The Different Ways to Communicate With Your Students

There is several ways you can communicate with your students, each way has its pros and cons.  This blog will cover the different ways to communicate with them.

Outlook Email:  

PRO:  You can go into your Outlook through the Portal or the full version on your system.  If you click on the TO: of a new message you can then type in your Quarter and the class to send a message to all of your students through the courses Distribution List. 

This way really doesn’t have a bad side.  You can email just one of your student through searching for their last name int he Address Book or you can email the entire class using this method.  You can add attachments and students can reply back you through their TCC email.  You can CC others to be notified; an example would be any TA’s you have in your course.  You can also BCC the class so the students don’t “Reply All” and send something meant for your eyes only, to the entire class. 
CON:  I guess one Con would be that students cannot use the Distribution List described above.  They would have to put in all of their classmates' names separately.

Canvas Inbox:

Through Canvas you have the messaging center called, Inbox.  

PRO:  Through here you can email your students in your course by sending them a message to All Students or to just one at a time.  You can click on the option to send the same message to each student separately so they don’t Reply All and send you back something meant for your eyes only.  You can also send them an Attachment or a video/audio message using the Canvas Media tool.  When you send this message the students will get a Notification from Canvas in their TCC Student Email if they have set up a Notification to receive messages.  Students can also send a message to the entire class through this system the same way that you can. 

CON:  The Con to this Message System is that you cannot add someone to the TO: list who is not in your course.  You cannot add in a Gmail, Yhaoo Mail, or TCC email address of someone not listed as a TA, Designer or student in your courses.  The other Con is the students have to have the Notification turned on, they also may have to set the Notifications as not Junk.  But the biggest issue is that they have to check their student email in the first place.  The other Con would be that you or a student can reply to the email notification and it will post the reply here in the Inbox, but it will only go to the sender, it will not Reply All.  If you wish to send a Reply All (Question answers about the Snow Day), you will have to log into Canvas and use the Reply All option in the message. 

ctcLink Roster:

PRO:  The final way you can communicate with your students is through the class roster in ctcLink.  With this option you can send a message to the entire class or just to one student.  By default the message is set to BCC the class.  You CC the class with just a copy and paste the list into the CC spot.  When a student replies, the message will go to the email that you have listed in ctcLink. 

 

CON: The Cons to this system is that the email it will go to is whatever the students have listed as the email in ctcLink.  This could be Gmail, Yahoo , etc.  It could be their parents email or an email that they no longer use.  It all depends on when they filled out the application to the school and what email address they had on it.  With this system you cannot send attachments.  Students cannot use this option at all. 

Canvas Mobile App:

PRO:  Through the mobile app you can send a message to the entire class or just one student at a time.  You can even add attachments or a media attachment.  Students have access to this and can send a message to the entire class. 

CON:  The Con with this is that if you use the Mobile App to reply to the message it is going to Reply All by default.  But you can clearly see at the top of the message that there is more than one recipient.  By clicking on the down arrow, you can see the whole list. 

If you have any questions about the ways to communicate with your students you can submit a ticket through the Learning Network Support or you can send an email to eLearning@tacomacc.edu