Surveys on the Corona semesters have shown that it is important to students to be informed transparently about the requirements and the schedule of the course.
 
This is a little surprising - since we probably all think, that we fulfill this wish already. However, for the students this information evidently gets a bit lost. They move between many courses and sometimes maybe they get confused. Everything just looks alike - the links, the rooms, the rectangular pictures of the others.
 
Therefore you should nonetheless repeat all important information. Moreover, give your students all the time they need to pose their organizational questions. This has a posive side-effect: These questions are (opposed to content-related topics) relatively easy to ask, so that the first inhibition threshold is already overcome and the motivation to speak up in the course increases. 
 

What else happens "behind the scenes"? What could interfere with the successful implementation? Or to put it another way: What absolutely has to work?
Of course: The technology.
 
Technical problems and hurdles can unsettle students and, in the worst case, lead to an abandonment of the course.

How can you make your students feel “at home” and safe in the virtual room?
Demonstrate and explain the most important functions of the web conference tool in use, and let studenst test these functions by themselves. Almost more important than the things that function well are the things that might “not” work, although they are supposed to.
 
Encourage your students to deal with these problems in a relaxed way and take away their fear, that technical problems may cause disadvantages for them. They can also occur to you as the teacher. Give tipps how to deal with potential problems, e.g. a microfone does not work, entry problems occur or important functions can’t be found.
 
 

To foster a sense of social inclusion (cf. Deci/Ryan 2000)[1] and awareness of commonalities (e.g., shared hobbies, pets, sports, etc.) among students, it is recommended that you specifically include informal, personal interests outside of the university: "When students and teachers never meet in person it is important to plan a moment to ‘virtually’ meet each other, preferably at the start of a synchronous session. Virtual introductions should focus first on interpersonal interaction between the group members and not immediately on work.“ (de Nooujer/Schneider/Verstegen 2020, o.S.).[2]

This can be done, for example, by "speed dating" over three short rounds: You ask a first question, about which the participants exchange in 3 minutes in sub-group sessions/breakout rooms, and repeat these exchange groups each time in a different composition (assign participants automatically) for the second and third questions. The first two questions should be more general (e.g., "Where would you most like to be right now?", "What is especially important to you in life?", "Which country would you like to travel to?"), the last question can be related to the topic of the event (e.g., "What do you already know about ...?") and lead into the content discussion.

To make students feel noticed, it makes sense to continuously make it clear that you as a teacher have a genuine interest in them - and in how well they learn in the course. To this end, you can create a "culture of metacomments": "Metacomments are a form of instructor intervention designed to help build trust and affirm an authentic interest in the success of all students through transparency and openness" (cf. Löwenstein 2021: p. 6).[3] According to Löwenstein, this includes, for example, regular transparent justification of the didactic approach as well as responding to students' suggestions.

It is important that the feedback from the students also has consequences, e.g. a topic is explained again, a teaching method is modified or a good suggestion is taken up.

In addition to an open discussion, anonymous written participation options are also suitable for initiating dialogue about the learning process. Especially through online surveys, dialogue corners on online bulletin boards or online card queries, all students can participate in the (written) dialogue about the learning process or the design of the course.