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office hours

Is it possible to actually set aside specific ofice hours.

Of course, you can, Jo, and youmust be prepared to honor them. You can set your virtual office hours and advise students about them.
Satrohan

That is my point. I have many responsibilites at my job other than instructor, I am sure others our in the same way. Setting aside an exact time where I could commit to office hours on a regular basis is a difficult task. Could there be a proctor in place to take questions? Just a thought.

Jo:
Your Institution can allocate a "Proctor"; however, virtual office hours are what they are, and students will requir answers when they contact someone during that time; so the "Proctor" must be able to answer the questions, as a minimum.
Satrohan

If what you're referring to is hours that you are available to the students, then I say "yes". Make them aware of what hours you'll be available & stick to it. If you don't want to be available on weekends & holidays, then let them know. I'm able to make this work.

Yes; Lisa; we are referring to what some term virtual office hours---the equivalent of office hours Instructors set aside to meet with students to engage in telephone conversatios.
Satrohan

I have found that the only way to effectively set on-line office hours is to treat them like an on-ground class commitment - you have to be there! However, 'there' can be in your office or at home or at Starbucks or ... on-line is pretty flexible in terms of your location!

Joanne:
The important factor here is that you maintain the hours to which you committed; and advise students if, due to extenuating circumstances, you canno tbe there for a session.
Satrohan

I think that if you are teaching any class, whether it be online or onground, you need to designate specific hours that you are available for students. In teaching onground my current students know at what times I am available outside the classroom. In the online environment, I am expecting to do the same.

It all depends on where your students are located. If you have students all over America, you can probably have set office hours that everybody can effectively use.

But what about if your students are all over the world? No matter what office hours you set, some of your students will not be able to get in touch with you. They will be sleeping, eating, working, etc.

Nilda:
Time zones can affect scheduling in North America also. There is a reasonable amount of time difference between the Atlantic coast and the Pacific coast. Of course it is more problematic for International students.

These are "virtual" office hours; so one way to manage this is to distribute the "virtual" office hours.
Satrohan

I think it is a good idea for students to know when best to reach you online.

Yes, setting office hours are very important. Instructors need to set aside time for students to communicate with them. Instructor availability plays a big role in student retention.

Hi Jerry! Thanks for your participation in the discussion forum and for your comments.

Especially in the virtual environment, set office hours are important for both the student and the instructor, particularly since technology can create an "immediately accessible" environment in our online courses.

Set hours, geared to both students' and instructors' schedules help to manage expectations of availability across the board.

Jay Hollowell
EL101 Facilitator

The office hours can act as a work time for you as well, when not answering questions and helping students, in the down time work on lesson plans or grading assignments, making tests, it allows you to have a more structured and exact time to work on the class as well.

No only you should but you must.

I think this is one of the hardest things for an instructor is the office hours; perhaps it doesn't happen at every campus, but at ours we have office hours posted, however, that is when students "don't" seem to come and seek us out if they have questions or problems. They will come to us when we are in a class and then want us to jump to assist them. As an online instructor, I think it is easier to set those hours and only those hours as students know (at least they should) that ones does not sit in front of a computer 24/7. When we are on campus, they seem to think ALL of our time belongs to them.

Julia,

Great point - office hours are nice, but may be less than helpful since students do schedule their work around their own schedules.

Jon

Yes office hours can be challenging, when I was an adjunct instructor office hours were not a requirement, as a result, my students could not get my assistants with developing their (course content) skills, so their challenges could not be worked on until the next class and this affected the students’ skills. Yet when I have been full-time faculty, were office hours were a requirement, I did find that this availability did help students, and the students that took advantage of this, their skills did improve. However I do need to mention this realut was heavily weighed on the types of classes I was teaching and the student population at the time. Yes students need to become more independent & realize we are not there 24-7 --yes we have a life outside our jobs teaching

Re: on-ground classes and office hours, I think it depends upon our teaching workload and the student population; we have too many that take us for granted. You should see the surprised look on their faces when we tell them that we are unavailable certain days and times because our work is not 24/7. Many students understand, but unfortunately, I feel we at times are made to focus on those students who honestly should not be in our program to begin with, and we are made to feel as if we have "to bend over backwards" for these people and jump when they need us. They will not succeed in the "real world" and I feel if we were to make them stick to boundaries (in this case to only come see us when we have office hours and only then) then
they may become a little more self-sufficient. The more hand-holding we do, the worse it gets.

In an online setting, there is no knocking on the door after hours and having to let them in; students know that if they want to "speak" to an instructor they will have to do so at the designated times, otherwise they will have to wait until the next session. If they do not contact us during the designated "office" hours, tey have only themselves to blame.

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