Tuesday Tool: Remind
Today let's take a look at the Remind app and the Remind.com website. By creating a free account on the website or through the app, you can build custom groups and send targeted announcements or other information directly to your participants. Let's explore how it works, and then a few ideas for how to utilize it in higher education.
How it Works
You begin by setting up your free account through the website https://www.remind.com/, or visiting your Apple App Store or Google Play Store and downloading the Remind app. You'll need to provide an email address, and you can choose to link it to your cell phone or to simply use the service with email (more on the cell phone connection in a moment). Students or participants would register with the site the same way as part of the process of following your class/group (it is free for them too).
Once you sign up, you create a "class" to start building a group. All you really need to do is create a name for the class, and then you will be given an instructions sheet for allowing people to sign up for your class. These instructions can be copied into an LMS course site, sent by email, or shared as a .pdf to help people sign up for your class.
With a class or classes created, you're ready to go! To send a message, you simply write 140-character messages or send attachments using the message creation icon or box (app and website respectively). Messages are automatically sent to anyone who signs up to follow your class.
The site works by allowing people to sign up using their email or cell phone numbers. Participants then will receive your announcements as emails or as text messages (they choose which format they want). They can even reply to you by text message or email if you opt to allow two-way communication.
Since the messages run through the Remind website, both you and your class participants can keep your phone numbers and email addresses anonymous. Users won't see your phone number, only that the class owner sent a message. Likewise if you reply to their communication in Remind, participants won't see your phone number or email only your name. You can opt to turn off the reply feature, allowing you to customize how you use the service and how others interact with you on it.
Uses in Higher Education
At this point you might be wondering how this is useful in higher education--it sounds more like a tool for keeping in touch with parents in a K12 setting. In fact, it's a deceptively simple app that has a lot of potential. And college students really love this app.
For individual courses, you can pre-schedule messages for an entire semester to remind students of specific due dates or as a weekly/daily reminder of class activities. You can also use it to contact students about changes to the schedule due to inclement weather or other issues. This is particularly useful in freshmen-level courses where students are still adapting to the college environment, and for advising (where students may only visit with you once a year, but you have information that you want to share more often).
While some may argue students should be able to keep track of schedules, etc., on their own, we need to keep in mind that retention and student success are increasingly important conversations on college campuses, and those pressures are not going away. This is an easy-to-use tool that enables you to remind students of important information, or check on how they are doing--and it contacts students where they are most likely to see and respond to that message, through text messages on their cell phone. Why wouldn't we want to have another tool in the retention battle?
You can also control how much you use the service, providing more help early in a semester and less as students become more independent. It is a particularly helpful tool for online classes where you do not have the daily or weekly interactions with students to remind them of upcoming projects or topics. If your program is totally online, this is another way to engage with students and let them know you are there and interested in their success. Online students in particular can feel isolated and unsure of what to do next or who to contact for help.
Beyond using it in individual courses, the service provides an excellent way to keep in touch with program majors. It can be used to share information about internships or jobs recently posted, remind them of the need to meet with advisers once a semester, encourage them to attend a lecture, and distribute general reminders of department or program events. And, Remind can also be used for communicating with faculty or staff.
We know that students do not always check their university email accounts regularly, but they have their phone with them constantly. Used in this way, Remind is a vital tool to increasing retention and supporting students. It offers a lot of uses that can revolutionize how you engage with your students and majors.
How it Works
You begin by setting up your free account through the website https://www.remind.com/, or visiting your Apple App Store or Google Play Store and downloading the Remind app. You'll need to provide an email address, and you can choose to link it to your cell phone or to simply use the service with email (more on the cell phone connection in a moment). Students or participants would register with the site the same way as part of the process of following your class/group (it is free for them too).
Once you sign up, you create a "class" to start building a group. All you really need to do is create a name for the class, and then you will be given an instructions sheet for allowing people to sign up for your class. These instructions can be copied into an LMS course site, sent by email, or shared as a .pdf to help people sign up for your class.
With a class or classes created, you're ready to go! To send a message, you simply write 140-character messages or send attachments using the message creation icon or box (app and website respectively). Messages are automatically sent to anyone who signs up to follow your class.
The site works by allowing people to sign up using their email or cell phone numbers. Participants then will receive your announcements as emails or as text messages (they choose which format they want). They can even reply to you by text message or email if you opt to allow two-way communication.
Since the messages run through the Remind website, both you and your class participants can keep your phone numbers and email addresses anonymous. Users won't see your phone number, only that the class owner sent a message. Likewise if you reply to their communication in Remind, participants won't see your phone number or email only your name. You can opt to turn off the reply feature, allowing you to customize how you use the service and how others interact with you on it.
Uses in Higher Education
At this point you might be wondering how this is useful in higher education--it sounds more like a tool for keeping in touch with parents in a K12 setting. In fact, it's a deceptively simple app that has a lot of potential. And college students really love this app.
For individual courses, you can pre-schedule messages for an entire semester to remind students of specific due dates or as a weekly/daily reminder of class activities. You can also use it to contact students about changes to the schedule due to inclement weather or other issues. This is particularly useful in freshmen-level courses where students are still adapting to the college environment, and for advising (where students may only visit with you once a year, but you have information that you want to share more often).
While some may argue students should be able to keep track of schedules, etc., on their own, we need to keep in mind that retention and student success are increasingly important conversations on college campuses, and those pressures are not going away. This is an easy-to-use tool that enables you to remind students of important information, or check on how they are doing--and it contacts students where they are most likely to see and respond to that message, through text messages on their cell phone. Why wouldn't we want to have another tool in the retention battle?
You can also control how much you use the service, providing more help early in a semester and less as students become more independent. It is a particularly helpful tool for online classes where you do not have the daily or weekly interactions with students to remind them of upcoming projects or topics. If your program is totally online, this is another way to engage with students and let them know you are there and interested in their success. Online students in particular can feel isolated and unsure of what to do next or who to contact for help.
Beyond using it in individual courses, the service provides an excellent way to keep in touch with program majors. It can be used to share information about internships or jobs recently posted, remind them of the need to meet with advisers once a semester, encourage them to attend a lecture, and distribute general reminders of department or program events. And, Remind can also be used for communicating with faculty or staff.
We know that students do not always check their university email accounts regularly, but they have their phone with them constantly. Used in this way, Remind is a vital tool to increasing retention and supporting students. It offers a lot of uses that can revolutionize how you engage with your students and majors.
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