Due to the corona virus (covid-19), we live in a difficult time where schools could be or are already closed and teachers are requested to use digital tools and cloud services to ensure some continuity of their lessons.
Could be scary for some teachers, although it should not be, as many services on Internet for teaching and learning can really be helpful, definitely ready-to-use, and surprisingly friendly!
In this blog, I will focus on educators working in general and vocational secondary education, and adult education and training. For these classes, we can reasonably assume that learners have (mobile) computing devices and Internet access.
So, in this context, how can we ensure some continuity of lessons when the schools are not accessible? I would like to share some ideas:
- [Coordination & Communication] - If the school has already in place an electronic class register, please continue to use it for coordination and important communications with pupils and their families. Yet, do not forget to use the old and omnipresent email. It remains the main communication tool for many people. Yet, some students don’t like or even don’t have an email. In this case, instant messaging applications such as Facebook or Instagram could be a valid solution. You could also consider to use WhatsApp or Viber, yet in this case you should know and use their phone numbers - in compliance with applicable privacy rules, e.g. https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/home/privacystatement
- [Homework & off-line Lessons] For sure many students, even those referred as digital native, will miss the human and social dimension that only a school can genuinely offer… However, during this difficult time cloud computing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing) and learning management system (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_management_system) could be acceptable alternatives. For example, you may consider to design and share your lessons using Google Classroom (https://classroom.google.com/h - you need emails), or using commercial tools such as Office365 (www.office.com – you need a licence) where you can upload your slides and resources, assign and collect homework.
- [LIVE lessons] To deliver live lessons you may consider to use, for example, Zoom (https://www.zoom.us/) or Skype (https://www.skype.com/en/) or 'Teams’ as part of the Office365 package. These tools include functions to chat, (video) talk and share your desktop as a kind of smartboard. Don’t forget that you can also pass the control or co-work on your desktop with your students, thus engaging and fostering their active participation. In this difficult time, public-private partnership should be particularly welcomed: for example, in Italy some private companies have launched the platform ‘la scuola continua’ (the school goes on) to help schools to continue their lessons online (https://www.lascuolacontinua.it/).
- [Other tools] The Digital and Online Learning eco-system offers a wide variety of ad-hoc tools for teachers for several instructional practices. Among others, you may consider to look at padlet (https://padlet.com/), mentimeter (https://www.mentimeter.com/) and Kahoot, a game-based classroom response system (https://kahoot.com/);
Please consider to share your experiences and initiatives, for example:
- What is your experience with digital and online learning?
- Any tips and tricks to get started?
- What are your preferred digital and online learning tools?
Last year we spent 3 months in communication with Google to get G-suit and since the beginning of current study year we actively use it. It gives us the e-mail to every student and staff member, google-classroom for educational process, google meet (same as zoom by function), and all the google tools such as google drive, google slides, google forms, google docs, etc. Pretty convenient. Also I was gladly surprised by finding out that khanAcademy integrates with google-classroom. Also we use other tools such as kahoot, menti.com, quizlett, mozaweb, etc.
And of course, not every teacher uses this opportunities in their work - as it requires 1) more time for preparation in the beginning, 2) mindset change, 3) digital competence. So it’s a challenge for schools to make this shift in teachers’ minds and competences.
And it rems of case-sharing. Today one teacher was absent (by a reason) and I was replacing her. I was lucky as the teacher I worked for today, is an active user of google classroom. So she prepared all the materials - put the videos, texts and tests to the google-classroom and it was very easy to work with the classes. And kids like this format and perform very effectively! But yes, a teacher and personal contact still very important - it helps to shape the process to make it effective. At least with early ages.
Hi 312 thank you so much for sharing your experience! Was training necessary to kick-off Google Classroom or peer learning and sharing of practices among teachers was enough?
41, our steps were the following:
1) we took video-instructions provided by google as a stat and shared them among the teachers
2) During summer vacations I created (in testing mode) a course and invited there some teachers as students. So we tested it on ourselves.
3) We've organized one short intro training (mainly based on the video watched).
4) Some most advanced in technologies teachers started their courses and got their real practice with real kids.
5) And then we organized a peer-training and experience sharing event for teachers (not only internal, but also invited teachers from other schools).
312 congratulation, your plan looks solid, please keep up-to-date this community and, of course, we will be glad to help, if possible!