To Hold A Class When You Can Not Be There

Sometimes it is not possible for faculty to be physically present in class because of a need to participate in off-campus conferences or seminars. Due to scheduling conflicts, it may not be possible to find a substitute instructor. Under these conditions, one could cancel the class and make it up later on. Instead, it could also be productive for teaching and learning to make assignments that students could work on during the scheduled class time in the absence of the instructor. This would make learning student-centered and foster teamwork. To do this, students were instructed to meet in the classroom to work together on the specified day and an assignment was made visible on the Blackboard Learning Platform. The completed assignment was due no later than the next class period. The assignment involved reading selected pages from the physics textbook, answering questions and a quiz. It was found that on the specified day, thirteen (out of the fourteen) sophomore students got together and correctly completed the group assignment without supervision. This was not done for extra credit. Students liked working in a collaborative environment. This approach may be used in larger classes with multiple assignments made to small group of students. Details will be discussed.