What it will mean to teach under these circumstances has been driving me crazy for weeks now. So I want to use my blog to think in public and clear out some of the concerns that are waking me up in the middle of the night.
I will be teaching in classrooms at scheduled times, albeit with some adjustments to alleviate hallway congestion during transitions. I will also need to make my classes accessible to students who may be taking it remotely for periods of time. All students must achieve course objectives.
Inside the classroom, the desks and chairs must be spaced six feet apart. Students are responsible for staying masked, cleaning their desks, and sitting according to a seating chart. Teachers need to have a face shield and stay in a limited area up front. I guess I will avoid passing out paper, including quizzes and exams, which I will move online.
Many students are very happy to be back to school. According to many students, remote learning meant: little to no interaction with classmates, little to no interaction with caring educators, no electives, extracurriculars, or athletics.
Whether, we are face-to-face, blended, hybrid, hyflex, or fully online, we need to be thinking deeply about what our students will need from us this fall. I can imagine students sitting in a classroom, wearing a mask, separated from their friends, facing forward with their feet on the floor, perhaps behind a plexiglass divider...I think that some students are going to be nervous, scared, and feeling disconnected. The best way to combat these negative beliefs and behaviors is to use teaching strategies that engage learners.
Blended learning is an educational approach that educators will be using a lot during this pandemic. While thinking about the implementation of blended learning, it is important to consider the different types of blended learning, how the learning is facilitated, and the developmental appropriateness for the age range we are instructing.
The elements of blended learning are composed of teacher-led examples, off-line examples, and online examples.
TEACHER-LED EXAMPLES
- small group direct instruction
- small group discussion
- providing real-time feedback on assignments, projects, writing
- Q & A session
- Lab/STEM experiment, teacher available to assist
- modeling a practice/procedure
- small group scaffolding
- oral assessment
- individual tutoring
- differentiated/modified practices based on student need
- small group min-lessons
- mini socratic seminar
- SEL discussions
- relationships building activities
- RTI station
- formative assessment
- I do, we do, you do activity
- rubric assessment overview
- exemplar overview
- small group review activity
- present a problem/challenge
OFF-LINE EXAMPLES
- STEM activity
- paper/pencil assignment
- student-led discussion
- brainstorming activities
- cooperative learning activities (Kagan structures)
- makerspace activity
- genius hour work time (hands on)
- inquiry planning time
- independent reading
- independent writing
- paper formative assessments /exit tickets
- peer tutoring
- peer-to-peer collaboration activities
- team building activities
- student-led socratic seminar
- creating a model (hands-on)
- art/craft project
- sketchnote creation
- mind mapping
- project-based learning (brainstorming, planning, collaboration, creating)
- self-assessment
- choice board activities
ONLINE EXAMPLES
- teacher created video lecture
- Edpuzzle video lesson
- electronic formative assessments/exit tickets (google forms, GoFormative, Schoology)
- interactive quiz/review games (Kahoot, Gimkit, Quizizz)
- video creation (screencastify, flipgrid, wevideo)
- audio creation (wevideo, audio chrome extension)
- curation activity (wakelet/padlet)
- infographic creation (adobe spark/google drawings)
- student reflections using Google Apps (Docs, Slides)
- digital portfolio or notebook
- online assignments
- listening to a podcast
I consistently challenge the traditional and often ineffective delivery models to drive new processes and learning and developmental methodologies to meet student needs.
We need to design a new choreography for schooling for a better decade. We need to implement blended learning models that integrate online learning with brick-and-mortar instruction to rethink time, space and staffing.
The flipped classroom is a blended learning model that flips the traditional relationship between class time and homework. Students learn at home via online coursework or pre-recorded video lessons, and class time is focused on teacher-guided practice or projects.
The flipped classroom is one of the answers to COVID-19. The blended learning principles and practices can help educators think through how to make the most of their circumstances.
Blended learning is more important than ever. We need to ensure that our students will get the best of both worlds, whether classroom teaching or remote learning, with our digital learning portfolio.
Indeed, we are going back to school. Therefore, we have to use new tools and strategies for virtual teaching: blended learning, flipped classroom, virtual classroom. We cannot recreate a physical classroom online nor the experiences we share in it but we can create opportunities for us to create new experiences.
Flexibility and an emphasis on relationships will be essential at the start of the new school year. It is naive to think that the return to school will be the same as any other year; a worldwide pandemic, students have been learning at home since March and teachers have been on a steep learning curve with blended and online strategies, so many new factors....
We need to take the time to share experience and progress, to address issues around adults' and children's wellbeing. We need to partner with our students to reimagine learning and reclaim our lives.
Albert Einstein said, "The future is an unknown, but a somewhat predictable unknown. To look to the future we must first look back upon the past. That is where the seeds of the future were planted."
In August, we are going to help get you ready for the unknown.
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