When faced with the uncertainty of this year some of us throw ourselves into planning, others procrastinate, still others spin the possibilities of what could be, maybe we are doing all three. I have been shaping rough plans, writing quick notes to myself in my journal. Then I came across this post about planning for uncertainty from Sarah Zerwin. Even though it is written with middle and high schoolers in mind, her reminder to look to your core beliefs was a little of what I needed to make some more plans for my students.
Here are some things that are important to me:
Put the students in the center.
First, get to know your students, but also let them get to know you. This should not be different online. Building a classroom community will be a challenge without face to face instruction but that doesn’t take away all interaction. When we were in the midst of emergency remote learning we learned more about our students through our daily “circle check in” question and I think they learned a lot about us this way too. This is something I would like to continue this fall because “Teach me something Tuesday” was one highlight of our whole year! Phone calls, postcards, emails and texts went a long way to help us keep connected to our community and I am already brainstorming ways to grow that community while we start virtually.
Along with all this I believe in checking in regularly with students. I we used simple google form surveys throughout the year to help us understand what our students and their families needed from us. If you are looking for a place to start with your students, I suggest you start with these 5 questions from George Couros.
Incorporating student interests and passions into your classroom can only lead to good things! When we asked these questions using this form in the spring it lead to a great lesson in student empowerment and student lead learning. We will be beginning the year with these questions because asking them in the spring was so successful for us.
Caregivers are an important part of our community, too.
Another important part of our classroom is the wider community, keeping in contact with caregivers is very important. Google form surveys helped us here too but so did texts, emails and phone calls. This year I would like to work more with the parent partnership events we had begun adding in to our monthly plans before the pandemic. Weekly or monthly Zoom check ins might go a long way to help our community connect and answer frequent questions. My wheels are just starting to turn on how this might look during this school year.
Everyone deserves to have access to high quality, grade level mentor texts and reading material.
If you know me at all then you know how much I love and value reading. That love extends to the books I bring into my classroom. As I think about what this year brings, I know one thing for certain that having my students access high quality texts online is just as important as it was in person. I have been curating our classroom library for years, finding books that represent its readers and give them windows into the world. I have our first day read alouds planned, Your Name is a Song by Jamilah Thompkins Bigelow and The Day You Begin by Jaqueline Woodson. I have been brainstorming ways to get real books into hands of our learners in a safe way and I know about online resources too, Commonlit, Readworks, Epic, etc.
I would love to run a book mobile or figure out a way to do social distance book drops for our class in the fall! https://t.co/3FErQfL00m
— Helena (@mstaylor_teach) July 31, 2020
Students deserve hands on learning experiences.
Engaging students in hands on learning while teaching virtually is a challenge but not impossible. I am searching for those opportunities because I value the engagement and empowerment students feel when they use their hands to create material. Some of the math activities we used in the spring from Youcubed helped our learners engage in math using their hands. Some of their interest projects gave them this opportunity as well. Just because our year starts virtually does not mean that our learners only have to work online to complete their school work. If we can find ways to connect but also build physical objects together how powerful would that be?
Never stop learning.
I am a lifelong learner and I bring that to my classroom. This summer it looked like me going to webinars, taking a couple of courses and reading, a lot. For me this summer has been spent connecting with other educators about antiracism and bias, trauma informed teaching and social emotional learning. Part of the learning I did was starting this blog, I hope that I will be able to point to this with my students and say, “This is what I am learning from blogging and now I want you to try this too, what do you want to share with the world?” I am excited to bring blogging a portfolios to my students during the 2020/21 school year and what a great year to give it a try!
When faced with constant changes and uncertainty returning to our core can provide us with the stability that we need to make plans for the coming school year. Please, share your ideas and plans with me!
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