Best Ways To Finish S1 Strong and Set Your Students Up For Success In S2

@LisaBerghoff/@MrKimDHS

1. Post all of your final exam information on Schoology!

I mean ALL of it. The dates, the times, the locations, what students should bring with them, how they should study. Don't assume anything. Did you say it 100 times in class? Did you also write it on the board and ask everyone to write it down? It doesn't matter! Please post it on Schoology. Make sure to include digital copies of anything you handed out in class. Remember, we have MTSS, TLC and ARC staff, counselors, case managers, and parents all working to support students. This will help remove barriers to students getting that help. 

2. At the very end of S1, copy your course to resources.

When semester 1 ends, your courses will be archived. Don't worry, you will be able to access those courses in the future. However, it's nice to also have the materials page saved to your Schoology resources so you can access it again for other classes you may teach. The bottom line is, this can be helpful and there is no downside so just do it.

    

Here's how you do it:

•     Navigate to your course's materials page
•     At the top click Options
•     Then choose Save Course To Resources
•     You can save to your home collection and no need to choose a folder

3. Rename Your Course SECTIONS for S1 and S2

I cannot overstate the importance of this one.

Since students will have access to both S1 and S2 tiles, they will need an easy way to determine which tile they need. If you have not already done so, or even if you have it's a good time to double check, please follow these instructions. 

• Navigate to your course and click Course Options (under the image)
• Click Edit Info

• The second box is for the Section Name- This is the box you want to change! There will be more than one if your sections are linked. DO NOT EDIT THE COURSE NAME

• Under section name, you can remove the IC course number and put the name of the course, period, and SEMESTER 1. You MUST click Save!

• Do this for your semester 2 tiles as well. Doing them all now ensures that when both are open you and your students will be able to easily identify them.
• Also, consider your tile images. You may want to put 2 different images to differentiate between S1 and S2 or your students may prefer that it is the same and that the section name is enough. 

4. Teach yourself and your students how to identify your S1 and S2 tiles and how to reorder their courses.

After you have renamed your sections and set your tile images, you will need to know how to navigate and reorder so the tiles you need are at the ready. Most of the staff know how to do this since our S1 and S2 tiles are visible for all of S1. This will be new and different for our students.

• Navigate to Courses in the blue menu bar at the top of the screen

• Click where it says My Courses on the right side of the screen under the blue bar

• Look at the right side of the screen where it says Mange Courses and click Reorder Courses

• Scroll down and you will notice there is a line. the top 12 courses will be visible as tiles and anything under that line will not be visible. 

• Choose the course tiles that you want to be visible in the courses dropdown and click and drag them up above that line. When you are done, just click the X. There is no save button on this screen.

If you are teaching a year-long course and plan to start using your S2 tile right away, instruct your students to move that tile above the line.

5. If you want your courses to be section linked for S2 now is the time to do that.

Here is a refresher on the terminology:

• Section Linking: When you have multiple sections of the same course, with the same name, and you want to link them so they share a materials page and updates. You can do this yourself! 
• Navigate to Courses  and then My Courses.
• Choose which course will be the "anchor" course. The other courses will be linked to it.
• Go to the gear and click Link Existing Section.
• You will then tick the boxes that identify the courses you want to link to this course.
• It will then prompt you to download a standard csv file. It does this because when you section link your courses all of the data from the non-anchor courses will be deleted. You should only link at the very start of each semester. Do not link and unlink once you have materials and grades in. If you do, they will be on the spreadsheet you just downloaded.

• Cross Linking: When you have multiple sections of a different course but they meet at the same time and in the same room. An example of this would be stacked classes. If you have a standard and an honors section that meet at the same time, you can request that they be cross linked so they will actually become one course for the purposes of Schoology. This is taken care of by our wonderful Rachel Lawrence in the district technology department. If you have not met her, send her an email to say hello. Rachel sent an email through IC Messenger with a link to a form for you to submit cross linking requests. Here it is again. 

If you aren't sure if you should be section linking or cross linking, feel free to contact Lisa Berghoff, Dan Kim, or Rachel Lawrence. We're happy to help you figure it out!