I wasn’t ready for this. I don’t think anyone was.
During the first couple months of the pandemic, I was thinking “when will we come back and do in-person?” From what I understood, not for a while.
The world is changing as we know it. “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use it to change the world,” Nelson Mandela. Just because we are at home doesn’t mean that the learning doesn’t stop. We need to flourish or bloom on the zoom calls. Teaching from home is something that I never even thought of. Find ways through your company, school, or university on how you can succeed remotely.
New Strategies
This is new for everyone and we are just going to have to adapt. Use this as an opportunity to search for new ways on how others should teach or communicate remotely. One example is: Khan Academy. For those of you who don’t know Khan Academy, it is an academic website that has elementary school, high school, and college math. On top of that there subjects like science, art, computer programing, economics and more. This is a great strategy for students who are having a hard time in a difficult subject and can go back so they can master it. One more thing to add is that Khan Academy has test preps for the SAT, LSAT, and the Praxis Core. Students can study these practices test so that they can flourish on the real exam.
Another form of remote teaching is an app called Kahoot. If you have a small or even a large class, this app can test students knowledge, speed, and accuracy. In addition, this app can be used for creating your own questions that can be true/false or multiple choice. It also adds a sense of competitiveness. The person that taps on the correct answer the fastest, they will receive the most points. At the end of the quiz, all the points will be added up and the top 3 names will be posted. I love facilitating Kahoots, but sometimes I love being a competitor. We are training the brains of the students so that they will have the same attitude and mindset when they take test.
Conclusion
These are just two examples that we should use during remote learning. Is there another app that can help your learning? If so what is it and how will you use it? Make use of the work online and use it as an extension for yourself. I wrote a poem a couple months ago and the last two lines said, “There’s still one question before you start. And that question is: “are you ready?”‘ Are you ready for your life to completely change forever. You have the power to change your life.
I think leveraging all the great content (like Khan) that is already online makes loads of sense. The key is to make sure students are engaging with the material. I did a lesson for my spring edtech class that showcases a number of free tools for doing that “Promote Active Viewing.” All these tools provide ways for you to enhance the video with quizzes, discussions and tool for tracking students engagement.
I also think it makes sense to invite your students to curate possible videos that might be used in class. What if you assigned a team of students to find good video content that teaches “X.” Students could use video rubrics that your class had developed to find good videos for the rest of class. They could “host” the session and explain why they think the videos were useful.
I agree that remote teaching requires the adoption of new techniques and strategies. I think the key with any of these options is developing an engaging environment that will help hold students’ attention and help learning become more tangible.
My primary concern with Kahoot, however, is that the competitive aspect may be somewhat of a turnoff to students who feel less comfortable participating, or have less confidence in their own abilities.