Multitasking is a constant challenge in higher education, but our Canvas Course Templates offer one concrete way to help mitigate some of that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the lead-up to each semester, one of the most time-consuming tasks on an instructor\u2019s plate is creating their course site on Canvas. Often, it involves creating new material (if it\u2019s a new class or has new components), importing material over (if it\u2019s a class they\u2019ve taught before), and updating any existing material from that import. On top of all that, you also have fit it all together in a package that is accessible, attractive, and organized enough that learners use it correctly\u2014and that\u2019s just the \u201cbuilding\u201d side of the course development! That doesn\u2019t even begin to take into consideration the background labor and work that goes into planning the course, making sure the objectives, activities, materials, and assessments are all aligned before you build them in Canvas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It’s a lot. And it\u2019s a task that, itself, involves multitasking as you bounce from course element to course element and process to process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Multitasking is often familiar, well-trod territory for faculty. In a recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education<\/em>, <\/em>\u201cMultitasking is the Enemy of Academic Productivity,\u201d<\/a> professor of informatics Gloria Marks leans on her background in researching multitasking<\/a> to discuss the ways in which faculty often feel pressured to multitask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mark notes that faculty are in a unique professional position that demands attention in impossible, often divergent, ways. Between the responsibilities of teaching, service, and research, instructors are often caught being pulled in three directions\u2014even if they\u2019re fortunate enough to have those areas overlap.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She goes on to outline some specific challenges that this creates for faculty, most problematic of which is that this leads to more fragmented work, creating additional stress and contributing to the erosion of an instructor\u2019s work-life balance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ultimately, multitasking in academia is a persistent and, at times, unique challenge, and while Mark offers suggestions for broadly addressing it, what can be done about the specific multitasking involved in getting your course site ready for the semester ahead?<\/p>\n\n\n\n