surveys for students: using google forms to get to know your classroom
Like any good humanist, I want as much information as I can get in any situation. (I imagine a scientist, or anyone, really, has similar desires.) And when I'm teaching, information about my students becomes invaluable as the class grows and shifts from planning to execution.
One of the most powerful tools for gathering this information is the online, anonymous survey. Below, I'll show three examples of how I've used Google Forms to create and administer these surveys at different points in a course. But first, why use them at all?
Surveys give students a private channel of communication
Throughout my teaching career, I often wanted to know how my students were doing individually, but also a collective group. And as anyone who has asked a class of undergraduates "how the reading went," one does not always get accurate, or honest, information when students are asked to be vulnerable in front of one another. I started using online surveys as a way to collect information that I'm interested in, and was pleasantly surprised when students were much more open and honest when they could answer privately, sometimes anonymously, and on their own time.
Get to know your students before the course begins
This is my pre course survey. I send it out (slightly modified for the type of course) before each class I teach, either as an assistant or instructor of record, as soon as is reasonable. This survey (as part of a "welcome to the class" on-boarding email) is the first signal I send to students that I value their voices and diversity in the class, and aim to be aware and inclusive of their strengths and backgrounds as I teach. I did configure this form to be associated with an email, but appreciate that I can both see individual responses and the answers in aggregate.
For example, the range of responses I get for the "what should I know about you as a student?" question range from preferences about class activities to concerns about preparation.
After getting responses like these, I made sure to include extra resources on film materials on the course website, as well as providing many ways for students to participate.
After getting responses like these, I made sure to include extra resources on film materials on the course website, as well as providing many ways for students to participate.
Most of the questions are pretty standard, but I am consistently surprised by the technology answers my students provide. I am guilty, as many of my digital humanities/studies colleagues are, of assuming access to technology. But this particular responses gave me pause, as I realized that a significant group of my students did not have smart phones, and thus my assumption that students would see an email blast before class with an announcement was in error. I made a special effort that semester to communicate information on the course site and over email with as much lead time as possible.
The most unexpected benefit of the pre-course survey is reduced nerves! I know quite a bit about my students before I ever step in front of them, which helps me feel more confident and prepared, and also gets me excited to work with them over the course of the semester. Usually, this is just the boost I need to get pumped about being in front of students again.
Muddiest Point gives you class by class data
'Muddiest Point' is a technique I was first introduced to in a STEM pedagogy seminar. This is a quick feedback tool, where students at the end of each course meeting are required to submit, anonymously, what they feel the most unclear point of the lecture or course session was. This is incredibly helpful in large lecture courses where it can be hard to gauge understanding, but gives students in classes of all sizes a way to express comprehension challenges without needing to do so publicly. If more than a handful of students express discomfort with a certain idea, that's a great sign that you might want to add an extra problem solution to the course website, or quickly review the idea next lecture.
In my own courses, I often handed out index cards at the end of each course, and students got in the habit of filling one out before leaving. But putting a durable link on the course website can be even more effective (and you don't have to carry around/buy paper!) Here's an example of how that form would look.
I also found that it was a great, anonymous way for students to talk back to me about how the course was going. Because their names aren't attached to the feedback, students would express all kinds of ideas to me - things they liked, new examples they wanted to share but didn't get to, explanations for their low energy, or candid feedback about how they were enjoying the course. Unlike student intake surveys, I do take these with a grain of salt, but students consistently mention in my end-of-term feedback that they enjoyed this structured, private way of communicating with me.
Check in with your students at the midpoint of the course
Midterm Student Feedback sessions were a service I performed for instructors on behalf of CRLT where I would interview instructors about how they felt a course was going, observe a section of their teaching, and facilitate an anonymous feedback session with their students. These were incredibly valuable conversations, allowing students to give feedback while time remained for the instructor to incorporate their feedback, and giving instructors a chance to open conversations and adapt courses.
But, even if you don't have access to a full, facilitated MSF session, you can still solicit feedback from your students at the midpoint of the course. Here's an example of a form I've distributed to students. And here are a few responses to an actual MSF form I distributed (this was after a facilitated session that was done on my behalf, and these two students chose to respond further to the form or were absent - I didn't have attendance data for that course session, so I can't say for sure, which of course protects my students.)
Many students come to my courses expecting to see 'important' 'artistic' films and instead watch Justin Bieber: Never Say Never, but I won't apologize for showing them that the same concepts that animate their high theory readings function in documentaries aimed at teen girls.
Many students come to my courses expecting to see 'important' 'artistic' films and instead watch Justin Bieber: Never Say Never, but I won't apologize for showing them that the same concepts that animate their high theory readings function in documentaries aimed at teen girls.
After receiving this feedback (along with the full report), I did continue doing the muddiest point exercise after every class (I hadn't been sure, with this group in particular, that it was helpful) but chose not to change my screenings. I also appreciated the answers that students gave about what they can do to improve their experience of the course. Students often know that their own investment in reading and attendance impacts their learning, but it was reassuring to know that they viewed themselves as co-creators of their learning experience.
MSFs give me a chance to adjust my teaching - every course is different, every student is different, and making changes halfway through can really re-energize a course that's straying off course, or help to shore up effective structures even more.
But okay, what do I do with all this data?
My first, and most important, piece of advice, is to honor what students share with you. Are many students saying in their muddiest point answers that they hate a certain assignment? Add a follow-up question to figure out why, and maybe address their concerns. Do all of your students have missing background preparation for the course? Build regular units of background knowledge into your classes, or provide extra resources on the course site.
But, as with so many pedagogy tools, the tool becomes much more effective when it gains the students' trust. After each survey, I referenced the results in class, and gave my students concrete actions that I was taking to address the ideas and concerns they volunteered. I made an effort to address muddiest point concerns, and explicitly referenced those answers in class. But keeping these channels of communication open, especially with these surveys, makes me a more responsive instructor, and empowers my students to participate in creating the learning environment with me, and with their peers.
building a team of mentors
No one explained to me how to find mentors in graduate school. People gave me a lot of advice, however, on how to select a chair for my dissertation committee, as I imagine there is a lot of advice around selecting a PI or lab to join. In a perfect world, the head of your PhD project would be the keystone of your mentoring as a graduate student. But even if you have the most educated, open-minded, available, supportive chair imaginable, I would still give you the same advice:
Get yourself a team of mentors.
No matter what your after-degree career plans are, no matter what your personal life looks like, and no matter what your subject is, a team of mentors is a wise move professionally, and personally.
Team mentoring can take some of the pressure off you.
We are all complex beings, with lives that stretch beyond the PhD. Having a team of people that you look to for advice, mentorship, and support can make it seem less overwhelming when you need to confide difficult information, or seek support about a sensitive topic. Before I consciously started to create a team of mentors, I often hesitated or refrained from confiding in anyone about sensitive issues, because I didn't want it to impact my standing in the program, access to funds, or reputation as a graduate student. But after building a team, I had people in many corners of campus who knew me, and could offer advice without also being directly responsible for overseeing my degree progress.
Team mentoring can take some of the pressure of your mentors.
At some point, I realized that it was completely crazy that I was expecting tenured faculty members at an R1 university to give me solid advice and mentoring on how to best translate the skills I learned during the PhD into a job outside of academia. I am not saying that to excuse faculty ignorance, or refusal to engage with the realities of the job market, but to acknowledge that there are many, many people (right on my campus, even!) that could give me much more sound guidance on alt-ac careers because they had them. I had similar issues come up when I had questions about having a family in academia, or how best to manage a job search in a geographically confined area. My mentoring needs had extended beyond the work one mentor could do, and I needed to adjust my strategy.
By not expecting any one person to give me sound, researched, supportive advice in every area of my life, personal and professional, I freed all parties from that burden. I shifted from asking all of my questions to one person, to asking specific, tailored questions to specific people, leading to richer conversations, and widening my network at the same time.
Okay great, but how do I find the team?
Well, young grasshopper, first you have to evaluate your mentoring needs. This is the critical step that I see so many clients skip. Many people can see the benefits of expanding their mentoring network beyond their chair, but not many know how to secure a diverse range of voices to support them. And I would argue that stepping back and assessing what one's mentoring needs are FIRST can lead to a more efficient, targeted, and efficient network building phase second.
I created this chart (download a PDF here) to help you brainstorm what areas you are already receiving great mentoring in, and where you could improve. Of course, these categories might shift depending on your PhD and its parameters, but for most, this is a good starting point.
5 mentoring zones
Here are some guiding questions for each zone to help you evaluate what kind of support you already have, and what kind of support will support you best moving forward.
Discipline/Field/Subject - For many, this is the area that is most easily addressed, and a role that is probably filled by your dissertation advisor, at least partially. Some questions to ask yourself:
Do I have support to keep abreast of the latest developments in my field?
Are there places I can go to make sure that my work is part of conversations important in my discipline?
Am I well connected to mechanisms for distributing work in my field (journals, conferences, Twitter chats, etc)?
If my dissertation advisor's research does not completely overlap with mine, am I looking for other spaces and conversations more directly related to my research?
Teaching - Although teaching is not part of all PhD programs, many jobs in academia involve teaching in some capacity. But as many of us know, many jobs in academic, or even academic-adjacent spaces, require teaching as part of the role. Universities are well equipped to support your teaching growth, if you know where to look.
Am I getting feedback on my teaching regularly? (Faculty members, staff from teaching centers, student teaching mentors, or even fellow graduate students can give you feedback, or help you interpret the feedback your students give.)
Am I learning and growing as a teacher? Am I staying involved in current pedagogy developments, or experimenting with new technologies?
Am I seeking out opportunities to teach, even if my funding does not include a regular teaching assignment? (Many students report that giving guest lectures, or volunteering for limited teaching engagements like workshops or grader positions can give them valuable experience on their CV.)
Skills - Grad school gives you a (concentrated!) opportunity to develop many skills, but your advisor might not have the time (or capability) to support your growth in a complete way.
Am I improving my skills as a writer? Am I taking advantage of on campus writing centers or support? Am I involved in writing groups? Am i seeking feedback on my writing from a wide range of audiences?
Am I improving as a reader? Am I reading widely in my field? Am I organizing the information I ingest?
Am I improving my networking skills? Am I practicing my informational interview skills? Am I cultivating an online presence?
Am I improving my discipline-specific skills?
Career Planning - For many reasons, your academic advisor might not be best suited to helping you plan out a diverse range of career options. But there are a growing number of spaces and places to help you do just that.
Am I being open-minded about the types of jobs and positions I'll be seeking?
Am I taking time to meet people from my discipline who hold a wide range of positions?
Am I consciously building my CV to support my job-market aspirations?
Am I building a resume that will translate to employers outside of academia?
Have I sat down and evaluated what kinds of activities I enjoy doing during the PhD and thought through what that might mean for my job search? Have I done the same introspective work about my values, and what kind of whole life I envision for my future?
Personal Life - Being vulnerable isn't easy, especially when in the high pressure academic environment. Building a team of mentors where you have places to go to be your authentic self can be invaluable.
Do I have people that I can confide in when I am not feeling my best, mentally, physically or otherwise?
Do I have people that will help me connect to the resources I need to be well and healthy without worry of career or future impacts?
Am I building a network of people whose values align with mine, and who can respect my values and how I choose to live them?
Do I have people who will be able to listen, respect, and talk through personal issues in confidential and sensitive ways?
Building the team
Try taking the "Whole Life Mentoring" wheel and placing people where you think they best support you. Do you have an empty spaces? Hopefully the answers to the questions in each section will guide you as you determine where your network of support is already strong, and where it can be built up.
And when you've identified an area where you can build your network, these questions will help you narrow down the specific kind of support and mentoring you're looking for. Need more support in teaching? Look to a teaching center, teaching workshops on campus, or faculty members in your department who may not necessarily align with your research but are well regarded for their teaching. And then you have the beginnings of a script to approach them, and ask for their help. Keep in mind that specific, limited requests are always a good place to start when building a new relationship. For example, emailing a professor whose teaching you admire to ask if they'll review a syllabus you are pitching for next fall, (bonus points if you can guide that feedback even more specifically by asking questions or limiting their feedback to structure, or content!) is much more likely to garner a positive response than asking for "mentoring on teaching." Mentoring is built on a relationship, but beginning that relationship with a specific request can feel more genuine, and less forced.
The important thing is to remember that not every mentor needs to be perfectly aligned with you in every area of the mentoring wheel. Some people may give you outstanding mentorship in the aspects of your discipline that are confusing and cliquish while also giving you terrible advice about the job market, or teaching, or how to build a fulfilling personal life. Having clear expectations, both for each person in your mentoring team, and for yourself as the designer, builder, and maintainer of that team, can make these abstract relationships much more concrete and useful.
A few low impact ways to check if your student's "get it" without an exam or paper
If you've ever looked out at your classroom and beheld a sea of glassy, blank stares, you've probably wondered if your students were understanding what you were teaching. But often, until you get to an exam or paper, it's hard to really know what's working, and by the time you're grading, it can be too late. Here are three ways to check for comprehension during class time, giving you more data about how you might want to shift your lessons moving forward.
Ungraded "gut check" quiz. In content heavy classes, or to check comprehension after an important reading assignment, I like to make a short quiz for my students to complete as a warm up activity. You could always grade these, but that's more work! So I have my students sit as if it were a pop quiz, and take it under those conditions. When everyone is finished, I inform them that I won't be collecting them, but we will be going over the answers together. "If you had a sick feeling in your stomach thinking this would be graded," I say, "now is a good time to check whether you're preparing for this class in a way that you feel good about." This way, students get a sense of what they're expected to understand after completing a reading or participating in a lecture, and you don't have to grade. Students can either feel good about their work, or know they have to adjust their habits, but it happens privately without unnecessary shame or guilt.
Minute Paper. Have students pull out a piece of paper, or provide them with one, and write for one (or more realistically, five) minute about a topic. You can use this in a variety of different teaching capacity, but I love to use them at the beginning of class, to get ideas flowing about the reading or an assignment (What was the most interesting idea presented in the reading for today? What is one connection between this week's reading and last week's discussion on X topic?). They're also great as summary tools at the end of class (What do you think was the most important take away from today's lecture? What do you want to know more about?). Collect these and read through them to get a sense of what students are thinking and connecting with, or just let them stay with students as a reference during discussion. For more ideas for prompts, check here!
Muddiest Points (My favorite!) - Once I learned about this technique, I incorporated it into every class I taught. At the end of class, I give each student an index card (you could also have students supply their own sheet of paper, or do it electronically with an anonymous Google Form) and ask them to write down whatever feels least clear about the day's content. There are no names, so they can be completely honest, but everyone has to fill one out. I would then read through them, send an email to correct anything huge or time sensitive, or make time in the next lecture to cover common misunderstandings. Over time, students eventually started using these to provide anonymous feedback about what they liked and didn't like about the course, or share thoughts about the content that they couldn't bring up in discussion. It was a great, easy way to stay connected and give students multiple ways to give feedback without it being another assignment to grade.
You need to address Charlottesville in your classroom
For years, I worked at a Teaching and Learning Center, observing teachers, building workshops, and giving instructors places to learn and grow as instructors. One of the most common concerns that came up across the disciplinary spectrum was how to effectively address the "real world" in classrooms, or whether you should just stick to the subject matter at hand.
Let me state it as clearly as I can.
YOU NEED TO ADDRESS NATIONAL EVENTS OF SIGNIFICANCE IN YOUR CLASSES.
The rest of this post goes through the research that supports that declaration, as well as strategies to use in your own classroom to discuss unsettling, difficult, or controversial things. I know, from both a student and instructor perspective, that these conversations can feel awkward, hard, uncomfortable, and maybe even unsafe. Many instructors receive little to no training on how to weave these topics into a class. This problem is even more pronounced in fields, like STEM disciplines, that can appear distantly related to current events. I offer these strategies in the hopes that more instructors will feel empowered to have these difficult conversations, and more students will feel visible, seen, and supported because of it.
A BIT ABOUT MY TRAINING AS AN INSTRUCTIONAL CONSULTANT.
I am, as usual, completely indebted to the University of Michigan's Center for Research on Learning and Teaching (CRLT) for training me as a teacher, and heavily influencing my own teaching and consulting philosophy. I am deeply committed to the idea of inclusive teaching - which briefly stated means that I strive to address and incorporate the variety of needs, backgrounds, learning styles, and abilities of all my students. Put another way, I do not expect that my students stop being the complex, intersectional human beings that they are when they enter into my classroom, just as I do not cede my own complexity when I step behind the podium. I'm drawing heavily from their website here, and will be linking to their resources directly - but I'm not sharing anything that I haven't used as an instructor myself, and supported other instructors in using across a wide range of disciplines.
ACKNOWLEDGE THE INCIDENTS, AND REFER STUDENTS TO THE PLACES ON CAMPUS AND BEYOND WHERE THEY CAN FEEL SUPPORTED.
This is the key intervention, and the bare minimum, of outreach that instructors need to incorporate into their classrooms. I acknowledge that not every instructor has the luxury to scrap a day's worth of programming to facilitate a discussion on a topic, but almost every instructor I know has the ability to open class with a short statement, or send an email, or post on a course website.
Research indicates that students find it helpful when instructors acknowledge that a traumatic event has occurred. For more, see this paper on how instructors responded to September 11th and Hurricane Katrina, and how helpful their students found those interventions to be. Faculty and instructors are the parts of campus that have the most day-to-day contact with undergraduate students, and students reported that instructors who addressed the events, offered support in the form of campus resources, and information about national resources and charities were very helpful. Most helpful was acknowledging that focus and attention might suffer, and verbally reminding students that material would be covered again, or that extensions could be given.
This is not to say that you need to change your course planning, provide direct emotional support, or engage your students in a lengthy discussion. By simply acknowledging the events and reminding students of the resources available to them, you make your classroom a more inclusive place.
PLANNING FOR A DIFFICULT DISCUSSION
If you feel called to discuss difficult topics in your classroom, there are a variety of techniques and strategies that you can implement to make sure that all students feel safe and supported. CRLT has a lovely guide that walks you step by step through this process, but I'll call out a few of the most important points below.
Decide what your purpose for having this discussion is. Are you having this conversation to draw links between current events and your course material? Are you sharing information that is not circulating regularly in other venues? Are you hoping to build your students' skills in critical thinking, or civil discourse?
Decide on ground rules. These rules can be set by you, or if you have time, you can set them together as a group in class. Many instructors also have ground rules for discussion in their syllabi - this can be a great time to reiterate those.
Give everyone a focal point. Especially in instances where reporting or writing about a topic might be biased, providing everyone in the group with the same text to read and discuss can help to ground the discussion in specifics, rather than in impressions or subjective stances.
Build in ways for everyone to participate. Not every student might feel comfortable sharing verbally to a large group. Try using a Think Pair Share structure, where students discuss in small groups before reporting out, or provide notecards or paper for students to contribute anonymously, or non-verbally.
SPONTANEOUS DIFFICULT DISCUSSIONS, OR HOT MOMENTS
Despite our best intentions, sometimes difficult conversations or "hot moments" can come up in class discussions. Again, CRLT has some really great handouts and general discussion on this topic but here are a few really important things to know.
Give yourself a chance to process what has happened. There is no universal rule that you must respond to every comment or question as it happens. Count to ten to yourself, as you decide whether this is something you want to address on the spot, later with individual students, or something that you'll come back to at a different time.
Give your students a chance to process what has happened as well. If a difficult idea or comment has been made, it can be really helpful to give students a minute to process what has happened as well. A quick "minute paper" where they respond to the incident that is never collected can give students a chance to process their responses before moving on to a whole class discussion. Questions could be "Why is this topic so difficult to discuss?" or "What do you feel you cannot say right now?"
Depersonalize comments as much as you can. Rather than continually referring to what Student X said, or the comments that Student Y has made, try rephrasing to center around the idea, not the speaker. Referring abstractly to the "debate about {blank} topic" or "the use of x word in y context" can help reduce defensiveness and redirect to the ideas, not the speakers. You can also add in other perspectives that have not been brought up to expand the conversation even more.
THE MOST IMPORTANT RULE WHEN ADDRESSING DIFFICULT TOPICS IN CLASS
You are not there to impose your views on your students, or required to give a soliloquy about current events with your students. You are there to give your students tools and support to make sense of how their educational lives intersect with their personal lives. Even if all you do is acknowledge an event and direct them to resources, you are still drawing connections between the educational space and the rest of their lives. As long as you proceed with that directive in mind, you can't get too far off the path. These conversations are hard for all of us, but the more you can help to draw connections between your class, your subject, and your discipline, and the lives your students live, the more you will help them create an integrated, critical view of their position in the world.