Supporting Student Absences

Suggestions for instructors to plan into courses

Being nim­bler and more flex­i­ble is the best way to sup­port stu­dents who may have lengthy or fre­quent absences. Weath­er, health, iso­la­tion, parental care, and trav­el are some of the chal­lenges stu­dents may expe­ri­ence that pre­vent them from attend­ing an in-per­son or vir­tu­al class. As edu­ca­tors, we need to plan our cours­es so we can sup­port all stu­dents and help them on the path­way to being suc­cess­ful.

Here are some sug­ges­tions to help stu­dents keep learn­ing dur­ing any absences. Think about which ideas might work for you, your course and your stu­dents.

But bet­ter yet — ask stu­dents what might work for them. Share with them some solu­tions and inquire about what they might like to help them keep learn­ing.

Learn More about Your STUDENTS 
Give stu­dents a quick con­fi­den­tial sur­vey to indi­cate if they are cur­rent­ly expe­ri­enc­ing chal­lenges in attend­ing to class learn­ing expe­ri­ences or may in the future. Also ask about their tech­nol­o­gy access should they need to under­take some adjust­ments that require view­ing dig­i­tal con­tent or gain­ing access to tech­nol­o­gy at oth­er times of the day. Just find out a bit more about your stu­dents to help you under­stand their needs and chal­lenges. This will go a long way in bet­ter under­stand the sup­ports they may need to con­tin­ue learn­ing dur­ing or after an absence.
PREPARE STUDENTS 
It is inevitable. Stu­dents are going to be absent in your class­es for a vari­ety of rea­sons (ill­ness, quar­an­ti­ning, self-iso­la­tion, trav­el, weath­er, fam­i­ly respon­si­bil­i­ties etc.). Being pre­pared is the best solu­tion so you can approach stu­dents on day one and put some plans into place. Stu­dents need to feel you are look­ing out for them, have plans already estab­lished and are ready to sup­port their sit­u­a­tion should they need to be absent.
SCHEDULE SHORT Class Check-In Times
Con­duct short 5–10 minute check-in times with stu­dents at begin­ning of class­es to hear how things are going along with any ideas about what they need to help them be suc­cess­ful etc. A check-in ensures there is ‘air time’ for stu­dents to share how things are going, ask ques­tions, pro­vide feed­back and maybe even share what is work­ing for them to boost pos­i­tiv­i­ty and sup­port of all.
CREATE persistent Student Teams
Put stu­dents in teams of 3–4 to work as a ‘course sup­port team’ through­out the whole course. Team mem­bers can take notes for each oth­er, have short meet­ings (in per­son or via break­out rooms) to check in on home­work and assign­ments and help each oth­er out if there is an absence to fill in miss­ing pieces etc. Stu­dent teams act like an ‘inter­nal sup­port sys­tem’ for stu­dents to reach out to, help each oth­er along and pro­vide moral and aca­d­e­m­ic sup­port. It isn’t to be seen as an oner­ous or addi­tion­al assign­ment or ‘group work’ but rather instill­ing a sense of col­lec­tive respon­si­bil­i­ty as a learn­ing com­mu­ni­ty to work togeth­er. You can cre­ate team-only dis­cus­sion boards in Bright­space for the stu­dents to stay in touch and post/share con­tent. Or you can let each group set up their own com­mu­ni­ca­tion plans.
  • Instruc­tions: Form­ing Teams — via Team-Based Learn­ing Meth­ods | Web­page
  • Arti­cle: Using Teams Effec­tive­ly in Your Cours­es | Duke Uni­ver­si­ty | Web­page
GEt STUDENTs doing Collaborative Note-taking
Stu­dents take turns in small groups (2–3) con­tribut­ing to a shared doc­u­ment (e.g., Google docs) to take notes on the class. Aids in high­er engage­ment with mate­r­i­al as stu­dents need to activ­i­ty to think about what is being said and learned and con­sol­i­date thoughts into notes used by all class­mates. One stu­dent may focus on what the teacher is say­ing, one stu­dent might focus on what stu­dents are say­ing and one stu­dent might be ensur­ing it is cohe­sive and orga­nized. Some sug­ges­tions on how to do it via the arti­cles below:
  • Arti­cle: Col­lab­o­ra­tive Note-tak­ing as an alter­na­tive to record­ing online ses­sions | Fac­ul­ty Focus | Web­page
  • Arti­cle: Using Col­lab­o­ra­tive Note-Tak­ing to Pro­mote an Inclu­sive Learn­ing Envi­ron­ment | Uni­ver­si­ty of Guelph | Web­page
  • Arti­cle: How Col­lab­o­rat­ing on Note-Tak­ing Boosts Stu­dent Engage­ment | Edu­topia | Web­page
  • Arti­cle: Col­lab­o­ra­tive Learn­ing | Colum­bia Uni­ver­si­ty in New York | Web­page
 
Develop Short Class Summaries
Instruc­tor or stu­dents cre­ate short sum­maries of the key concepts/content from a class. Can also be short sum­maries of read­ings, resources to have reviewed etc.
  • Stu­dents: This might be an all-class activ­i­ty for 5 min­utes in Google Jam­board or Google Docs shar­ing the top learn­ing con­cepts from the class, things they need to study more, key themes or take-aways etc.
  • Stu­dents: It could also be a short small-group activ­i­ty for each group to con­sid­er the key learn­ing from that class or read­ings and share with the class in a 30 sec­ond whip around to each group to share or post in a dis­cus­sion board etc.
  • Instruc­tor: Could be a five-minute sum­ma­ry video of the key points of the class (noth­ing fan­cy) done in one take and shared with class. Acts as a nice sum­ma­ry for all and pro­vides addi­tion­al info for study notes.
  • Instruc­tor: Cre­ate a short email sum­ma­ry high­light­ing the key points, con­cepts, con­tent, things to remem­ber etc. Noth­ing too long, just the high­lights.
 
FOr multiple evaluations — consider “BEST OF” and DROP LOwest or Missing
If you have mul­ti­ple eval­u­a­tions (e.g., week­ly quizzes, a few reflec­tions, num­ber of small tests) con­sid­er just tak­ing the best X out of Y (e.g., best 3 out of 5 quizzes) for the final grade. Stu­dents who miss these will feel more assured they are not going to lose marks for absences or miss­ing eval­u­a­tions. It also saves instruc­tors cre­at­ing a make-up eval­u­a­tion item.
  • Put this in your course out­line or adjust exist­ing eval­u­a­tion to be the ‘best of’ so stu­dents know how many can be dropped.
  • In your grade­book, ensure you have a way “drop­ping the low­est” one or two or three items for final grade cal­cu­la­tion
 
Send Brief Communications
Ensure you pro­vide time­ly and help­ful com­mu­ni­ca­tions about the course so stu­dents who are away (or if you are away) can stay in touch. Exam­ples:
  • Dis­cus­sion board in Bright­space: Cre­ate a spe­cial dis­cus­sion board to just share updates.
  • Class Sum­ma­ry Emails: Share updates via short email bursts.
  • Ask stu­dents what plat­form or for­mat would work best for them to stay in touch with you out­side of course emails and LMS — there may be oth­er ways to help all stu­dents stay con­nect­ed to the class in eas­i­er way
 
Allow for Adjustable Due Dates
Pro­vide oppor­tu­ni­ties to adjust due dates, give more time to some stu­dents to demon­strate their learn­ing and over­all engage in a flex­i­ble approach to assess­ment and eval­u­a­tion such as:
  • Share your planned due dates, but ear­ly on in course share how stu­dents go about request­ing adjust­ments (so they are clear from the start of class)
  • Share your phi­los­o­phy of want­i­ng to have every­one be suc­cess­ful and that you’ll work with stu­dents 1:1 to cre­ate adjust­ed dates (so they have less stress in wor­ry­ing about los­ing marks or doing poor­ly)
 
Nurture Class Community Building
Any­time you can enhance your class as one big learn­ing com­mu­ni­ty, you shift the focus from the teacher to the col­lec­tive of all learn­ers tak­ing on the respon­si­bil­i­ty to work togeth­er.
  • Com­mu­ni­ty Build­ing in the Class­room | Colum­bia Uni­ver­si­ty in City of New York | Web­page
 
Reuse Online Teaching Materials Previously Created
You may have mate­ri­als from the pre­vi­ous year(s) that could ben­e­fit stu­dents who are unable to attend class­es or need con­tent in anoth­er for­mat. Review what you have devel­oped and see if any of it might be eas­i­ly adapt­ed or repur­posed for stu­dents unable to attend class­es.
  • Reusing exist­ing course mate­ri­als in dig­i­tal for­mats can help stu­dents stay on track with their learn­ing while away.
  • Cre­at­ing any new or more cur­rent mate­ri­als might not take that long if you are think­ing small and noth­ing fan­cy — such as build­ing lit­tle videos or upload­ing sum­ma­ry notes etc.
 
Provide Flexible Access to course and resources
Ensure con­tent, resources, mate­ri­als are unre­strict­ed so stu­dents can access at any time to learn and com­plete demon­stra­tions of learn­ing such as:
  • Remove any restrict­ed access times to con­tent (or open up some con­tent at begin­ning of course so stu­dents have more time to access mate­ri­als
  • If you had resources and con­tent hid­den from stu­dents until they com­plete a read­ing or view a video, con­sid­er remov­ing so there are more path­ways for stu­dents to access con­tent
 
Consider alternate Demonstrations of learning
If stu­dents have missed a test or a quiz and you have marked and returned to stu­dents, con­sid­er alter­na­tive eval­u­a­tions of learn­ing with choice or flex­i­bil­i­ty in for­mat and con­tent.
  • Don’t recre­ate a quiz or a test if a stu­dent has missed, instead focus on the learn­ing out­comes and work with the stu­dent to pro­vide alter­na­tives ways of eval­u­at­ing their learn­ing (e.g., maybe a con­cept map of course com­po­nents, reflec­tive writ­ing about what they have learned the learn­ing out­comes, oth­er for­mats etc.)
  • Arti­cle: Design­ing Assign­ments for Learn­ing | Colum­bia Uni­ver­si­ty in the City of New York | Web­page