“Virtual yet very real” – A look back at the summer semester (Part 2)

“As far as I’m concerned, the 2020 summer semester – which suddenly had to be delivered digitally – went surprisingly smoothly. Fortunately, everyone involved pulled together right from the start: the students understood the need for the change, the IT services expanded our technical capacity at an astonishing pace, and the Presidential Board not only steered things in the right direction but also provided very reassuring communication throughout.

I myself was very fortunate that my wife effectively managed our children’s ‘home schooling’ on her own – otherwise, as a lecturer, I might well have been overwhelmed by chaos. This allowed me to concentrate on further developing the content of two key teaching modules as planned and digitising them at the same time. The unofficial feedback from students on this was very positive.

Looking ahead, I hope that the university will engage in constructive and critical reflection on the extent to which digital elements should be retained in teaching once the coronavirus crisis is over. At least for traditional lectures, in which so-called explicit knowledge is to be conveyed, I believe there is a significant gain in flexibility for students. They are now free to choose the place, time, pace and frequency at which they work through lecture videos. Looking ahead, there could be similar gains in flexibility for lecturers. However, I do not see this advantage for seminars and other courses that thrive on discourse and the exchange of implicit knowledge. As far as those are concerned, I look forward to communicating with students in person again as soon as possible.”

“In my seminars, students usually develop short teaching sequences themselves, in which they try out many things in practice and thus learn and teach simple Computing Science fundamentals. Converting this format into purely online seminars was completely new to me and, of course, involved extra work. I now see this as a benefit: whereas in previous semesters students learnt and taught about the digital world, they are now using precisely these digital media for their own learning and teaching.

Student feedback on the seminar was positive: above all, the link to the current situation – in which teachers are faced with the challenge of delivering their lessons using digital tools – motivated many to try out the tips and ideas for designing online learning units for themselves.

However, I missed the personal contact with the students – despite regular video chats. Very few students used their cameras or microphones, though, so I never actually saw most of them. If I were to run the course again, I would make it more personal. I’m pleased with how the summer semester went and have gained a lot of experience that I can apply and build on during the winter semester.”

"Switching our teaching to digital formats was not easy - especially for seminars with a practical focus, such as the preparation for school internships or visits to extracurricular learning centres. I received help from colleagues who had prepared digital modules for the school internships for the teachers. My students were actively involved in the digital seminar work and the student assistants tirelessly tested apps and plug-ins and reflected the moods from the seminars back to me. In the long term, digitalisation will bring more diversity to teaching. This semester has shown me that independent and sustainable digital study is possible: the students' online results have generated direct feedback outside the seminar through publications and can also be used in my teaching in the future.

A particular challenge for me, as for many students and colleagues, was the additional care of children at home. Studying at night, caring for and teaching children during the day - certainly not a reasonable model, but one that has been reported to me. When there is hardly any time left to answer the question of work-life balance and the digital home office makes it possible to work at any (in)conceivable time and situation, it is important to communicate with each other. However, I haven't had enough verbal communication this semester. I'll be paying attention to this in future - because right now we need a strong sense of togetherness."