Automated Synchronous sessions for asynchronous online courses

Updated 05 Mar 2024

Automated synchronous sessions allow groups of online students to answer questions together.

You specify multiple time slots for participation, and students sign in for a session that is convenient for them.

You don't need to be present for these sessions.

  • Learning Catalytics uses automatic pacing to deliver each question, based on your sequence and timing settings.
  • It determines whether the participants would benefit from peer discussion of a question, based on their responses. (Set the grouping thresholds in advance in course settings.)
  • If a discussion is warranted, Learning Catalytics automatically places students into chat sessions. Students discuss why they answered what they did. Then the question is redelivered for them to answer again.

When you add multiple time slots to a module, the Learning Catalytics Gradebook creates a column for each one.

For example, if you create three start times, there will be three columns in the Learning Catalytics Gradebook. A student's score is in the column for the session in which the student completed the module; the other columns display 0 (zero) for the student's score.

  • If you download the scores, edit the .csv file to remove the zero scores.
  • In MyLab and Mastering course, if you transfer the scores, the transfer adds three columns for this module to the MyLab or Mastering Gradebook.