for keeping the school running in difficult times!
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I just taught my last Zoom sections...thank you again so much for the advice...it really helped me in adjusting to the virtual format.
We’re looking forward to continuing our teaching remotely explorations and engaging with our community in our summer Bok Seminars. The full schedule will be posted in May.