Developing a Pre-Course Survey

Activity

Developing a Pre-Course Survey

LaKisha Barrett

To ensure students’ success, knowing their names and establishing a connection with them is vital. This can significantly impact their ability to stay engaged and motivated. Conducting pre-course surveys and assessments is an effective way to achieve this goal.

Educator prep: Moderate

Duration: Variable

Timing: Pre-session

ACTIVITY PURPOSE

To provide better support and personalised learning to your students while fostering a sense of community through intentionally learning more about them.
To connect students with institutional resources.

USEFUL FOR

Establishing a meaningful relationship with students
Understanding their goals, responsibilities, current level of comprehension, and metacognition.
Student data shows that personal connection with instructors has a positive correlation with success, but getting class time to learn from each student may not be available. These activities aim to provide insights into student needs and learning motivation.

PREPARATION

Select a tool that you would like to use to build your survey: Google Forms, Survey Monkey, your institutions’ learning management system (LMS)

INSTRUCTIONS

Pre-survey

Using a survey tool (Google Forms, SurveyMonkey, Qualtrics, etc.) or your learning management system (LMS) build a pre-survey for students.
Include questions that aim to build an understanding of your students both personally and academically, for example, their preferred names, pronouns, accessibility needs, their time zone, access to the internet, any challenges that they anticipate getting in the way of their course, see Assessing Student Needs in Your Course article and Use an Online Survey to Learn About Your Students for more question examples. Download a Sample Pre-Course Student Survey (Word, 45 KB).
Ideally, you want to send this survey before the semester begins or during the first week of class.
Consider adding links to the student resource pages to begin connecting students to services.
Use the survey responses to get to know your students and their needs better by putting personal touches on emails, customising your feedback, your choice of examples, and assignments.

Pre-course assessment

To determine where your student is academically; use a pre-course assessment to identify where your students are and then customise your support.
Google Forms, SurveyMonkey, LMS, or adaptive learning platforms are helpful tools for completing this assessment.
Questions can reflect pre-requisite course material, foundational and course base knowledge, and introductory course questions.
Ask the student to rate their confidence on each question with a happy face, meh face, or sad face. Tally for each student and compare to the class. Use this alongside grading to identify students’ areas of focus and support.

DURATION

Depends on class size

ADAPTATIONS AND EXAMPLES

Using the pre-course survey at the beginning and the end of the course or incorporating questions on the final assessment can allow you to measure student growth. Students can be tracked in persistence and success by rating their confidence level and engaging each student. Students can reflect on how they have matured as a learner.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS

Survey tools, for example, Google Forms, Survey Monkey, your institutions’ learning management system (LMS).

RELATED RESOURCES

Download a Sample Pre-Course Student Survey (Word, 45 KB) developed by Kisha.
Assessing Student Needs in Your Course. Vanderbilt University.
Getting to Know You Survey by Michelle Pacansky-Brock.
Use an online survey to motivate your students. ACUE, 2020.