“I am able to workout, relax, and complete the work in a timely manner, with no distractions.”. The new regime may be working better for her, but it’s clear that many—perhaps including her disruptive classmates—are falling behind. But it’s not a tiny handful, either, and the unplanned break from the physical classroom may be bringing to light  hidden reasons some kids struggle while others succeed. Ohio children who normally get free or reduced-price lunches at school, but have been learning remotely, will soon receive additional food benefits, according to the Ohio Department of … I write about retooling K-12 education to address social inequality. Students can learn at their own pace. She is also the co-author, with Judith C. Hochman, of The Writing Revolution: A Guide to Advancing Thinking Through Writing in All Subjects and Grades" (Jossey-Bass, 2017). One clue is that Veronique says her school “puts a big emphasis on collaborative learning; approximately 80 percent of our work is done in teacher-assigned groups of three to five students.” There may be more of it at Veronique’s school than others, but group work is a widespread practice; during their training, teachers are told that it’s preferable to direct instruction. Cassidy Kaht, who teaches kindergarten at a public elementary school in Scottsdale, Arizona, said she has been trying out different teaching methods, learning what works the best for her group of kids as she goes. 1. In the responses we gathered from our educators, we found recurring themes—like social situations and the inflexible  bell schedule—that simply don’t work well for all kids. While the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends 8-10 hours a night for teens ages 12-18 and 12 hours for children ages 6-12, a 2018 study of high school students across 30 states found more than 70 percent of students were not getting enough sleep during the school year. It shouldn’t take a pandemic to point up basic defects in the way we go about teaching—but let’s hope that reforms in these areas can serve as silver linings to a horrific crisis. Lunches are often filled with club meetings. Making remote learning effective and engaging with Microsoft for Education. With remote learning, immunocompromised or otherwise disabled students have the same chances to learn as everyone else without putting their health at risk or being subject to bullying. Called Knowledge on the Go, the series is freely available online to anyone. When faculty can put their teaching egos aside and use negative student feedback to improve their remote teaching practices, students will benefit and hopefully faculty will, too, because they will learn how best to meet the learning needs of their students. Teachers told us that many of their students like working at their own pace during school closures, an insight some say they'll take back to their classrooms when they return. Although this is changing, the imbalance and unequal treatment still exist and this dictates the kind of job remote learners can take. Those could include, “What did you wonder about X? Students are able to independently learn, with teacher guidance as-needed. As part of their training, K-12 teachers are encouraged to skip over “lower-order” aspects of thinking, like basic comprehension, and go right to “higher-order” tasks, like analysis. In the classroom, Cary told the APM podcast Educate, she would often have trouble getting students to answer questions—out of fear they would give the wrong answer, she speculates. Math is easier because the teacher has the time to explain concepts and hold online office hours. Though we’ve seen many comments—from both students and teachers—about missing the in-person connections and relationships at school, for some students, school socialization may be fraught with anxiety, our teachers suggest. For a few of the teachers, at least, it’s inspired them to consider making permanent changes when they return to the classroom. There are ways to use technology to do anonymous polling in face-to-face situations—or Cary could regularly administer brief multiple-choice quizzes in hard-copy form. F… “They’re taking ownership a bit more because they’re no longer under the micromanagement of the school day.”. But when teaching over Zoom, she uses its polling function to have students answer multiple-choice questions anonymously. Teachers too, have also been under increasing scrutiny in the last decade-plus to prepare students to hit benchmarks on standardized testing, pressure that trickles down to students, who are twice as likely to report unhealthy levels of stress during the school year compared to the summer. The Nashville, Tenn., schools made the decision this month to stick to full-time remote learning when the 2020-21 school year begins. Students who are the most bullied have also been found to have lower academic performance than their non-bullied peers. But the problem often is that students haven’t understood the material in the first place—and you can’t analyze what you don’t understand. If we hold on to these learnings beyond a crisis, we will be less fragile in an already uncertain and changing context. For Teachers Remote School Round 2: How to Improve Distance Learning for Students with ADHD. Effectiveness. That’s not to say it’s the norm. Whether you teach online or you're considering it, here are some teaching strategies that will help you engage kids in the remote classroom. When schools return to something like normal, perhaps educators and administrators will glean lessons from experiences like these. I think it is partly because so many things like sports and social activities are no longer happening and they have more time than they ever had to work on school work,” said Kasey Short, a middle school English and social studies teacher in Charlotte, North Carolina, by way of explanation. Assign group project to students related to the learning objective. 7 Benefits of a Virtual Classroom ; Resource Articles // 7 Benefits of a Virtual Classroom Online learning has many benefits, one of which is the flexibility afforded by the virtual classroom. “The reason I enjoy online learning is because of the opportunity to structure my day efficiently,” wrote a 10th grade student in English teacher Katie Burrows-Stone’s class survey. Remote learning provides some benefits worth considering. The quality of the work students are doing remotely is just as high as before, Butts says. Remote Learning for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder Coping with COVID-19 Changes To Do due to thecoronavirus This publication is pursuant to a grant from the Illinois State Board of Education and funded 100% with Autism Training and Technical Assistance Project dollars. This is the most obvious advantage of remote learning these days, but it is just as valid in the absence of a pandemic: learning at a distance is safer. Resist traditional grading. It’s late Tuesday night and my kids need a bath–and, well, this isn’t complicated: public schools in the United States need to continue to use remote learning in the 2020-2021 school year. Before, “he spent at least a third of class time trying to maintain order.”, “The fact that I am learning so much better away from the classroom,” Veronique concludes, “shows that something is wrong with our system.”. To help parents and guardians support their children, we have created a Remote Learning Guide for students and parents. eLearning has a positive influence on an organization’s profitability. What is happening? This is likely due to remote learning being a more personalised, independent activity – allowing people to study through methods that best suit them, and thus leading to better academic results. Edutopia® and Lucas Education Research™ are trademarks or registered trademarks of the George Lucas Educational Foundation in the U.S. and other countries. Natalie Wexler is the author of The Knowledge Gap: The Hidden Cause of America's Broken Education System—and How to Fix It (Avery, 2019). As a result, remote students are more likely to stick with their courses. Cary finds the ability to instantly check all students’ understanding “exhilarating,” and it’s something she’ll miss when normal classes resume. Her articles and essays have appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other publications. We may even learn that some remote learning could be desirable for what it affords our students. After enrichment activities were canceled due to shelter-in-place orders, our teachers say they also saw a difference in some students’ performance. Three stories about some unexpected benefits of remote learning hold lessons for how to get schools to serve all students more effectively. “He says that now that the pressure of state testing is off, he feels he can really learn.”. A larger percentage of those that enroll for distance education are actually persons who are working. As class-size continues to increase at … Establish your presence right away. Natalie Wexler is the author of The Knowledge Gap: The Hidden Cause of America's Broken Education System—and How to Fix It (Avery, 2019). Teams relies on additional Microsoft 365 capabilities such as Microsoft 365 groups, Exchange, SharePoint and OneDriv… ways that face-to-face instruction can be improved. 1/2 page written reflection is … Teams Assignments have built-in rubrics. In fact, statistics show that e-learning increases retention rates by 25-60%. All school year, Montenique Woodard’s seventh period, her last class of the day, has been her hardest. One can study after work, in the middle of th… Many students are struggling to adapt to remote learning: Digital access and connectivity remain a pervasive equity issue; stay-at-home orders have magnified existing problems in familial dynamics; and, universally, teachers and students grapple with how to replicate the engagement and discourse from an in-person classroom. Because remote learning requires the student to check in at set times to watch lectures and presentations, it has a higher level of accountability than online learning. Many districts are transitioning to remote learning — even for elementary school students who are as young as six and seven years old. The inequality associated with an online learning degree is probably the biggest con of distance learning. They could start using group work more sparingly, ensuring that all students have understood what’s been taught, and adopting literacy curricula that build the kind of knowledge that equips children for academic success. “There are kids who have a hard time getting to class at 8:30, but they might do really well getting their work done at 10:30 at night or even 10:30 in the morning. “Students who have been victims of physical or verbal bullying while at school are likely to be relieved to be home in a safe space,” said Elena Spathis, high school Spanish teacher in Hillsdale, New Jersey. Engagement has skyrocketed. And kids find the themes in the curriculum engaging—some of them, like “courage under fire,” especially so in the current environment. Classroom Management: For Veronique Mintz, a … Students are able to study any time, and anywhere as long as they have reliable Internet. “One student told me he likes remote learning better because he no longer feels the extreme pressure of failing,” said Cathleen Beachboard, a middle school English teacher in Fauquier County, Virginia, who says other students in her class have expressed similar sentiments. It's harder for a student to fall behind when they must check in every week for virtual classes. “There were some points where I threw in a question that I thought was going to be an easy one,” she told Educate, “to sort of get things going. Educators and parents need support to help make this work. But she’s also found that many are misunderstanding the content. But maybe it doesn’t have to stop. She is also the co-author, with. Butts also appreciates the recorded videos of lessons created by the publisher of the curriculum his district uses, Wit & Wisdom. It’s not necessarily the case that these resources and accommodations weren’t available before the pandemic. In an op-ed for The New York Times, the 13-year-old describes what a typical class was like at her school before the pandemic: students repeatedly talking out of turn, destroying classroom materials, disrespecting teachers, and hitting and kicking each other. “I can't say enough about how this closure has changed my entire approach to teaching because I see how it has been an amazing respite for so many students.”. In her three years of middle school, she says, she encountered only a few teachers “who had strong command of their classrooms.”, Now, with recorded video lessons, Veronique can work at her own pace. It’s also much easier for parents to help kids with their assignments. Increasingly, teachers in our audience are reporting that a handful of their students—shy kids, hyperactive kids, highly creative kids—are suddenly doing better with remote learning than they were doing in the physical classroom. by Terry Heick. What are Some Benefits of Remote Learning? For students with IEPs or 504 Plans, the secret to an improved distance learning experience is parent-teacher coordination, reliable routines, and these at … From our research in elementary schools, there are clear benefits for students when ESL and classroom teachers collaborate to provide aligned … Other teachers point to the changing academic expectations during the pandemic as a causal link. By … As it turns out, engaging students who are miles away necessitates a new set of teaching strategies. There are a number of people with the wrong perception of remote learning. In the weeks since the COVID-19 outbreak first hit China, our Education customers in the region have done amazing things to keep students learning while they transition to learning remotely. And for our younger students, we’re using starfall.com, which provides full access to video learning as support for their handouts.” Now here’s what I’m extrapolating from this, in terms of benefits to students in SPED programs. With COVID-19 forcing schools to close for the last three months, Elementary School students, teachers, and parents have felt the brunt of remote learning. Rubric grading helps increase assignment transparency for students and allows you to give more meaningful feedback. Why would anyone need to have seven classes? Welcome your students to the learning community. Staff, instructors, and students should have identities established to facilitate collaboration. This is a quick, simple post. Not having to come up with his own content has given him time to find workarounds when kids don’t have the books they need—for instance, online videos to flesh out a unit on forensic anthropology. While teacher-training programs tout the supposed benefits of collaborative learning, they spend little time on how to maintain control of a class—even a traditional, teacher-led one. It makes it easy … Remote learning and other kinds of education technology generally benefit high-achieving students but hold others back. “I think a huge part of [some students’ work improving] is that we’ve dramatically ratcheted down the total workload in order to make tasks accessible rather than overwhelming,” said Mark Gardner, high school English teacher in Camas, Washington. “I have the time to sleep eight hours a night every night [now],” said Ingrid, a high school junior in California, when asked what she likes about remote learning. After school, many participate in extracurriculars or sports—often to impress colleges—or work a part-time job. “I think not having those everyday distractions in school has really allowed for kids like him to focus on the work and not necessarily all the social things going on because some kids can't separate that out,” said Woodard, who teaches in Washington, D.C. We’ve been hearing that a lot. said Rosie Reid, a high school English teacher and the 2019 California Teacher of the Year. Lastly, teachers commented that the difference they’ve observed in some students’ performance may be tied, simply, to sleep. While school schedules differ by district, many students then face back-to-back classes with little reprieve. Students interact on a discussion board and share one take-away and one question regarding each reading. 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