A week ago today I had the pleasure of a short zoom session with Jason Sutton, Instructor: Heavy Mechanical Trades. I asked him how his first week had been — this was his response:

“Until the bear is chasing you in the forest, you really don’t know how fast you can run, “

“I have been so consumed making sure my delivery was on point, and that I best represented our program with a strong sense of reliability and validity in my assessments, that I have thought about nothing else.

This past week has been extremely taxing on both my mind and my time. I can literally spend hours at my computer. Been a crazy week! 

That said, I have gone from never using D2L, to somewhat proficient in just a few days. I have been able to create a workable platform for my students to share. I actually love chaos, and I do my best work when things are going a hundred miles an hour!!! 

The experience thus far has been very well received by my students. Here are some of the comments they shared with me as we wrapped up our first week.

This is what the students have to say:

“I think you have been doing a great job using this platform, its honestly easier for me to take notes like this outside the classroom. Hands on is challenging but I feel that most of the guys are learning a lot academically by being forced to learn everything online. Thanks again for all you do for us.”

“This online class is going  a lot better than I thought it was. The smaller groups are very helpful. With all things considered, I think the class is going better than expected. Again, thanks for putting in all the time and effort to get us through — me and everyone else really appreciates it.”

“The way this is being delivered under the circumstances is going well. I think day by day we will improve. Looking forward to the whiteboard drawings.”

 “I think you’re doing a great job — it is working good!”

“The classes are good so far, can’t think of anything to add or change as of now but will keep it in mind if I think of any suggestions. The online is going way better than I expected. Feedback from today: I really enjoy these online classes, I appreciate your hard work to try and make this as seamless and streamlined as possible. I think that going through the power points as a group is good as we can still bounce ideas and questions off each other and everyone has the opportunity to hear. I really liked that you tossed in some shop pictures of what we are working on as it makes it easier to see and understand where I would find it and how its constructed on a machine, since we don’t have the shop time and can’t look for at it ourselves. I don’t think I have anything to add to this as I think this is the best we can get in these circumstances and hopefully we are back in 6-8 weeks to finish off in the shop.”

 “The zoom and voiced over slides on d2l are awesome but if you wouldn’t mind posting the slide show plus the voice over video that would a little easier to follow along. I was having difficulty yesterday with the video of the slideshow to keep on the same slide as you but this is working great for me. I really appreciate all the effort you’re putting in for us in these trying times.”

“Thanks for the hard work you’re putting into making sure all of us can hopefully continue. I liked the big class today and then breaking off into groups to discuss. For myself the zoom meetings are working out actually very well, I am able to focus without distraction, my only complaint i guess would be the audio quality as it can shutter often.” 

“Hey Jason, I’m liking the way you do online class, I think it is a good system you have going, I liked when we went into smaller groups like yesterday and think we should continue to do that. So far I am pretty good with the online side of things but I am sure I will get stuck maybe when I go to hand something in, but so far it’s pretty good.”