Introducing Office Hours, Reimagined

“If you email me, I’m not responding”.   This is what a recent calculus TA from a large university told his students.  

TAs, professors, and teachers have many students.  When so many students have so many questions, it is often hard–impossible, really– to get them all answered.  At the same time, educators will get the same questions from their students week over week. The current system of getting students the answers they’re looking for does not scale–as a result, many students fall behind because there is just not enough time for a single TA to help hundreds of students in the class.  While college classes provide office hours for students to attend and ask their questions, most of the time students either don’t attend or when they do, they get little to no time with a professor because of the number of students seeking help.

Here is a quick video overview of Office Hours. 

This is why we are launching Office Hours.  On Numerade’s Office Hours, educators can now help students ace the material while saving time and energy by creating short videos answers to their students’ questions.  For example, educators can provide video responses to specific student questions or create weekly class recaps to ensure all students are getting the clarification they want and need.  Moreover, Office Hours allows students to ‘vote up’ questions indicating to instructors which questions are most popular among the class, and should be prioritized.  Videos are available for all students to view.  This will help improve the current inefficient system and ensure students get the help they are looking for. 

How Office Hours works:

Log in and go to click on ‘Office Hours’ at the top.  

  • Hit ‘Create’ and input the course name and school.  
  • Then create a section.

Now invite your students into your course where they can ask questions and view your videos.   Your students will need your unique code to enter your course. Your code will appear under your school name.

After inviting your students, they can ask questions.  Other students can upvote their questions to help you prioritize which questions to answer.  

Find the question to answer, and click on ‘Answer’.  Then follow the recording instructions. 

Now your video response to your students will be available to all your students.  Students will need to log into Numerade and go to ‘Office Hours’ at the top. You can also create new videos of anything.  For example, click on the ‘Create New Video’ under “My Office Hours Videos” to create weekly video recaps or anything else for your students.

Author

-->