Distant learning - how did i run my classroom?

Even though full lockdown was awhile ago for us in New Zealand, with the recent new cases in the community we are looking at the true possibility of a nationwide full lockdown again. I want to do my part and have been asked to share what I did in lockdown before. This post will share roughly what I did and have links to freebies you could use. 
For background knowledge, I teach Year 0-3 students and we were fortunate that all students in my class had access to a device, internet and the online learning we had set up. 

---

General online learning - what did I do?

• We met daily for zoom sessions with me. These were half an hour and were targeted curriculum areas like writing, reading, maths, phonics/word work, art
• We had themed days where students could wear something, bring something or we would do something fun
• We had school wide optional morning meetings at 9.00am for 15 minutes to catch up, share news and be together
• We had school assemblies once a week to share student of the weeks, fun challenges and work we had been doing
• I ran 1:1 opt in sessions 2 times a week for students to have learning just with me on reading, writing or maths.

What technology did we use?

• We created a school Google site home learning site where we shared our work and choice boards for students to find and use
• My class used Seesaw to communicate and share their work from home. This was to share learning activities for students to complete, learning from home and messages to parents to keep in contact
• I had set up Epic for reading, Teach your monster to read, and Prodigy for learning at home. Other technology apps were optional but those 3 were set up for logins to go out on the first day of lockdown

How I run it?
My school did a choice board of activities that were similar, but different. I used a must-do, may-do and you pick system where there were certain activities that were a must-do, then some things they could choose from. 
Of course parents were able to choose whether this worked for their students or didn't, and there was no pressure to complete it all. 
​

The must-do activities were usually one reading themed, one maths themed, one writing themed and then a check in. There were also two different variations of the choice board which differentiated for needs, with students being able to choose 1, some from both or all options. 
This was a Google slide that was embedded into our Google site and had all the links on it for students to use. There were screenshots of activities and specific key help for parents to be able to support the learning happening. I also talked through this every Monday so students could see the learning that was happening and the activities for the week. 

How did it go?
Overall I really loved the online learning. Anything technology I thrive off and found it a great opportunity to stretch my learning, change my practice and use technology to enhance learning. Yes it was hard (which I will share below) but I feel my students didn't regress too much in the time we didn't have in class. 
I had 90-100% attendance in every online zoom session, with students being prepared for the session by bringing the materials, being present and engaged online and using technology in a new way we might not have before. The learning was completed regularly by 72% of my students with many doing parts here and there. Of course I wanted them to be happy so there was no expectation for it to HAVE to be done. The 1:1 sessions were always booked each week and were used to target students in discussion with parents. 

Any downsides?
Yes of course there were some which every teacher faced!

• Time - there wasn't enough to do your job justice. Yes I feel like I did all that I could with what I had but of course time to do more would have been great
• Differentiation for all levels like you would do in class is hard. Group work was harder to achieve but Seesaw did help make this happen - thanks to Seesaw for being amazing!
• Ensuring students were engaged in the learning and making the most of who I was as a teacher. I wanted to help them all achieve and found a HUGE amount of pressure on me to do a great job. Especially in those half an hour zoom sessions!
• I missed my kids! Man I missed them a lot!

Want even more ideas and in depth on what I did? Check out my online PLD recording that I ran in April!

Freebies for your online learning

Zoom activities sheets with ideas for teachers! 

There are 5 in this pdf idea pack that can be used to support other online ideas you might have. 

Zoom rules
This zoom rule sheet was helpful for my students to know the expectations and what was meant to be done. 

Weekly overview chart
This is a Google Slides template that can be used as your overview for your students. What is the theme, what is the focus and what will you need. 

Seesaw check in templates
Using Seesaw and looking for check in templates? Here are a range of examples covering different ideas. These can be added to your Seesaw library via the links. 

Eye Spy with my little eye freebie
This can be used on Seesaw or Google classroom. Based on first initial sounds and then also items for them to find. 

Letter fitness
This is a great way to get students moving and recognising letters. I used this in a zoom session and was lots of fun.

Home learning sticker book
This sticker book was a great online sticker motivation for my students. They got stickers for different aspects of work they completed and were assigned via Seesaw. 

Need more Seesaw help? Check out my Youtube channel for PLD recordings and online tips.