As teachers everywhere are beginning to prepare for back-to-school while distance learning this year, their approach may be a little different. But, keep in mind, we can also maintain our valuable engagement strategies, even online.
Let’s go over some critical ideas for starting a new year and explore how we may “tweak” the usual approach to develop an effective plan for starting the new school year.
One of the most important aspects of a positive and supportive classroom is the relationship between the students and their teacher. Students perform best in a positive and safe environment.
Recent research found “that strong teacher-student relationship was associated in both the short- and long-term with improvements on practically every measure schools care about: higher student academic engagement, attendance, grades, fewer disruptive behaviors and suspensions, and lower school dropout rates.” Education Week 7/23/20
The first step in building relationships is to get to know your students. This can often be accomplished through discussions, writing assignments, surveys, and personal favorite class games.
During the first week of school, I have two writing assignments that we complete as a class, which lets the students and myself get to know one another better.
The first assignment is the traditional “All About Me” Poster. You can get a free copy of the one I use here. Once you download the resource, you can add text boxes for students to complete online.
The new feature by Teachers Pay Teachers makes online assignments possible. If you haven’t given it a try yet, this is your perfect opportunity.
The “All About Me” assignment provides topics to start discussions, and best of all, it offers an opportunity for success. All students can share the necessary information. Therefore the stage is set for success.
I then use this same “All About Me” assignment to appoint my daily “helper.” Since we will not be in the classroom, I will not need a “helper” assigned. So here’s my little “tweak” for distance learning.
Each morning I will allow five minutes of my morning meeting to spotlight the “Star Student.” The students and I get to know one another better through the topics outlined in the assignment. So far, this assignment is pretty typical.
The one “tweak” will be to create an image of the student’s “All About Me” poster and display it as my background setting during recordings. Think of it as your distance learning bulletin board.
To create the image, I use a program called Kami, which my district provides. You can also accomplish the same effect in Google Classroom. (I don’t know what I would do without Kami!)
Kami turns any pdf into an editable resource. The students can add text boxes and even color the page. Once the student submits his/her work, I can save the page as an image to display as my background. (Pretty cool!)
Another critical element during back to school is teaching students the classroom or online room’s routines and procedures. I don’t know about you, but I’m going to make sure we don’t skip this crucial step while distance learning. The students will still need to learn your expectations for each activity throughout the day.
Just as any other year, we need to be clear on our expectations.
These are all questions that need thoughtful responses, time to discuss and model each with the students.
After explaining my expectations, I then spend a fair amount of time modeling each standard to the students. Trust me when I say I spend a “fair” amount of time. That means I exhaust the topic. I believe modeling with extreme clarity is key to student success. This concept also applies when teaching routines.
Any smooth operating classroom has a behavior system set in place. Distance Learning deserves the same. To provide feedback throughout the day, I have chosen to use classdojo.com.
Although I love class dojo, I usually offer my students tangible materials to monitor expectations at the second-grade level. You can check out my “Ray of Sunshine” Behavior System here.
I am “tweaking” my method of communication to the class dojo format for distance learning since everything will be digital. It only makes sense.
Student engagement is always a big topic. And it’s equally essential in distance learning. The same strategies used for student engagement inside the classroom are also used with distance learning through the computer. If you’d like to read more about my favorite engagement strategies, I have a post for you; click here.
Although my student engagement strategies look similar online, my one “tweak” will be my delivery mode. To help keep students actively involved and engaged, I have been preparing my lessons in Nearpod.
I’m fortunate to have a district that provided the program, but if you are not as lucky, take time to check out their free version here.
Nearpod has set up a structure and outline for all my lessons while keeping student engagement in mind. Here’s a sampling of the online engagement options provided with Nearpod:
With help from Nearpod, my engagement options for teaching online are maximized. (I’m so thankful for this application!)
Whether you are preparing for back to school in the classroom, online, or maybe even a hybrid of both, you are sure to set yourself up for success if you keep these things in mind.
While we are on the subject of writing, make sure your students have a solid grasp of paragraph writing. Check out my FREE Structured Paragraph Handbook, which will guide you and your students through the steps needed to create the perfect paragraph.
Let me know what’s working well for you. We’re all in this together. (Sorry, I watched High School Musical a little too much.)
