Office Hours

One-on-one conversations during office hours are a crucial element of learning. Our goal should be to utilize this time for Mastery Learning.

Setup your calendar

I'm assuming you have a Google Calendar account and that you have a Google Email account.

Sign Up for Calendly

• Visit https://calendly.com/ and click 'Get Started' to set up an account.

• Enter your email here, and click 'Get Started'.

• On the next page, click 'Sign Up With Google'.

• On the redirect, verify your email is correct and hit 'Next'.

• Enter your password, and again, click 'Next'. Click 'Allow'.

• Create your Calendly URL: ex: calendly.com/< your name here > .

• Click 'Continue'.

• You'll be directed to a page: Set your availability, you can start adding available times here, I suggest skipping this, you will be able to customize more later on.

• In the next step you can further personalize your experience, or click 'Finish'.

Add Office Hours Availability

• On your main dashboard, click '+ New Event Type'.

• Then, select 'One-on-One'.

• On the next screen in 'Event name' field, type: 'AppDev Office Hours'. - For location, select: 'Zoom'. Select 'Next'.

• Invitees can schedule...

  • 14 calendar days into the future

• Duration

  • Custom: 20 minute time slots

• How do you want to offer your availability for this event type?

  • Set Custom Hours

• Click on days of the week within the calendar, and 'Edit all' of those days to set your time slots.

• Click 'Next'

• Return Back to 'Home' to see your dashboard. There will be a new event box that you just created. Click 'Turn On'

• Copy Link and add it to Canvas Homepage under the section 'Book office hours': Book office hours with < your name >

• Add the zoom link under the section 'Zoom links': < your name > office hours Zoom

Office Hour Suggestions

• I usually make each block of office hours last for two hours.

• Students have the option of booking for 20 minutes (default) or 40 minutes, so this means 4-5 students per block.

• I usually open two 2-hour blocks per week. I will then open more if students post on Piazza that they can't find open slots.

• Make the event re-occurring if you want to, until the end of the quarter.

• You're welcome to set up whatever sort of schedule makes sense for you and your co-instructors, as opposed to the above suggestions. Maybe you want to just do all five weekday 1-hour lunch hours? Sure, if that works for you and your team.

If I know I will be in a particular physical location while conducting office hours (e.g. the Harper Center Winter Garden or the Midway Club in Gleacher), then I also give students the option of meeting me there in-person. Let me know what you decide so that I can update the booking confirmation message.

How much of the answers should I tell them?

In general, try not to leave a student who has already struggled and is coming to you for help hanging — they should walk away from an office hours appointment with most of the questions that they came in with answered. Remember our goal here is not to produce professional developers, so be deliberate about which questions you leave open for them to struggle with, and which ones you resolve with them.

However, if you recognize that the student clearly hasn't put in any time before the call and is expecting you to just do the work for them, it's perfectly acceptable to tell them to read/review/do certain things and then book another appointment.

It is good to give them new things to think about, however, and then have them book another appointment to discuss after they've done some work — e.g. researching an API for their project.