Virtual Learning Diary

Singapore announced all schools moving to Home-Based Learning at the end of March 2020.

Today now marks the first day of my international school's Home-Based Learning (HBL) program being open for pupils and I am absolutely buzzing after my first virtual lesson!!

I'm going to write a short blog that I will update throughout my virtual learning experience and aim to share things/resources that have worked, things that haven't and give shout outs to all my amazing colleagues along the way.

Week 1: April 6th - April 9th

Planning Day A - 6th April

So I was definitely apprehensive and nervous starting out. After seeing all the tweets and comments from teachers all around the world my biggest concerns were what tech will we use to stay connected, will pupils even want/be able to engage and how will I keep pupils and their growth at the centre of all I do?

After going through the whole school plan put together by my colleagues (@costich and @daveburke82) I felt reassured! For secondary pupils, we had decided upon a two modules a day approach, one at 9 am and one at 1 pm. There would be one module per subject area per cycle. This created a four-day cycle as most of our secondary pupils do 8 different subject areas.

Planning Day B - 7th April

I started the day feeling fired up and ready to go - I sat down and planned out some self-guided slides that pupils could use to complete Maths tasks asynchronously. I then set up corresponding task tabs in Google Classroom (GC). Exploring the functionality of the different tasks on GC was a lot of fun and I managed to create tasks that ranged from uploading a document/picture to multiple-choice questions.

I shared my slides and Google Classroom tasks with my colleagues and gained some really positive feedback which was awesome. It's definitely lovely to gain positive feedback whilst working from home - it gave me a huge sense of achievement and productivity today.

To access the slides I made you can download them for free here on TES and look at a snapshot below. The snapshot also includes a few pictures of the corresponding tasks set on GC too.

Day 1 of HBL - 8th April

After my first day of teaching online I felt so incredibly proud of my pupils. Almost all pupils rocked up to my Google Meet on time and were properly engaged with the tasks set - I was so proud of their adaptability and resilience!!

The best part of the day was setting pupils off on the GC tasks via Google Meet with me staying on Google Meet if they needed to pop back on to ask questions. Pupils were absolutely amazing at communicating their questions via Google Meet, Google Hangout, and emails. Almost all of them ended our question conversations with a "thank-you so much" and it really gave me that "wow - I'm actually making a difference today" buzz!

Day 2 of HBL - 9th April

Same same as Day 1 - I'm starting to get used to the timetable we have that involved the following:

8:50 - Meet Homeroom on Google Meet

9:00 - Meet class for lesson 1 on Google Meet. Set them off on tasks and meet back at 9:55 to check in.

13:00 - Meet class for lesson 2 on Google Meet. Set them off on tasks and meet back at 13:55 to check-in.

The main component of my online lessons is providing a reflection space at the end of every lesson. I've asked pupils to set up a Maths learning journal and post the entry for each lesson on GC via the "Question" function. The best part about this task was receiving this lovely feedback from one of my year 12 DP pupils...

"Our first module for math went better than I expected in terms of me being able to follow instructions clearly. I really appreciate the time and effort you took into making sure that everything was in order and were able to follow. As a result, it really helped make sure I was on track throughout the module and that I completed the assigned work. In addition, it really kept me at calm and less stressed as I was able to follow and go at my own speed. Thank you Ms. Staple!!!!!"

Week 2: April 13th - April 17th

For me, this week started out low energy and feeling run-down. I think after the adrenaline rush and strain on my working memory of having to prepare for something so new like E-Learning I wore myself out and spent way too much time on my screen. (I've been reading Why don't children like school? by Daniel T. Willingham hence my thoughts about working memory. Have a read of my blog EduBook Recommendations for more info on this fantastic one!)

During the first week, I spent a lot longer on my laptop than usual and a lot longer on my phone communicating with those I'd normally chat with face-to-face. This definitely took it's toll on my sleep and then impacted my overall energy!

This week I decided to refocus on balance and took more time talking with really good friends, talking about how to manage wellbeing during this time and trying to spend some time away from the screen.

Key learning point this week for me regarding well-being has been playing games on my phone excessively might feel satisfying at the time but 100% de-energises me and stop me from sleeping well, which then leads to a vicious cycle!

Week 3: April 20th - April 24th

I started the week off by deleting all gaming apps on my phone and trying out list writing in my diary. List writing was a tip from one of my wonderful friends back in the UK and it genuinely has helped me stay balanced this week.

Frequently on my list to complete each day are super simple entries like:

Do usual morning routine
Drink some tea on the balcony
Read
Do some of my online courses (currently signed up for Laurie Santos' Yale course called The Science of Wellbeing and numerous courses on Future Learn).

Having these mini-daily lists has helped me focus on doing things that I know help me stay happy! They have also helped me in practicing the rewiring activities Laurie sets out in The Science of Wellbeing course. My favourite so far has been naming 5 things you are grateful for each evening and spending 5-10 minutes really visualising them with your eyes shut1

With Singapore's move to E-Learning taking place after most of the rest of Asia I spent this week really focusing on the advice of home-based learning experienced educators on Twitter.

My main focus taken from this advice has been...

Put making connections in a new learning environment first, learning and growth will follow from that!

With this in mind, I felt that my Google Classroom mixed with Google Meet approach had been going well. With 100% of pupils logging on and taking part in these online lessons.

The feedback that I had had from my pupils via the reflection tasks was proving that pupils were happy with the setup and felt it was organised. They also loved the freedom to work asynchronously but also meet back up with the whole class at regular intervals during our lesson slot in the HBL timetable.

I think sticking to what I knew how to use first really helped to promote connections during HBL and kept me from feeling super overwhelmed. But I am an obsessive learner and trying out new things in my teaching is what I live for!!

I signed up for the Teaching Online Summit by AppsEvents during Week 2 of HBL. I was so exhausted that I only managed to watch about 30 minutes of a 3 hour event but what I did see was Sethi De Clercq (@SethiDeClerq) explaining how to use Loom.

Loom is an awesome free online screen recording and video making tool that allows you to film yourself explaining something through a bubble with your face in it whilst presenting what's on your screen!

Here's the video on Sethi's YouTube channel Flipped Learning Tutorials.

So far I've now made a fair few little Loom's for my lovely classes and the feedback from my students has been awesome. One pupil said "Wow - it was just like being in the classroom with you" which was such a wonderful thing to hear!

Here are a couple I've made so far...

- A quick how-to Loom that I shared with my department. Two members have now started using it too and even encouraged their pupils to use it in their Maths projects!

- A round-up Loom of our first HBL module with pupils questions answered and ideas shared for my year 12 class.

- A well-being Chats Loom for my year 11 homeroom.

I just downloaded the Chrome Extension which then allows you to jump straight to recording your video from any web-page. As I mostly use G-Suite for all my creation this worked really well for me. However, one of my department members noted that if you are using desktop apps you need to download the desktop version of Loom.

I've decided that the best way to not feel overwhelmed whilst planning HBL lessons but also ensuring you are providing the best and most authentic learning experiences for your pupils is to try one new thing at a time. My next to try tools are:

An online whiteboard tool for live presenting, but thinking at the moment I would need a tablet and pen as writing maths from a laptop and mouse to typing is way slower than handwriting.
Google Meet breakout rooms for group work.
SlideMania to jazz up the looks of the lessons I am producing
Use of LAUNCH (from Empower by John Spencer and AJ Juliani) to introduce an Internal Assessment (IA) style project for my year 12s.

Week 4: April 27th - April 30th

All in all this felt like a really good week. I felt incredibly productive and energised with a few waves of feeling "meh" this week.

I finished reading Empower by John Spencer and AJ Juliani (check out my EduBook Recommendations for the full review) and I felt super empowered myself! It was such a great and easy read. Written in little snippets with lots of awesome stories about the author's lives and pupils! It was a great book to be reading at the moment as it wasn't too heavy or hard to read due to how well they broke down the concepts into bite-size chunks!

I got blogging again which felt great too and I loved sharing on twitter and my Instagram (@educatinglobsters) and gaining some fantastic feedback from my PLN!

I also took part in @mediabyexample chats on Twitter all about how we can use social media for advocacy and promote this with our pupils too. I was a great great chat and I loved this question...

It really got me to rethink what it is that I am so passionate about within education that I will openly advocate for on twitter. Here was my response...

Sharing like this on twitter via the excellent fast chats not only helps me reflect and rethink my understanding and passions within education, but it helps me connect with like-minded educators who often provide that much needed cheerleading!

If your looking to get some teacher fire going - join @mediabyexample next chat Sunday 17th May at 11 am (Hong Kong time).

This chat was also awesome because it enabled me to connect with the awesome educator @naomitoland. If you like what I talk about on my blog and agree with my vision for people-focused education, open-minded compassionate collaboration, and cultivating creativity, innovation, and openness at every level in education check out her amazing content. Click here for her YouTube channel and here to download her Empathetic Educators app.

Week 5: May 4th - May 8th

As weeks go, this one went by so fast. In Singapore we had a public holiday on Thursday for Vesak Day, meaning we almost had a 3 day week followed by a 1 day week combined!

The fire from Sunday's @mediabyexample chat spurred me on and I hit the ground running on Monday. I learned how to use Google Classroom's rubric function for marking, which was easy to use but I am not sure how useful it will be in providing in detail feedback.

For the MYP assessment tasks in Maths, we have pretty complex rubrics often linked to questions and specific wording. Google Classroom's rubric doesn't quite allow you to see all of the guidelines you put into the rubric whilst marking so not sure if this is a functionality I will use with any future assessments. If you're reading this and have any suggestions on how to mark using rubrics quickly online, that doesn't involve two screens, post me a little comment below. 😜

I spent a lot of time on Monday too, feeding back to students about their online submissions. Mostly small little tasks used to break up the Home-Based Modules I've made. The best part about this was sparking conversations with pupils that lead to them un-submitting, improving their work on my feedback, and resubmitting.

I definitely think I'll continue to use Google Classroom submissions to monitor classwork and provide timely written feedback as I think it's such a great way for pupils to track improvements and not forget about a piece of work when it's done!

I started reading Learn Like A Pirate by Paul Solarz. I haven't quite gotten into it yet but I am thinking it's a great one to read after Empower by John Spencer and A.J. Juliani as they core such similar concepts, like project-based learning being used to empower pupils!

I also took part in another awesome twitter chat this week with @EduNeverDies all about "the power of no"! It was great sharing with other amazing educators about how hard it can often be to say "no" as educators

Week 6-8: May 11th - May 29th

Singapore announced the end of Circuit Breaker and the partial reopening of school's starting June 2nd 2020.

These last three weeks of full home-based learning very much felt like a mad rush to get ready for opening and to adjust to a crazy smash up of face-to-face and home-based learning.

With the end of the school year in sight and my impending departure from my current school these last few weeks of full home-based learning flew by.

My main points and learning that I will take from this time were:

Try one new thing at a time. The new thing being for me an online tool, app, site etc. I'd also really recommend considering this things impact on learning/learners beforehand. Use your colleagues and PLN to discuss things that have worked for them - specific recommendations and keeping it simple really helped me stay grounded and helped keep my perfectionism at bay!
It's 100% ok for the online lessons to fall flat on their face - build in a back up plan to offer support. My favourites were encouraging pupils to use Google Meet breakout rooms with a class group I could drop in on or having my Google Meet logged on for individual help drop ins throughout any independent work time.
Be mindful of the emotional toll being isolated will have on pupils, parents and colleagues. Aim to seek to understand before being understood whenever an issue arises. Hard to do but really helped me approach any conflicts during this time with patience and compassion!
Set and model really clear boundaries around screen time. For me sitting behind a screen all day and not moving led to sleepless nights and general restlessness. I found having a little list of non-screen related things to do really really helped me balance and I shared this idea frequently with my classes and homeroom!

Week 9: June 1st - 5th

Week 9 meant back to school with half the cohort in every other day and wearing a mask! I was so incredibly nervous about the return and had 1 million questions about it buzzing through my head!

I returned to school for the first time in three months (ish) on the Wednesday of this week to teach my year 9 and year 11 classes in two three hour lessons.

It was absolutely amazing to be back in the classroom again and back to having those beautiful little conversations about life, the world and sometimes Maths!

I made sure to plan in a little timetable for our three our lessons ensuring enough breaks and independent working time for my classes. Using the awesome little timetable set up by my Maths colleague Kelly:

9 am - 10 am Maths lesson time

9 am - 9:30 am Break (but staying put in the classroom)

9:30 am - 10 am Independent work time (work on anything - any work missing from home-based learning modules or work from other classes too)

10 am - 11 am Maths lesson time.

This worked so so well and really ensured that pupils had enough space to adjust to being back in school without overwhelming with new material, activities etc.

This week was definitely an emotional rollercoaster as the unknown of returning created a void that I filled with all the worries - what if I don't have enough space for a socially distanced classroom? what if teaching in a mask means pupils don't feel that connection? what if they are super nervous too? what if the mask is too itchy/suffocating etc?

What massively helped beforehand was talking with a colleague who had already been in and reflecting on the experiences my peers across the world were going through whilst returning too.

Week 10 - 11: June 8th - June 17th

The last two weeks of face-to-face mashed with home-based learning were a whirlwind! With a four day rolling timetable plus alternating days in for year groups it was fun deciphering my new timetable and what days I needed to go in.

It was fantastic having some face-to-face time to finish off the year and my time at this school with my classes. Was incredibly appreciative to have this time in school to finish the year off!

Had a sad last few days saying "goodbye" to my amazing classes and was so very proud of them and how they made it through the challenges of Circuit Breaker, home-based learning and then returning to school.

Singapore announced the start of its Phase 2 of reopening for June 19th with restaurants reopening and social gatherings of 5 people allowed. This was AMAzing as it was our first day of Summer holidays and meant we could have an socially distanced celebration plus "goodbye" that day.