Telework: Using Zoom

From the Highline Instructional Design Dept.

Zoom: Highline has access to Zoom, a web conferencing tool that allows you to talk with students, share video, chat, and share screens. You can use Zoom to hold office hours, study sessions, or even live cast your lectures. 

• Request a Zoom Pro license by emailing helpdesk@highline.edu.

If you’ve started or completed the Canvas Orientation, see the tips on Using Zoom in your classes. Contact Instructional Design at id@highline.edu with questions. 

Zoom Web Conferencing Tool
What is it
Zoom is a web conferencing tool that combines video conferencing, chat, screen/window sharing, and mobile collaboration. It is essentially an online meeting room. It is available to faculty and staff on campus. There is a free license and a pro license. The free license limits calls to 40 minutes.

Where to Start
Submit a help desk ticket to get zoom installed on your desktop and/or laptop computer.  You can also download it from the Zoom Website for MacOS, Windows, Chrome, iOS, and Android.

To get a Zoom Pro license, contact the help desk and request one.

Once You Have Zoom

Your Highline Zoom Pro (http://zoom.highline.edu, or http://highline.zoom.us) account comes with a number of helpful features. Most importantly, the time limit associated with free Zoom accounts is removed. 

You can find more about how to use Zoom on their website.

• Getting Started on MacOS and Windows
• Getting Started on iOS
• Getting Started on Android
   

A few features you may find helpful:

• Using Zoom in your Canvas course
• Waiting room - Users connect, but are kept in a holding area until you explicitly let them into the room. Hand for confidential discussions in office hours.
• Breakout rooms - Create small group rooms within the main conference.
• Polling - For in-meeting feedback opportunities
• Join from browser - No download/install required, but has reduced features. 
• Share a second camera - Handy for document cameras, or if you want to point a camera at lab equipment, a keyboard to show key sequences, and so on. 

If you have questions about using Zoom, or would like to try a test meeting, contact the Instructional Design team at id@highline.edu. 

Don' t Record to Zoom Cloud Storage

A quirk of our current contract is that we only have a certain (very, very, small) amount of storage for Zoom recordings. If you need to record your Zoom sessions, please record them locally. If you need them to be available to others, there are a few options:
 

• Recording Zoom to your computer
• Upload recordings to Google Drive and share them
• Upload recordings to Canvas Files or the Media Tool in the content editor
• Upload recordings to YouTube

If you’re sharing these with students and expect to use them for multiple quarters, contact the Instructional Design team to discuss captioning options.

Done with Zoom?

The college has a limited number of Pro licenses. If you’re not going to use Zoom any more, please contact the Help Desk to release the license to another colleague.

For more Information please see Zoom Video Tutorials for most of your questions on how to use the tool.

8 Ways to Be More Inclusive in Your Zoom Teaching
Chronicle of Higher Education (April 8, 2020)

First three paragraphs: 
"By this point in the Covid-19 transition to remote instruction, you’ve probably had a few sessions on Zoom. You’ve taught a few classes, met students for office hours. No doubt more than once, you’ve seen a lot of students staring blankly at you after you pose a question. (Insert crickets-chirping sound.)"
Faculty members are getting a crash course in Zoom and finding it can be supremely awkward, at least at first. One reason for our collective uneasiness: Most of us are not well acquainted with the "hidden curriculum" of Zoom — all the unwritten rules and expectations that you’re supposed to know but none of us have been taught. Faculty members and students together are diving into a new tool with little to no experience with it, technically or culturally.
As you lead a class discussion or a meeting on Zoom, it’s all too easy to lose people in the process. But the principles of inclusive teaching can help you reach students in a virtual classroom, just as in a physical one.

How to Secure Your Zoom Meetings from Zoom-Bombing Attacks
Article from Bleepingcomputer.com  (March 31, 2020)

This article has practical tips on securing Zoom meetings.  This follows an FBI warning of ongoing Zoom-Bombing attacks on video meetings.  
Zoom bombing is outsiders trespassing into meetings and often posting offensive materials.

How to Prevent Zoom-Bombing

From PC magazine, another article with additional ideas on preventing unwanted participants from disrupting your Zoom session.

See below for best practices for using Zoom (adapted by the Highline Library from the University of Minnesota Information Technology). The information provided below will help you and your students get the most out of your Highline Zoom Pro account (http://zoom.highline.edu or http://highline.zoom.us) experience (learn more about Zoom meetings)..

Prepare for the meeting

1. Set up your equipment

• Request a Zoom Pro license by emailing helpdesk@highline.edu.
• Zoom is optimized to work best on the computer desktop (rather than the web-based or mobile version)
• Download the Zoom desktop app and encourage students to do the same, if they have not already
• Get a headset and microphone if you have them, to reduce background noise 
• Test your audio and video, ideally with someone in a different room
• Review how to share your screen (note that if you switch between sharing multiple screens, you will need to manually share each screen separately)
• Close unnecessary tabs in your browser

2. Look your best

• Lighting should come from in front of you or from the side, in order to best light your face
• Keep your background clear of distractions
• Look at your webcam, not at the screen
• Use gestures and mannerisms that you would typically use in person

3. Participate productively

• Make sure everyone can hear you
• Use a microphone when you speak.
• Make sure the microphone is on and close enough to pick up your voice, no matter what location you are in.

4. Help everyone focus

• Don't have side conversations
• If you aren't talking, mute or turn off your microphone.
• Avoid noisy activities like typing while your microphone is on.

5. If you are the host

• Review your host controls and meeting settings ahead of time
• Share housekeeping details with students:
  • Remind them to mute their microphones when others are presenting or speaking
  • Let them know how they can get your attention during the meeting
    • Will you be checking the chat window?
    • Should they unmute themselves to speak up?
• Start the recording (or set up automatic recordings)
• Troubleshoot audio problems if they arise

Get support
The Highline Canvas Orientation includes an advanced section which has information on how to use Zoom. If you haven’t yet started taking the Canvas Orientation, you can still get access to that info. Simply follow these steps:
 

1. Go to https://canvastraining.highline.edu/
2. Log in with your Highline username and password.
3. Click the button to start the Canvas Orientation. (You never have to do steps 1-3 again.)
4. Next, go to canvas.highline.edu and log in.  You should see the Orientation there, plus a test course in your name.
5. Click on the Orientation, and then scroll down quite a ways until you get to the Advanced Canvas Course (Optional) section. There is a module on Zoom in that section. (Of course, you can also just do a Ctrl + F and search for Zoom.)
6. You can return to the Orientation anytime you want, to continue to review the Zoom info.

 
If you’ve started or completed the Canvas Orientation, see the tips on Using Zoom in your classes. Contact Instructional Design at id@highline.edu with questions.