Scheduling Zoom Meetings for a Course

To schedule a Zoom meeting for your course, you can create one meeting that follows a recurring schedule to use over the course of a semester. To get started, follow these steps. If you prefer, you can watch a video on Scheduling a Recurring Zoom Meeting for a Course.

Scheduling meetings through Canvas:

  1. Click the Zoom Meetings link in the navigation bar of your Canvas course.
  2. Click the Schedule a New Meeting button.
  3. Follow steps 3 and 4 below.  The links to Zoom meetings will be automatically added to the Zoom Meeting link in the Canvas navigation bar and to the Canvas calendar.  For more information please see our Canvas/Zoom Integration Guide.

Scheduling meetings through Zoom

  1. Visit your UD Zoom account by logging into the UD Zoom Portal and clicking on “Sign In.” If prompted, enter your UD credentials.
  2. On the left side, click Meetings. On the top, make sure Upcoming Meetings is highlighted and underlined. Click the Schedule a New Meeting button.
  3. On the schedule form that follows, enter the following information.
    • Topic: This is the name of the meeting. It should be short, but informative. Good suggestions are the course ID, section(s), the term, and the year (e.g. “ENGL101-010/011 Fall 2020”) If you choose to make a recording, the name of your recording will be this name.
    • Description: You can provide any additional description about the meeting here. Perhaps include your name, the best way to reach you, a link to the Canvas course, etc.
    • When: This is the date of the first meeting.
    • Duration: This is the length of your meeting. Choose the closest length that matches your meeting and round up. If the duration doesn’t exactly match your class length, you can alert students on the first day and note it in the description field.
    • Time Zone: Verify the time zone is correct (Eastern Time).
    • Recurring Meeting: Check this box and new options will appear.
      • Change Recurrence to Weekly.
      • Verify Repeat every is set to 1 week.
      • Select the days of the week in Occurs on for your course.
      • Choose an End date for your recurring meeting, usually the end of the semester.
    • Registration: Leave this unchecked. This option requires students to complete a form to attend every session.
    • Security: Zoom requires that you enable at least one of these options.
      • Passcode: (Note the terminology here is NOT password.) This is a short code (letters or numbers) that you must also provide to your students with your Zoom Meeting link. A passcode is generated for you but you can also change it if you wish. Students will need to enter the passcode to join the meeting. This provides an additional layer of security and privacy.
      • Waiting Room: This setting holds new participants in the waiting room. You as the meeting host will receive an alert in Zoom that there are new participants waiting. You can choose to allow or deny them entry. If multiple people are waiting, there is an Admit All option as well. This is likely a good option for small courses, but not recommended for large classes.
      • Only authenticated users can join: It’s recommended to enable this setting if all of your students are using their @udel.edu Zoom accounts. After checking the box, verify “udel.edu” is listed below. This provides a great level of security to prevent Zoom Bombings (unwanted participants in a meeting that cause disruption). Your students must make sure they are logged in to their UD Zoom account.  You can edit an individual meeting and turn this setting off if you have a guest speaker or other participant who is not affiliated with UD.
    • Video: This controls the initial state of video upon joining the meeting for you as the host and students as the participants. Video can still be toggled on or off during the meeting, regardless of this setting.
    • Audio: It is recommended to leave audio set to Both Computer Audio and Telephone options. Computer Audio will deliver the best quality but Telephone is a viable option for students that are experiencing technical difficulties and allows them to join with just a voice call.
    • Enable join before host: This option allows your participants to start and join your meeting before you are present. Use this option with caution if you have enabled automatic recording (see below).
    • Mute participants upon entry: Enable this option if you would prefer to have participants’ microphones turned off when they initially join. Microphone mute can be toggled on and off during the meeting, regardless of this setting.
    • Breakout Room pre-assign: If you plan to use the breakout room feature, you can pre-assign users to rooms here.
    • Record the meeting automatically: This option begins a recording when the meeting starts (either you as the host or any other participant if you selected “Enable join before host”). When you select this option, you can choose to record locally or in the cloud. Cloud recordings are automatically uploaded to your My Media tool in Canvas, which you can then publish for your students to watch.  You can stop or pause the recording during the meeting.
    • Alternative Hosts: This option allows you to designate one or more additional people (additional instructions, graduate assistants, etc.) that can perform certain host functions like start a recording on your behalf.
  4. Click the Save button at the bottom of the page. Your Zoom Meeting has been created.
  5. From here, you can follow the instructions on our Add a Zoom Link to your Canvas Course to share this Zoom Meeting with your students.

Good to Know about Scheduling Zoom Meetings:

  • Start each of your class sessions by going to the Meetings link in your UD Zoom account or the Zoom Meetings link in your Canvas course if you have connected the meeting to Canvas.
    • UD Zoom account: Log into the UD Zoom Portal and click on the “Sign In” button. From the Meetings link, locate the meeting from the series, and click the Start button to the right.  This will ensure that you have full Host controls.
    • Canvas course: Click the Zoom Meetings link in the navigation bar of your Canvas course. Click the Upcoming Meetings tab, then click the Start button next to the proper meeting.
  • You can use Zoom to hold Student Hours (also called Office Hours). Make sure to create a separate Zoom Meeting link and clearly indicate to your students the difference between the two.  This meeting can be set with “No Fixed Time” so that it is always available for appointments.
  • Meetings do not automatically start or stop at the specified times. You can start and end your meeting at anytime, any number of times.
  • When your class is complete, be sure click the End Meeting button on the bottom right and choose the “End meeting for all” option.  This will ensure that your account is free to start another meeting, and that your recordings will process correctly.