When you are ready to transition to teaching online, here are some helpful guidelines to get you started and activity ideas and resources to support your virtual classroom.
Keep the parents informed
Make sure that parents are aware of the items that will be required for their children’s home learning and the time of learning.
Set rules
Create your own rules for your online classroom or guidelines for studying at home. Students should be sent home with a set of guidelines for learning online or at home and for communicating with you and with one another.
Prepare learners for the day
For example, a morning message should be sent out at the start of every “digital day.” Because of this direct communication from the teacher, kids can feel more connected to you and their classmates. You could send this to parents via email or post it in a shared classroom or the school chat room. You might also consider including the names of your pupils in your messages (a few messages per day) to help them feel more connected to you (for example, “Rosemary, I’m so delighted you loved yesterday’s reading!” or “Ben, I’m sure you’ll enjoy sharing the Bug on a rug with your parents.”).
Keep the class active
Keep the kids on their feet! By utilizing GoNoodle, you can ensure that children are connected to daily energy boosters and brain breaks. You could propose 2-3 times per day. An excellent idea for younger children is to have them instruct their parents or babysitter/nanny on the class project, such as a Bug in the Rug or a Baby Shark.
Have interactive learning
Consider using a web-based resource such as Flipgrid to demonstrate interactive learning scenarios. While older kids will be able to utilize this on their own, younger pupils may require the aid of their parents.
Maintain a sense of belonging
A daily check-in with each student is encouraged to foster a sense of belonging and importance among them and keep them involved in the learning process. This should be in the form of a discussion forum on Google Classroom or a Google Doc, where every student provides comments to a specific question and where each student responds to two other students.
Subjects can range from academic (such as “What do you think to be the most significant component of the brain’s structure?”) to personal (such as “What do you regard to be the most important component of the brain’s structure?”) (Describe the ideal birthday cake.) To foster conversation, make sure that the questions are open-ended!
For pupils less than ten, they can be drawn or written down in an at-home notebook, which students are asked to bring back to school when they return from their vacation or vacation.
Review the classes
Reflections daily are analogous to closing circles. According to research, reflection is beneficial to all learners regarding knowledge retention. Prepare questions that require students to reflect on their learning by utilizing simple prompts such as Three Words, Picture This (a drawing of anything that happened throughout the day), or What’s Stuck with Me to inspire reflection.