Distance learning has definitely put my Masters in Digital Learning Design to the test in the last year! Our schools closed last March, and a couple of months later I wrote a post about how my 2nd grade team was designing for online learning that allowed our young scholars to be self-directed at home.
Now, since we will likely be in some type of distance learning format through the end of the school year (whether fully online or some type of hybrid or blended model), I wanted to share some up-to-date tips for supporting more student self-direction at the K-2 level, based on my (and some of my colleagues's) experiences this year having to train students in a fully online format in self-directed routines.
Provide explicit technology training for students
Do not assume that students in the digital age will be able to figure it out on their own (or that parents will). Explicit technology training & tutorial videos help our students learn use devices and apps more quickly. Plan on reteaching every time you introduce a new tool. I know it can be hard to "give up" live class time for tech training, but putting in the work up front to help students learn the tool means that the technology is less likely to get in the way of their learning once you start using the tool with curriculum.
What tech tutorials might you provide to students?
Consider not just app tutorials, but what general tech skills students (and families) might struggle with at home, or what new challenges might arise when sharing a computer at home. Click to view an example of a tech mini-lesson we recorded for our 2nd graders.
Some of the topics that we developed training on included:
- How to create & navigate multiple Google profiles on a shared computer
- How to use multiple tabs in your internet browser
- How to use ZOOM (both on a Chromebook or on a tablet)
- How to view & turn in work on Google Classroom
- How to find & turn in activities on Seesaw
- How to use our online reading curriculum
- How to use our online math curriculum
- How to copy & paste links/web addresses
Technology "badging" system
We also started a technology badging system for students. Students earn digital badges for learning and demonstrating technology skills. They get excited about collecting badges and they are learning a lot of skills in the process. I started creating the badges in Google Drawings, and I paste them into a Google Sheet as students earn them. Click to view an example of a badging lesson.
Google Classroom in K-2
After lots of trying, failing, and changing the way we do things, the following ideas have helped make Google Classroom much more accessible for our primary-aged students and emerging readers.
Create "Topics" in Google Classroom
We create two topics for each week and name them "Week #.... self-directed (dates)" and "Week #... class time with Ms...." Asynchronous lessons get tagged with the "self-directed" topic and resources that we might use during our synchronous class time get tagged with the "class time" topic.
Creating Assignments for young learners
- One post per assignment: In the spring we tried a few different formats, but now that we're back to a more regular school day schedule, the work load has increased. We discovered that posting every lesson as a separate assignment allowed students to check off each lesson as they go and use Google Classroom as a "to-do" list of sorts.
- Use emojis 👍🏻: Give students visual clues with emojis. I use emojis often in the assignment names and in the instructions to support emerging readers with understanding instructions. Now, when they see a green book emoji on a post, they know right away that they're doing something in their green phonics books. When they see a pencil, they know there will be some writing.
- Video directions on each post ⏯: I try to record myself reading directions aloud on each assignment post. Videos are always titled "listen to directions..." and assignment name on the back. The "listen to directions...." video are separate from the lesson videos. These are strictly a screencast of me reading directions on a post. If students are confused by directions, or struggling to read, they can read along with me when they watch the video.
- Live class meeting links 🔗: This year we organized all of the weekly meeting links into Clever, since our district has an account. That way all regularly used links are in one place-- Zoom links, Google Classroom, Seesaw, Epic, and other creation apps. I created one class meeting link that reoccurs every week, so the link never changes. As did our reading interventionist, our art teacher and the other homeroom teachers. If your district doesn't use Clever, organize Zoom or Hangout links together under one topic in Classroom. Students could use the same links each week for meetings that they need to attend, including links to class meetings, art class, office hours, school clubs, etc.
- Try Mote 🎤: Mote is an extension for Google Classroom that lets you record audio feedback for students in a document or in Google Classroom itself. It has been a game changer! My students love being able to listen to feedback or notes that I leave in comments to them. Mote is also another great way for me to leave a read aloud of instructions on the bottom of a post.
Designing digital lessons in K-2
- Keep it short ⏱: In a classroom we think a lot about how much time young learners are being asked to sit and listen. The old rule of thumb -- 1 minute for each year of a person's age-- is still true in a virtual setting. Keep it short! If you are teaching 5 year olds, keep the video lessons shorter than that. For our 2nd graders, video lessons are about 6 minutes or less. Any longer (just like in a classroom) and they start to get wiggly and distracted. If they are no longer focused, my lesson is no longer effective.
Make it hands-on 🧮: I am a believer in constuctivist and constructionist theories that we usually learn best by experimenting and doing. Just because students may not have access to the manipulatives in our school buildings, doesn't mean we can't find ways to incorporate hands-on experiences. My team sent home a box of materials we call "Innovation Kits" with the student's workbooks. The boxes include dice, play doh, recycled materials, colored tiles for counting, a small succulent, a hand full of Lego bricks, and more. Things that cost us little or no money and we weren't afraid to have get lost. We've also had students find things that they already have at home that they can use for math and sciences. This week's counting collections were made up of macaroni, beans, legos, Q-tips, toy trains, rice, and more!
counting collections from home
- Virtual Manipulatives 🎲: There are also a lot of great virtual manipulatives available online for free that students can use to make sense of math and science concepts. Click this link to check out my post on virtual manipulatives for math. For science, we've had students become observers of natural phenomena around them-- plants, the moon-- to allow them to engage in science off the page. Mystery Science is also a great resource for low to no-prep hands-on investigations or printables that you can send home or drop into a Seesaw activity... and they are still offering a free distance learning version of many of their materials.
- Make it predictable 🤔: Incorporating predictable learning formats lessens the cognitive load for students, allowing them to focus more on the content and less on learning how to use the technology or complete an activity properly. Our phonics routine is a popular one with our 2nd graders-- they love knowing that every lessons starts with a mini-lesson video by my colleague, Mrs. Hughes, and then typically follows with a workbook page or word work game. Inspired by Jon Corippo & Marlena Hebern's EduProtocols, we've also created a new set of reuseable templates for learning routines in math and reading, including some #MathReps activities, counting collections, frayer models for vocabulary and story maps (click to see our shared templates on Seesaw). The best part is, we will continue to use these routines when we go back to school, to allow students's more independence in the classroom while I can focus more time to focus on small group teaching).
- Don't forget opportunities for creating 🎨: While we do like some predictability, we still make sure to make learning fun. As a school centered around design thinking, it's a priority for our students to engage weekly in elements of design, creativity and innovation. Our 2nd graders start every day, as we are all getting logged into our morning meeting, with a "Do Now" creativity sprint. These short warm-ups range from drawing challenges to scavenger hunts to creative math challenges. Our young learners also have opportunities to create digitally with free tools like Scratch or Scratch Jr., Google Drawings, Seesaw drawings, Adobe Spark and more. They engage in low to no-prep art and music lessons (we are lucky to have arts teachers recording lessons, but we've also pulled lessons from YouTube recorded by teacher from all across the country). They make and build their ideas using recycled materials at home.
- Design with UDL in mind 💭: If you aren't familiar with Universal Design for Learning (UDL), it is a framework for the design of instructional goals, assessments, lessons and materials that is broken into 3 major guidelines -- engagement, representation and action/expression. What I most appreciate about the model is that it reminds us to design every lesson with all learners in mind. Using UDL guidelines for design ensures that we have scaffolds built into every lesson (no need to create 3 or 4 different versions of a lesson to meet different needs) and help develop agency in our young learners.
- Multiple means of representation 📖🎧📺: Design lessons so students have access to text, visuals, videos and hands-on opportunities in the lesson. It sounds like a lot, but once you get into a design routine it comes together pretty quickly. An example-- our independent reading lessons are posted with a story to read, an audio file to listen to while they read along, visuals to help front load vocabulary in a story, and we use TPR (total physical response) to explicitly teach tricky vocabulary or phonics patterns during live lessons.
- Multiple means of engagement ✏️📹💬: We incorporate student choice into most of what we do. Literacy choice boards let them decide whether to read, practice word work skills, or write during part of their literacy time. They have similar choice with weekly math choice boards. Students often also have choice of how they demonstrate learning-- type or hand write, draw or create a digital image, write or speak responses, and in some larger projects students can choose topics of study and/or how they present their learning (video, animation, speech, writing, etc.). Tools like Seesaw, Flipgrid, and Google Tools allow our students lots of choice in sharing what they know.
- Goal setting 🎯: Students engage in simple weekly goal setting and reflections. We train them explicitly in how to do this for the first several weeks, and they it become an independent task in which students think about what they need more practice in and/or want to learn this week. They document that goal at the start of the week and reminded throughout the week to keep it in mind while working on learning tasks. This helps them determine where to place the more of their effort, or how to make strategic choices for their learning. Fridays are reflection days and students are asked to think about what new skills they learned during the week, and what they still want to work on the next week.
- Executive functioning skills 🗓: Students (and many adults) of all ages benefit from explicit teaching of executive functioning skills (i.e. how to self-manage and monitor progress). We start every year with explicit stamina training, timing students during work time to show them how long they work without getting distracted (they love seeing the graph increase over time). This year, we've had to take additional steps to help students develop skills for managing their time at home on their own. We've taught students how to:
- Use timers throughout the day to time their breaks and work sessions (some buy timers, but there are also plenty of free apps and YouTube timers).
- We've explicitly taught them how to use the calendar and to-do list features in Google Classroom.
- We've taught them how to create their own to-do lists on paper (or sometimes provide them with a template).
- We've taught them how to break a task into smaller parts.
- We've taught them strategies for goal-setting and making strategic learning choices.
- I also like to have students teach each other. Just this week, as I noticed students work stamina waning, students shared with each other their strategies for staying focused at home (ideas included hiding toys, using a timer, finding a quiet corner, do everything before a certain time, ask Ms. Haughs for help, etc.)
