Saturday, February 6, 2021

How is Online Teaching going so far?

 How's it going so far? Because I'm beyond exhausted. I quite literally could not imagine trying to do this with children at home - you guys are actual SAINTS. All of my hats off to you. 

I wanted to use today's post to talk about the wins and losses of Online Teaching, and to share some ideas I would like to incorporate in the next half term. (Who knows how long we might be doing this for, the idea of March 8th fills me with anxiety for a number of conflicting reasons). 

What's going well.

I am really enjoying greeting every student individually as they enter the call. It immediately slows down the pace and gives students an opportunity to say hello and tell me about their week, an opportunity I don't really make time for when teaching face to face. It also allows me to make a quick check on attendance, making it easier to know who's in the call which makes picking students for differentiated questioning a much quicker process (and it's also easy to note which students have actively engaged in the lesson too).

I have been really taking the time to celebrate student success, this has been in the form of phone calls home and my new 'digital postcards'. Postcards have been a real quick, but personal way to celebrate students and reward their efforts with remote learning. 

We currently have virtual form time once a week, it is only a short session so I like to try and use that time to touch base with students, especially with their mental health and workload. I use a 'virtual classroom' to engage students as soon as they enter the call, and as expected they have thoroughly enjoyed seeing a 'pupdate' each week! This week has been Children's Mental Health week, and to really engage students to think about this, I have created a 'Positivity Board' and a 'Compliment Box' using Padlet. This allows students to add their own posts at a time that suits them, that I then share during form time to spread some joy and see what they have been up to outside of schoolwork. I think this has been really important in helping students touch base with each other too, in a way they usually would in form time. 


What's not going so well.

I am having real difficulty engaging my Year 10s online, they are a difficult group in person and really want to take advantage of the fact that students are working alone. But it is becoming difficult to get students to get the bare minimum done, I'm seeing copy and pasted answers, bullet points and simply skipped questions throughout. I feel I need to increase the use of quick, formative assessment in lesson in order to gage the participation and understanding in the lesson. Any ideas here would be greatly appreciated!

Focus for next half term:

  • Quick, formative assessment ideas
  • Spend some more time on professional CPD opportunities and reading
  • How can I make truly meaningful learning happen online?
    • Focus on modelling skills online (Annotating photos, writing opinions and explaining links)
    • Model how to approach exam questions live to support LA students
    • Focus on extended writing skills in KS3 especially. 

But right now, I'm going to plough through the final week of this half term and then sleep for approximately 7 days straight!


Enjoy the weekend you lovely lot!
Tayla











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