Toronto Oasis has chosen to use the zoom.us video conferencing platform to host their weekly gatherings. You may participate even if you don’t own a computer, a webcam or a computer microphone; you may still join by phone. Many people choose to connect by phone.
I can’t get into the zoom call!
We want you to participate fully from your level of comfort. If you are interested, we will support you to learn the technology. It will take some practice.
- Download the latest zoom.us client at https://zoom.us/download.
- Test that your device works on the zoom platform. Check online at: https://zoom.us/test. Also, check that there are no issues with the zoom platform itself at http://status.zoom.us.
- Sign up for our meetup at https://meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis.
- Find the current meetup event at https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/.
- Click “Attend” on the current meetup event.
- Find the section marked “Online Event”.
- Click on the link below the “Online Event” title.
- For the best zoom experience, we recommend using the following:
- Enable Gallery view to view all the participants.
- Enable the “Side-by-Side” option for when the speaker shares their screen, to view the screen share and the speaker at the same time.
- We have enabled live transcripts/subtitles by default. To disable, click on the live transcript button at the bottom of your screen and then select “Hide Subtitle”. For mobile devices, select “More-Meeting”
For technical support, please make a comment on the meetup event requesting technical assistance.
Overview
Each meeting will use the same conference id and password.
The zoom meeting link will be made available in two ways (mailing list and meetup.com):
– Through our weekly email, by joining our mailing list. (Sign up for our mailing list using the form in our sidebar on the left side of the screen.)
– Through meetup.com, by completing the RSVP process, before the meeting starts, by clicking “Attend” on the event at meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events. On the meetup event page, look for the “Online Event” section and click on the link provided to connect to the video conference call. If you choose to join by phone, please connect your video first, then join by phone. Detailed phone instructions are below.
Note: The organizers have chosen to not provide the zoom meeting link through the website, Facebook, or as a meetup comment on an event in accordance with the Zoom platform security guidelines to mitigate “zoom-bombing”.
Online Video Conference Etiquette
- Please find a quiet location to share your audio and/or use a headset. As a courtesy, please keep yourself muted if you are not speaking. NOTE: The host will mute you if your background audio is distracting to other participants and you are not the one presently speaking.
- Be respectful to others. You are allowed to disagree, but please don’t be disagreeable.
- Please follow our Toronto Oasis Code of Conduct at: https://torontooasis.org/code-of-conduct/
- Etiquette from Zoom Blog
- We encourage you to turn on your video for Toronto Oasis’s security purposes. You may turn off your video after we are able to verify your identity by video or by audio:
- If your video is on:
- Keep your face in the centre.
- If possible, adjust the camera to have most of the screen be taken up by your face.
- If your video is off:
- Please identify yourself when you first join the call, and when the host addresses you, or you will be removed by the host.
- If your video is on:
- During our music segment and the presentation, we will limit chat to “Host/Co-Host only”. If you do have something relevant to share, please message a co-host and they will share your message with everyone at their discretion.
- Feel free to hide non-video participants to show more participants in the gallery view.
Phone and Video Controls
Phone Controls
- Joining a Meeting: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201362193-Joining-a-Meeting
- Some members are choosing to first connect through their computer to view the video gallery of the participants, and turning off their computer audio to use the phone option for the audio. https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201362663-Joining-a-meeting-by-phone
- If you are connected by video and by phone at the same time, you must join the two together by clicking on the “arrow” next to the Mute button and selecting “Switch to Phone Audio…”. It will say “Already joined by phone? Enter #PARTICIPANTID# on your phone.” Follow those instructions and it will automatically link your phone to your video on screen.
- When connecting by phone, use the following codes:
- *6 – Toggle mute/unmute
- *9 – Raise hand
- NOTE: If you happen to have a bad connection from the zoom phone number dialed, hang up and choose a different zoom phone number. This has happened multiple times and after switching to a different phone number, the call quality was excellent.
- If you don’t want the transcription subtitles to show up, Zoom’s own online instructions say to go to “More …”, then turn off the slider for “Show Captions CC”.
- However, as of September 2022 that does not seem to work, at least not on some users’ Android devices. Instead, you need to open the Zoom app without being connected to a meeting, and sign in to your account. Then go to “More …”, then “Meetings”, then turn off “Show Closed Captioning (when available)”. That change will then apply to any Zoom meeting you join on that device.
Video Conference Controls
- Mute and unmute yourself using the onscreen controls or use the spacebar as a push-to-talk button. https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/360000510003-Push-to-Talk
- When the group is moderating a discussion, we ask that each participant who wants to speak please use the “Raise Hand” feature of the zoom platform. It will order the participants window based on who has raised their hand first. We will use this ordering to manage the discussion queue. Please lower your hand once the speaker and/or moderator has finished answering your question. If you have multiple questions, please ask your best question first and then defer to the next person and re-raise your hand. If you have a comment, please identify it as a comment and attempt to keep it short. It is best to re-phrase your comment into a question towards the speaker for more engagement.
- To raise your hand, first open the “Participants Window”. Click the “Raise Hand” button. When you finish talking, please click “Lower Hand”. https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/115001286183
- On Windows use the shortcut key [Alt]+[Y] and on Mac use [Option]+[Y]
- Feel free to use “Lower Hand” if your question was already answered by another participant.
- Change the Video Layout by switching between Speaker View and Gallery View in the top right hand corner. On the IPAD app, you may swipe to view a second page of participants. At times, the host will “spotlight” one participant so that it changes the video layout for everyone. https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201362403-Active-Speaker-Video-Layout-
- When viewing a screen share, you may view the speaker and the screen share by enabling “Side-by-side” mode. At the top center of your screen, click “View Options”, and click “Side-by-side mode”.
- Enable a virtual background to hide your background using the options found on your Video control in the lower left hand corner. (Some computers may not have the correct hardware to support this feature.) https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/210707503-Virtual-Background#h_bebf36a4-c1e9-4769-9d3c-e0d01457d341
- If you notice that the participant windows are floating, click on “Exit Full Screen”, in the top right hand corner, to have the participant window and chat window moved and re-sized to the right hand side.
- Breakout Rooms: If the host invites you to a breakout room, you will be notified with a popup window. Please click “Join”. https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/115005769646-Participating-in-Breakout-Rooms
- In a breakout room, You may click “Ask for Help” to have the host join your breakout room and address any concerns you have.
Opportunities to Volunteer
- If you want to offer to be a volunteer during the online meeting, please join the call at 10:30am to be available to be assigned a role. All roles will be assigned by 10:45am.
- [Required] Zoom Host – Responsible for starting the zoom meeting at 10:30am and creating the zoom invitation.
- [Required] Master of Ceremonies (aka MC) – Starts the meeting on time, ends the meeting on time, and provides an agenda to manage the pace of the meeting. Introduces the different feature segments and is in control of the flow of the meeting. Responsible for making any required final decisions during the meeting.
- [Required] Greeter – Welcomes participants as they join the meeting with “Hello. Welcome to Toronto Oasis.”. Wait for a gap in the conversation to interject and send out a friendly hello to the new participant. Set the participant names to what we recognize as being put on their name tag, as we do when we met in person. Consider adding their preferred pronouns to their name in brackets.
- [Required] After-Meeting Discussion Moderator – Manages the group discussion after our scheduled meeting ends. Usually includes the speaker and may include an open discussion.
- [Required] Private Discussion with Leadership Team – If a participant is not following the code of conduct, a private discussion may be required with a participant. We ask that two members of the leadership team volunteer for this if the situation comes up.
- [Optional] Discussion Moderator – Moderates the discussion and makes sure participants share the discussion fairly. Participants can use the “Raise Hand” feature found in the “Participant Window”. We ask participants to lower their hand when they have the focus. (Due to a limitation in zoom, Co-hosts will need to type in the chat if they want to ask a question, as they are not able to raise their hand.)
- [Optional] Background Audio Watcher (aka Mute Police) – Check if anyone’s background audio is distracting when they are not currently speaking, they need to be muted.
- [Optional] Chat Reporter (aka Chat Police) – If there are a lot of chats being missed, please interrupt and summarize the recent chat messages for the group. Not everyone wants to follow the chat.
- [Optional] Nonverbal Reactions Watcher (aka Vibe Police) – Summarize any non-verbal reactions from the group. If many people are using the applaud or like reactions. Also, if a participant’s raised hand is not acknowledged within a minute, please alert the Discussion Queue Facilitator.
- [Optional] Video Gallery Watcher – See if someone is needing attention visually and the hosts have not noticed yet.
Host/Co-Host Instructions
- We ask that all speakers please connect to zoom over the internet for video and also by phone for audio. This applies to the MC and the guest speaker. We have experiences where the internet connection quality drops out at times and if the speaker is already connected by phone, it will provide us a consistent experience in us not losing a speaker from the meeting. We strongly prefer for this to be done in advance so that the participants will not have to wait for the speaker to re-join their audio by phone.
- Zoom Host Tasks
- Before the meeting:
- Login the the zoom.us website
- Check for an updated version of the zoom client
- Move any prior recorded meetings to the trash
- Start the meeting
- Assign co-host role to the volunteers
- Make sure chat is enabled for everyone to everyone
- Disable the waiting room
- Start the breakout rooms for participants
- After the meeting:
- Download zoom recording
- Edit if necessary
- Upload zoom recording to Google Drive
- Create Share link
- Copy share link
- Update web page for event with the share link
- Update the web page with is-meeting-recorded set to true.
- Before the meeting:
Sharing your Screen
- After sharing your screen, move your mouse to the controls at the top-center of your screen, move your mouse over to “More …”, and click on “Disable participants annotation.”
- If you want to share your computer audio after you already shared your screen, move your mouse to the controls at the top-center of your screen, move your mouse over to “More …”, and click on “Share computer sound”.
- To view the participants window while you are sharing your screen, move your mouse to the controls at the top-center of your screen, click on “Participants Window”. Move and/or resize the window to your preference.
- To pre-download the Youtube videos, please use “4K Video Downloader” found at: http://4kdownload.com
Post-Meeting Discussion
- Remove all co-host privileges so that they may now be allowed to raise their hand in the discussion.
- Assign the “host” privilege to the post-meeting discussion moderator.
Breakout Rooms
Only the host can assign participants to breakout rooms. The co-host can leave and join any breakout room only if they join a breakout room assigned to them by the host. https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/206476313#h_1660846b-7d2d-4a87-b8a6-efe29a61759a
Breakout: Greetings
- During the meeting
- In the bottom toolbar, click the “Breakout Rooms” option.
- The breakout rooms should look like the following:
- Conversation Lounge
- Quiet Room (No Talking)
- Meeting Co-ordination
- Code of Conduct
- Room 1
- Room 2
- Room 3
- Room 4
- Room 5
- Room 6
- If it does not, choose: “Recover from pre-assigned” or type in the room names manually.
- Click on “Create Rooms” or “Recreate All Rooms”.
- The breakout rooms should look like the following:
- Your rooms will be created, and will not start automatically.
- Click on “Options“.
- Enable “Allow participants to choose room“.
- Enable “Move all participants to breakout rooms automatically“.
- Enable “Allow participants to return to the main session at any time“.
- Disable “Breakout rooms close automatically after after:“
- Disable “Countdown after closing break out rooms“.
- Click “Open All Rooms“.
- Click “Join” on “Breakout Room 1”.You must also join the breakout room to potentially remove the participant if requested by the organizers, and to close the breakout room when the discussion is completed.
- When greeting completes, the host must click on “Close All Rooms”.
- Pass control to the meeting host by selecting their name in the Participants Window and clicking “Assign as host”.
- In the bottom toolbar, click the “Breakout Rooms” option.
Breakout: Private Discussion / Code of Conduct
- Before the meeting
- Assign two organizers who volunteer to address any participant who needs a private discussion about the Toronto Oasis Code of Conduct (https://torontooasis.org/code-of-conduct).
- During the meeting,
- In the bottom toolbar, click the “Breakout Rooms” option.
- You may need to click on “Recreate” if breakout rooms were already assigned.
- Change the number of rooms to “1”.
- Click on “Manually”.
- Click on “Recreate All Rooms”.
- Click on “Options”.
- Enable “Allow participants to choose room“.
- Enable “Move all participants to breakout rooms automatically“.
- Disable “Allow participants to return to the main session at any time“.
- Disable “Breakout rooms close automatically after after:“
- Disable “Countdown after closing break out rooms“.
- Assign the two organizers that previously volunteered to Breakout Room 1.
- Assign the participant to Breakout Room 1.
- Click “Open All Rooms“.
- Click “Join” on “Breakout Room 1“.You must also join the breakout room to potentially remove the participant if requested by the organizers, and to close the breakout room when the discussion is completed.
- The organizers may now discuss with the participant about the violation of the Toronto Oasis Code of Conduct.
- After the discussion, the two organizers will decide if the participant is allowed to join the main group or if the participant must be removed from the meeting.
- If the decision is to remove the participant, the host clicks on the participant in the “Participants Window” and selects “Remove”.
- When the private discussion completes, the host must click on “Close All Rooms”.
- In the bottom toolbar, click the “Breakout Rooms” option.
Breakout: Mix and Mingle
- Before the meeting
- Ask the Master of Ceremonies how many minutes the mix and mingle feature will run. It is typically 7 minutes. We will break that down into a 7 minute limit on the breakout room with a 30 second warning before being automatically moved to the main room (even if your are in mid-conversation).
- Calculate the number of breakout rooms needed
- In the participants window, please note how many participants are in the meeting.
- Do the math to determine the number of rooms that divides the group to a minimum of three to four per room. Note: Zoom host is not included in calculation. Number of participants divided by four gives you the number of rooms needed. Also known as, the largest whole multiple of four.
- Take note to move any participants that are logged-in to multiple devices into the same breakout room.
- During the meeting
- In the bottom toolbar, click the “Breakout Rooms” option.
- You may need to click on “Recreate” if breakout rooms were already assigned.
- Click on “Options”:Disable “Move all participants to breakout rooms automatically”.
- Enable “Allow participants to return to the main session at any time”.
- Enable “Breakout rooms close automatically after:” and set the limit to 6 minutes.
- Enable “Countdown after closing breakout rooms:” and set the limit to 30 seconds.
- Announce to the participants: “You will receive a popup asking you to join the breakout room. Please click join”.
- Click “Open All Rooms”.
- As the host, you must remain in the main room to receive new participants to the meeting from the waiting room. You will notice that not all participants clicked on “join” and they will remain in the main room. (We do this so that the breakout rooms will not include any participants who are away from their device and not available to mix and mingle.)
- The host may sign-in on another device to allow them to participate in a breakout room.
- In the bottom toolbar, click the “Breakout Rooms” option.