An awful lot of you are Livin La Vida Loca called “Simultaneous Teaching” or sometimes “Hybrid Teaching” An
On behalf of all humans everywhere, not a dang one of us who have personally cured Covid-19 by now, I apologize for putting you in this position -- where no teacher should be.
I am seeing my veteran master teachers feel like first year teachers and I am seeing my first year teachers ... feel even less “together” than they would during a normal year. I am seeing you all work even longer hours than usual (I didn’t know that was possible. Get some sleep, y’all!)
This is so hard, you guys!
Whoever said to just “do the same thing with both groups” has obviously not been in a simultaneous class, especially in a school where Face-to-Face kids aren’t allowed to bring technology into the classroom (or don’t have any to bring, which is killing me!)
I facilitated PD last night where I mostly asked questions and listened to our colleagues talk about their Simultaneous Teaching problems and victories.
Here’s what I learned. I’m like Robin Hood today, stealing (with permission) the great ideas from our colleagues to give to those who need great ideas. I hope at least one will make your simultaneous teaching life easier.
Here are the Top Ten Things I have learned (from our colleagues!) to make Simultaneous Teaching easier on Teachers (and kids, too)
Plan for the Virtual Part First: I am hearing that it is easier/faster to adapt the digital activities to face to face (play the video whole-class, make the discussion verbal and not a chat, print the reading) rather than the other way around. This is especially true if you are using district-created resources and not making/finding all your own stuff.
Establish Bellwork/Beginning procedures: There are plenty of ways to start class, and starting class smoothly has always set the tone for the rest of the class. That hasn’t changed, but maybe the logistics have. Some teachers have the face-to-face kids (F2F) start on bellwork by looking at the board and writing in their notebooks while the teacher gets the Online kids started on their digital bellwork. Some teachers have all kids (F2F & Online) do their bellwork the same way -- all in a physical notebook or all in Canvas. But all teachers who feel like they “have this down” have the kids do some sort of bellwork while the teacher takes attendance.
Build Relationships with Online Kids Differently (but intentionally): Remember, some of the online kids don’t see another human all day. And some of them have their whole families breathing down their necks. They have a lot of emotional needs and they really need to bond with you and with each other. (please don’t forget this! Please be intentional in building classroom culture with them!) Some great ideas to help with building relationships included:
Asking kids (at their choice and discretion and comfort level) to turn on their cameras for a few minutes at least once a week so you-the-teacher can get to know their faces.
Asking kids to turn on their mics for an extended culture-building bellwork once a week where everyone shares their answers out loud. Something like “Thankful Thursdays” or “Good news Mondays” would be great for this!
Having each kid create a Bitmoji to use in your physical & digital classroom, even as their “signature” on a Class Agreement or classroom Social Contract.
Have Online kids respond with emojis and F2F kids respond by drawing emojis on whiteboards (they can be cleaned at the end of each period).
Let Online kids be “seen” and known by having “bring your pet to Online Class day” or use that as an incentive for Online kids (like dress-down day for F2F kids)
Manage Canvas Confusion: Kids are confused in Canvas. To manage this, our colleagues suggested the following:
Put a due date (of that day, if possible) on everything so it shows up under today’s “to do” list and not under a future “to do” list.
Hide everything kids don't need to see. Hide the apps on the left that they aren’t going to use.Hide future lessons and future tasks. Less clutter is less confusion!
Make tasks “prerequisites” to each other. Meaning that they can’t go on to Task B if they haven’t completed or looked at Task A.
Doing Too Many Things At Once (and None Well): Use rotations to give some special, focused time to each group -- your Online kids and your Face to Face (F2F) kids. Depending on your numbers, this might just be two groups, say 15 minutes of direct instruction with your Online kids while your F2F kids do some independent work (maybe a reading task or map activity). Then, switch! Ask your Online kids to do the reading while you do some direct instruction with your F2F kids.
*Bonus -- this can help with the bonding/relationship building that you’re doing with your kids (that’s harder with those Online kids AND can possibly decrease your stress level one notch [we can’t work miracles here] while you only work with only one group at a time). If your class numbers are uneven (maybe one of those two groups are larger than the other) you can split it into two and have a rotation of three groups (for example, two F2F groups and one Online group) or if you have One Giant Class, you can have four rotations. You can split those rotations over two days if necessary.
Using Channels: Do you have an ESE teacher who needs to meet with ESE students for pull outs -- online? Use a Teams Channel! Do you want to have your online kids discuss things in small groups? Use a Teams Channel! Do you want kids to work in groups? Use a Teams Channel *One caveat! Kids can get up to mischief if they are unsupervised in a physical room OR a virtual room. Please make sure to be really good about popping into the Teams Channel(s) to make sure kids are being supervised and not up to mischief.
Nearpod: Nearpod is great for lots of things -- including the checks for understanding and kids collaborating and giving feedback. This gives them a voice -- which THEY need right now because the world is crazy and YOU need because you’re reinventing your teaching.
Thumbs Up: Have kids use “thumbs up” and “thumbs down” both in F2F and (when cameras are on) with Online kids. It’s an easy way to see if kids are okay, and if they’re with you, and if they’re understanding coursework.
Online Kids Can Check Out and Come Back: If your audio won’t work or the simultaneous content won’t work ... ahem .. ..simultaneously, have the Online kids go watch the video on their own and come back to Live Class at such-and-such time. It’s not skipping class. It’s doing their classwork!
Having Patience: In a normal year, by the third week of school, half the kids still don’t know where to turn in work. Or how to put a heading on their paper. They have seven (or eight) different teachers with seven (or eight) different expectations. Now amplify that with in-person and/or virtual expectations. OF COURSE they don’t remember how to do all of the new things! That is also changing as we all work through things. Add the stress of a pandemic and the learning curves of new technology (for us AND for the kids) and the economic stresses hitting a lot of our families and they’re all a hot mess. (so are many of us, to be honest) Not turning in work. Ghosting class. Not answering questions. Not turning on mics. Acting like fools. Just having patience with ourselves and with our kids when we/they mess up can make all the difference.
I know that this is ALL different and weird and crazy. Do you? Do your colleagues? Do your kids? Do their parents?
This is your weekly reminder that this is a GLOBAL PANDEMIC (yes, I’m yelling) and NOBODY HAS EVER DONE THIS SIMULTANEOUS TEACHING BEFORE (because why the heck would they?).
It’s ok that it isn’t great yet. Don’t forget to be patient with yourself and your kids. It takes small, incremental fixes to go from terrible to okay to good to great. Start small.
And let us know how we can help.
-Tracy
No comments:
Post a Comment