- Zoom is a great platform for synchronous classes and is easy for class discussions if you have less than 15 students.
- The breakout rooms feature on Zoom is great, but pre-assigning students to rooms hasn’t worked well for me yet. Some students ended up in the correct room, but I had to manually place most of the students in the correct room. It is still a great way for them to have small group discussion.
- Time seems to go faster than expected. In my 2-hour class on Tuesday, I intended to have discussion for the first hour and then give them an assignment for the second hour. We ended up talking the entire time. I definitely need to change that this coming week as many of my students have class from 8 to 12:15 that day and all classes were synchronous!
- In History of Math, I wanted to use COVID-19 as part of our conversation so we did a problem on Monday, where I asked them if every person in South Dakota could have a circle of radius 2 meters around them without the circles overlapping. And, we do have enough room for that—even extra to invite some friends.
- Then I asked the History of Math students to post on the Discussion Board their thoughts on what impact they believe Covid-19 will have on the History of Mathematics. It was an interesting discussion and I appreciated reading their perspectives.
- In our Assessment course, we had our annual Homework Debate, where we assign students to be either Pro Homework or Con Homework. Then they have to argue their side. They did a great job, but it wasn’t as fun as it would have been in person. We were all in agreement that there needs to be some middle ground in homework so they are writing their homework philosophies and homework policies for homework this week.
How does one tell a colleague that perhaps you are expecting too much of your students without upsetting them?
I am not sure how to answer your question. Teaching is such deeply personal activity and unless it is approached with a growth mindset accepting feedback is a difficult proposition.
ReplyDeleteI have been so grateful Samra Trask for pointing me in the direction to go paperless with Class OneNote and having lesson plans in Planbook a few years ago. Also a few years ago, I began recording lessons when a student was absent and making those available on Google Drive. I and my students have been able to make this transition for the most part smoothly. I only have one students that does not have internet access but we have a system of exchanging flash drives for him. We have used Zoom twice this week for question and help sessions. Special Education teachers and paraprofessionals that are normally in my classroom also attended these sessions. The first day streaming was perfect and the second day was horrible. I think Zoom may be having trouble keeping up with the sheer volume of demand. I visited with a technician at ITC and he had heard the Microsoft Teams was having that issue.
A question that has been nagging at me for the last day or so is the issue of access and equity. Reading some of the posts on Facebook posts, I get them impression that some teachers are being told to do packets and worksheets with everyone because not all students have access to the internet and everyone must be equal. Shouldn't we be using technology to its fullest potential with our students and innovating ways to raise students access rather than holding everyone down to the lowest common denominator?
I visited with a principal today and he said that he felt bad that he was telling his staff to hold back on all of their ideas for technology because not all students had the same access to technology and internet. Again, wouldn't it be better to unleash the staff and innovate ways to raise students up? It might even be less effort than running off papers and making packets of busy work.