This semester, professors have been getting accustomed to teaching their students online. For many, it has been a challenging adaptation, as professors have had to get used to not seeing their students faces, changing some of their lesson plans as they were designed for in-person teaching, and grading all of their assignments online.
Dr. Susan Grantham, a professor of Communication at the University of Hartford explained that she misses the in person teaching. She stated “I absolutely miss seeing students faces just for the joy of that interaction. Hiccups in online teaching because I’ll realize I did not explain something well or need to rephrase something by looking at my students”. Students typically do not turn their cameras on when they are in their online classes, therefore, professors like Dr. Grantham do not know if their students are understanding their lectures.
Another immense problem for professors is that their lessons plans were created for in-person teaching. Not all lessons and lectures can be taught online the same way that they would be taught in person. Finding new ways of being interactive with students while teaching online has been a big struggle for most professors.
Dr. Grantham also spoke of how many more assignments she has to grade now. Because of teaching online and understanding her students may be going through a lot of personal struggles this semester, she decided to create more assignments for lesser percentages of her grade. She did this so if students missed an assignment, it would not be the end of the world because that assignment is not a big percentage of their grade. Doing this for her students upped the amount of assignments she has to grade from 300 to 1,000 a semester.
Although professors have been going through hardships while adapting to teaching online, they are still very dedicated to providing the best education to their students. Adam Chiara, another UHart Communication professor said “I always question myself, am I doing enough to make students have a good experience? But still push them to where they need to be, because you know, fair or unfair, at the end of four years you’re still going into the job market like students did before COVID”.
