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Things to Tell New USask Students about Final Exams
There are many unstated or rarely stated norms and practices associated with the final exam setting. New students need to learn the ropes. This is especially important for students who are: writing their first university exams because they are new to university study (like first year students), new to USask (like transfer students), new to Canadian higher education (like international students), and/or returning to USask after only a COVID-based experience of remote exams. It’s a good idea to reduce uncertainty and to avert distress during exams. What can you do? Tell students what to expect and explain what is expected of them in the conditions for the final exam. Double…
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Easy ways to make your course more accessible
There are 3,000 students at USask who have some form of accommodation, so there is an excellent chance that your class has a student with a disability. Ideally, we’d all design courses that are universally accessible and reduce the need for accommodations by using Universal Design for Learning. If you feel like you don’t have time for a rethink right now, you can make simple changes that make it easier for all students, not just your most advantaged students, to have an equitable opportunity to succeed in your course. Accessible Online Environments Here are four simple ways to make your online class more accessible for your students: Record and Share:…
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Exploring the Many Ways of Using Canvas Classic Quizzes
Quizzes are an extremely flexible tool that can be used to support many stages of learning. For example, quizzes can be used to pre-assess (prior to learning), provide practice and feedback (during learning), or as post-assessment (after learning). Experimenting with these various methods can assist you in finding ways of making your course more supportive of our USask Learning Technology Ecosystem Principles (e.g., “Designed for Reflection and Growth”). Here are some approaches to using quizzes that you may want to consider: Using the same quiz at a different stage in learning Using a quiz prior to learning and after learning can help make learning visible to students. Allow multiple attempts…
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Considerations for creating an open-book exam
An alternative to the traditional time-constrained invigilated final exam is the open-book exam. “Open-book” implies that learners will have access to some type of references or resources during the exam, but the level of access to resources and time constraints are variables controlled by the instructor depending their exam design decisions. If you are considering an open-book exam, here are some things to keep in mind: Focus on the Learning Outcomes – When making decisions about exam design and the types of questions you are going to have on your exam, think about the most important things you want your students to come away knowing (your learning outcomes / key…