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Summary
Faculty are aware that Canvas is available to create course content and collaborate with students. However, if you teach on-campus courses but are not familiar with Canvas, our new collaboration tool, Teams can help you instruct remotely. Teams has the ability to chat, share files, and meet in real-time, making it a great stand-in for an on-campus course. These powerful collaborative features are why Teams is already being used at all levels of education, in addition to the business world. Even if you are not faculty, the information below will help to get you started on Teams.
How do I access Teams?
Much like the other Office 365 products, Teams can be accessed anywhere with a network connection. You can access Teams through the desktop app, web app, or by downloading the app on a mobile device. One amazing thing about Teams, is that the interface should be nearly identical on all three. Faculty who are using a college-owned device, will have access to the desktop version. Anyone who doesn't have the desktop version can access Teams through a browser (such as Chrome or Internet Explorer). To do this, you can go directly to Teams Online. In addition to the experience being similar across different platforms, it will also be the same for different audiences (faculty, staff, and students).
How do I create a Team?
You can Create one Team or multiple Teams, depending on your needs. If you are teaching 3 classes, you may want to create one Team for each class. When you create a Team, you have a few options/settings presented to you. One setting that is important to note is the "Public" versus "Private". If you aren't sure which option you would like, make sure it is set to Private. You can always change the privacy later.
How do I add students to my Team?
As a faculty, there are a few ways that you can add students. The fastest way will be if you are familiar with the email address that is associated with your class (Ex. 1234B903@bellevuecollege.edu). If you have not heard of this distribution group before, these emails/distribution groups are automatically created for every academic course each quarter. If you run into issues with that email address, you can always manually add the students, it will just take a bit more time. You can start by pulling up your class roster, which can be found in Instructor Briefcase. Once you have the roster ready, you can manually type the names of the students in your course to add them to the Team.
How do I chat with one, two or three students?
The chat option within Teams should look very similar to other chat tools you have used. You can chat with one student or with many.
How do I chat with the entire class?
If you would like to have a discussion board so that all students will see the same information, you can use a "channel". By default, all Teams should have a "General" channel, which is a great place to get started. If you find that you need to categorize the conversations in relation to more specific topics, you can add more channels. This could be helpful if you have group projects and would like the students to have a discussion board that is directly relevant to their group assignment.
How do I run a lecture with a meeting?
You have the ability to meet remotely with students and colleagues. If you have attended or hosted a webinar in the past (Zoom, GoToMeeting, Webex) Teams Meetings essentially work in the same way. You can schedule a meeting within your Team. If you prefer communicating through email, you can create an Outlook Teams meeting. Teams meetings allow you to share content, record meetings, connect with audio and share your video. You also have some flexibility in the meeting options, such as who can bypass the lobby. When adjusting the meeting options, we recommend reviewing the roles for a meeting first. For added security, you can change the roles so people are attendees rather than presenters. If someone does need to present during the lecture, you can change their role during the meeting to allow temporary access to present.
What if I need captioning?
Teams has Live Captioning as a preview service.If you are creating a meeting, you will need to select the captions option when you setup the meeting. Then, those who attend will have the ability to turn the captions on/off as needed.