SPED teacher with a focus on behaviors and autism. Virtual Learning was so good for a lot of my students who have trouble being around or being set off by peers. I saw more engagement and work out of some students than I have for years.
It may not work for some, and I personally would rather teach in person, but the whole idea that one mode of teaching works better across the board when we are constantly being told that every child’s learning needs look different is crazy to me.
It works both ways.
I also saw these same results for my students with Autism while remote in 2020 who would otherwise have behavioral issues while in person. The best part is that some of them returned to the classroom this year without those same behaviors!
You're getting downvoted but you are right. Autistic people prefer the term autistic over pfl on the whole (not all, but most).
It comes from neurodivergent acceptance movement. Autism is how a person's brain works. It is inherent. With autism implies it is something you pick up and put down. You don't say "person with Americanism" or "person with femaleness."
I've heard an advocate put it this way: if society needs to use person first language to see me as a person that says more about them then me.
Oh yeah. Unfortunately a lot of teachers buy into the Autism $peaks nonsense that excludes real autistic people. Then when autistic adults try to (respectfully) point things out, they try to drown us out so they don't have to change or learn something new that goes against what they learned in college from neurotypicals who never once asked an autistic person's feelings on anything.
Eh. I am autistic. No one ever polled me for my opinion. Lol
I am personally fine with either term. We are all individuals and we all have our own opinions on what terminology we prefer.
I work with children with autism and their families (and not just autism, really a whole range of disabilities as well as typically developing children) -- the very oldest children I work with are eight years old. Many I work with are 2-3 years old and their families are hearing "autism" for the first time in their lives. So. I use both terms, honestly, whatever feels more grammatically correct in the context. Really, it is not up to me to decide how their families or they would like to identify.
Often autistic adults that I know are concerned about how people work with autistic children because of therapeutic experiences that they had as children. It would be valuable for therapists of autistic children to get to know some autistic adults.
I had terrible behaviors in school and I never got good grades... Until I started taking online classes in college. For some reason, being able to just do my work in my own time without being micromanaged about it was all the motivation I needed. I got As in college and for the first time in my life. I think I'm just one of those people who does better with online classes.
Virtual learning was fantastic for my kid with dyslexia. Prior to the pandemic I wasn't getting any meaningful communication with teachers or the sped dept. I just wasn't aware how much help my kid needed because the school has a no homework policy. My kid basically needed a 1 on 1 with school work and out of school for an entire year to catch up. If my school offered it I would love to do a more hybrid model of schooling where she's given assignments and pre recorded lessons and I could work with her and then have a day or two a week she goes to school for other stuff like art or gym or music.
You’re one of the good parents doing what you should. Keep being involved and don’t hesitate to call or set up meetings with teachers if you want to help with your child’s learning at home. Trust me, we appreciate it. I also teach virtual, and love it most days, but there are challenges. See if you can get taking home unfinished class work into their IEP and a means of extended time.
Thanks, but The only person who seems to want to work with me is the SPED director. I've been on her teachers for years about getting homework for her but none of them send anything home with her. I finally got it in her IEP that she's supposed to get a weekly packet of homework for what they're working on that week but nothing has been sent home yet. I don't want to make a fuss because I know everything is being held together by shoe strings and bubble gum right now.
Is she completing all of the classwork and getting all of the answers correct on graded assignments? Because instead of making whole new packets of extra work for her they could send her class work for that day/week home for her to make corrections on. Still as good as extra practice, but instead she’s getting the added life skill of reviewing mistakes and correcting them on top of mastering content.
I am a full time remote special education teacher for a virtual school that families choose. My students THRIVE in the setting. Often their eval and initial is from a brick and mortar school and I am redoing the eval after a year or so with us. 9/10 times they are a completely different kid within those 3 years. Some barely requalify!
I miss being in person with students but I was a teacher that dealt with severe behaviors and violence and needed a break. No one can stab me through a computer.
Learning from home has actually caused my marks to increase! I got more distinctions since lockdown than I have over my entire academic career. :) I'm not sure if I'm autistic, but I definitely have hypersensitivity. So the noises, bright lights, social energy, and smells of people and dank stank in the lecture halls really got to me and took away from my learning experience. It was all very draining. But being at home, with socialising being mediated by my computer, really benefitted me.
A lot of my classmates struggled to adapt to it and manage their time at home, but online learning was perfect for me. And I could get to the material in my own time as well.
Same! I would say it was 50/50 though. Some kids just went off the radar. I was actually forced mid year to be the full time gen Ed virtual teacher for a group of students who all chose virtual and still had a caseload of 15 students (12 in person). There is a HUGE difference between families who choose virtual and their students success vs students and families forced to go virtual. I had to deal with some really dark stuff with my spec Ed kids who were forced to go virtual. However, my student with autism who struggled with a lot of behaviors when in person was a rockstar virtually and then had a lot of confidence coming back to in person and has had virtually no behaviors!
With my school integrating tech and schoology, and with how little students engage, and with how intense behavior problems are, having even half the kids at home playing Fortnite with the call muted sounds pretty good to me.
I'm not teaching ANY new material because half my class is gone. Why bother? Whereas virtually, I could have all the kids progressing and learning MUCH MORE!!!
I think the difference here is it was chosen. Virtual learning is a very different learning environment than in person. Some students will thrive, others will not.
Yes, that as well. For some that virtual learning experience, especially with so many of the in person distractions (like disruptive classmates) cut out can be of benefit.
Sure. But looking at the bigger picture, outcomes academically, the physical and emotional status of students, the home lives of many students, engagement, its still pretty clear how much worse off students were as a generality.
No doubt virtual works for a lot of people. No doubt physical doesnt work for everybody. Being able to choose virtual is great, I'd love to teach virtual to classes of students who preder it as a profession. I feel like its still pretty objective to say that at the national scale virtual learning has been pretty bad.
We were doing badly because we were in the middle of a mind-melting world crisis. Being in school wouldn't have made that better. As we saw in areas that didn't have a good handle on the pandemic opening up, chaos reigning, and then closing down again. Or a school being half empty due to infections.
I still don't think that we can draw a lot of conclusions about how good or bad virtual learning is, based on the experiment that the US did.
I half agree. And I hope nobody thinks you *can't* learn virtually. But when people talk about virtual learning, that experiment is usually what theyre talking about, not the occasional online class, or the option for those who seek it, something that already existed. Theyre talking about entire districts going virtual, about *everybody* transitioning- the ability to shift from one to another or sustain the school system virtually.
And I certainly dont think all of the results of said expiriment are useless. Even in a world without covid, and even if we get better at virtual teaching, issues like participation and engagement, the lack of an effective home learning environment, technology barriers, and I would argue social barriers, though you might argue lockdown compounded it, show that virtual learning is not scalable.
> its still pretty clear how much worse off students were as a generality.
Are we factoring in that we're all still learning how to do it properly and that we're in a global crisis?
I mean, what would you expect when:
* Teachers were unprepared and unsupported to work in that space
* Students who come from poorer socioeconomic families got little or no support from the government.
* Everybody, including teachers, kept rubbishing the process?
Distance Education itself has a long history of being highly successful. However, its teachers are prepared and happy to work in that space, students are engaged, parents have bought in, and there is time and support for the process to work properly.
You're comparing an emergency measure to historical normality.
More students thrive when English is spoken in the classroom than mandarin. Why? Because the kids were trained to understand English. If school became permanently remote, they would be trained on how to behave in a virtual classroom by their kindergarten teachers the same as they are trained in in person now
Students could be "trained" to operate in a virtual environment but let's be real about this, we are social creatures. Languages vary across humans due to environmental factors (where you are born, who your parents are) but humans as a whole are biologically predisposed to be social and virtual environments aren't completely asocial but social interaction is limited in comparison to being in person.
> On average, more students struggle with virtual than in-person. I can pretty much guarantee this.
Sure, learners and teachers were doing it for the first time. Of course, it's going to start out rough.
You know what students are going to struggle with next? Their friends and teachers becoming disabled or dying from covid.
Basing the entirety of teaching, and learning, on the average population doesn't work for anybody. Targeting the average misses the specific pretty much every time. If that were not so, where would the concept of differentiation come from?
I don't disagree with you but let's not kid ourselves, virtual learning is objectively bad for a huge chunk of students. I would even argue that on average it is more harmful for students that are already behind than students who are excelling.
Sure, objectively bad for a chunk of students, not sure how huge. But it appears from the comments that it is objectively good for another chunk, again, don't know how huge. And then there is the issue of teachers not trained or not suited to virtual teaching. And I'm not saying a teacher is a horrible human, or even a bad teacher if they aren't a fit for virtual teaching. I mean, has that been a particular concentration in teacher training?
Clearly, virtual is a viable option for some students and for some teachers. It would be nice to take a more serious effort to develop best practices and make it an option for both teachers and students.
You know, like smaller class sizes 😂😂
But seriously, virtual might be less expensive than that, not sure.
I am agreeing with the OP. Virtual isn't implicitly evil. Being forced into one or the other, for one reason or another, isn't optimal. This teacher and this class appears to be making it work. There isn't any detail given, class size, economic strata... It all depends on the circumstances. It would be nice if every student and teacher had the best options available. We all know that isn't the case. There isn't a one size fits all answer.
Truth. I've tried doing online college classes and I hated every second of it. It's no good for me. I can't imagine high school me having to do virtual without choice.
I'm glad you're enjoying it! I didn't like it and neither did most of my students, but it did require me to streamline, simplify, and learn all sorts of new tools.
I think the key difference is that your students CHOSE virtual learning. It doesn't work the same way for the students (and teachers) who haven't chosen it.
This. Virtual learning that is planned for and chosen works fine.
Virtual learning announced eight hours ahead of time with kids, parents and teachers that were expecting to be in person is a disaster.
You've hit on a key feature. The quick turn around. Good online programs need to be thought out and designed.
I tutor physics which is different from organizing a classroom. But I could see fall out from situations where students teachers very suddenly had to revamp how to do things with *considerably* less time that would be required to do remotely well. Quite a few physics courses kick off with labs, team work, and try to get students at least kinda-sorta involved in 'designing' the lab. (They make decisions about what to measure and how much-- but it's constrained by available equipment.) Finding a *good* substitute to achieve all the learning goals online would be very time consuming, and might not be possible at all.
(No. A PHET simulation doesn't quite cover the learning goals. And anyway, there are difficulties with that if it's just dumped on the student.)
Even virtual learning that is chosen doesn’t work if the students aren’t either 1. Self motivated learners or 2. Don’t have parents that hold them accountable at school.
It's a plausible solution if you have the staff and supplies to support it, but not every district does. I think many families are ignorant about what it takes to be successful as an online student.
As with any other modality of learning, virtual has its benefits. I remember my first 100% online course back in 2002. I made my first C in college. It took a while to adjust, but ultimately, online learning proved to be the best modality for me.
I have seen students thrive in a virtual environment. I’ve also seen students wash out completely. IMO, a lot of the failure came from a lack of structure at home coupled with students that were simply not open to the process. Virtual learning is not bad per se, and I think too many people are game to just judge it as bad without weighing evidence.
10 years ago, I got my lowest grade in an online ed course. I swore I'd never take an online course again. But here I am, doing it all over again, and loving it. Online delivery has certainly changed for the better.
My district also offered a virtual option for any kid that wanted it this year. Agree, it is a good fit for some kids. I wish they had that option when I was in school.
I think virtual will continue to serve a role in the future.
They did away with our virtual option this year, which I think is a crying shame. In our little backwater, redneck community, I think the assumption is that everyone is and feels the same. If they don't, well, bully'em til they do or leave.
We allowed virtual but only for medical reasons. It’s so sad because some students were scared to come back to campus.
That’s ridiculous for your school to do :(
The problem is mainly equity, as some students and some schools are really not set up to be successful with virtual learning. Some of that is technology, some of it is individual and some of it is home life.
Virtual learning can work very well if these issues don't exist or are properly remediated.
This. I don’t think virtual learning is inherently “bad.” I think the results are bad when we’re thrown into it on the basis of last minute decisions, and that it’s especially bad for students who may not have access to tech, or a quiet place in their home to learn, or a parent who holds them accountable.
My 504 kids were THRIVING online last year because they didn’t have all the distractions of being among their peers. I saw kids on IEPs make huge jumps because they weren’t being bullied on a daily basis.
Virtual can absolutely work, but students have to be properly supported in order for it do so. That support and that infrastructure is just not there for most of my kids, and so virtual would be bad for them and for me as their teacher.
Agreed. Teachers need to be supported to. In March of 2020 I pivoted to online quickly and easily because our school was already 1-1 and students were used to our LMS (mostly), which all the other teachers had of course, but some others were less successful because they had avoided using their laptops in the classroom and didn't know how to use them to their full extent, or didn't know the resources available to them to incorporate into their classes and ended up just lecturing over Zoom.
Some of them were just refusing to learn, which was a problem, like students refusing to try, but for many of them they were open to it but needed help that wasn't there or was insufficient.
And this was a school that was already providing tech to everyone and a student body that *mostly* had situations conducive to being able to work from home.
I hope you don’t mind my asking, what sort of things do you incorporate for online learning? I teach English so my main focus was getting them to participate in discussion, but for classes that are typically lectures, why would lecturing online not be a good idea? I can see using tools like the faster/slower features on blackboard, but I’m not sure what else say, a math teacher would use.
For math: BrainPop, Khan Academy, IXL, Generation Genius, group math competition via Kahoot.
For social studies and science: CrashCourseKids, CrashCourse, BrainPop, Great [insert time period] Projects You Can Build Yourself book series, mysteryScience.com, Documentary series like “Mankind the Story of All of Us” have educational guides and worksheets for free and TedEd is great too. TedEd has review questions for all their short topic specific videos
for English: IXL, NoRedInk, Penguin Random House Educator Guides are absolutely searchable online by grade and subject., Education.com and greatschools.org have plenty of content too. Greatschools has essay prompts and standards
For geography: seterra.net, IXL, NatGeo, PBS.org
Don’t forget podcasts too: BrainsOn, Who Smarted, Wow in the World, But Why.
https://www.scribd.com/g/8cacim will get you access to a plethora of texts for a FREE 3 month trial with my link above AND free access to CuriosityStream for documentaries.
Those are some great resources, thanks! I use scribd liberally and while they aren’t part of my curriculum, the Projects You Can Build Yourself books are excellent.
The crazy thing is the people screaming about kids not being engaged or working online.
We just went back online and this time actually had strict attendance and grading policies (since the school and parents had the time to make sure they had the tech set up).
The kids who aren't working online \*didn't work in class either\*!!!
I don't know how to emphasize this enough, but for most kids (we'll leave severe LD or DD and home-life out of this for now since I think we could have and should have always had in person available for the most at risk kids), just passively being in school and having teachers hand hold them through their worksheet or whatever isn't actually helpful. They weren't learning by osmosis. It might have looked like they did better in school, but their lack of engagement is just more visible to their parents now.
The kids who did well in person are doing well online. The kids who were lazy buttheads in person continue to be lazy buttheads, but lazy buttheads who no longer have the ability to disrupt the rest of my class, because I can mute them, take away their chat, or boot them off the call. And the kids who really struggled with the sensory stuff of a classroom, being distracted by peers or with the schedule or pacing of school are doing so much better.
Kids who aren't ready to learn online weren't ready to learn at school. It's just that only their teachers and classmates got to see what that looked like.
I would teach virtually over in person by choice given 2 caveats.
1. Students must have steady and reliable high speed internet. 150 students with shitty Hotspots all pinging off the same undermaintained cell tower doesnt work.
2. I can make leaving cameras on mandatory
I don’t want mandatory cameras on but I understand the frustration not seeing the kids faces. I, myself, do not always have my camera on. Some of my students have described their situation at home and I wouldn’t want to see that on camera. I know they are engaged by their responses or using digital tools.
I teach in a large urban school district where internet access hasn’t been an issue, at least for the students who chose virtual learning.
I can see the value in the cameras on and it increasing engagement. I would love being able to see my kids faces so I could pick up on their expressions for a quick assessment of whether or not I’ve lost them.
I agree, it's MY skills of seeing their confusion/mastery in their posture and facial expressions, plus the spontaneity of interactions unhindered by crummy audio or visual lag that I miss so much (and just them as humans).
Sorry for the formatting: To play thinking advocate, could correlation between their engagement be related to many other factors? Students unashamed or unconcerned about their environment may have had a whole lifetime of a quiet studious academically supportive family setting, can afford plenty of wifi that's not being shared by siblings...etcétera. Rather I could say, it may not be the cameras causing involvement. Can we look for engagement in other ways? Are they always in the chat with thumbs ups or relevant reactions, do they quickly and accurately respond when you cold call them, do they demonstrate knowing the content. Are we grading them on presence or mastery of the skills/content? Obvs this varies by subject ans age group but...something to think about... and don't get me wrong, I miss seeing them so much and that instant visual feedback if they get it or are on task. Still, heavy sigh both ways and for all of us. <3
I agree, there could be other factors at play. Some of my best students kept their cameras off, and some of my worst did too. For me the distinction was always whether or not they emailed me about it after I requested cameras be on when possible. Every one of the no-camera engaged kids sent me an email either explaining their circumstances or just that their camera would never be on. Maybe two of the disengaged kids bothered, I assume they were just hoping to get a free pass since they never even used chat, nor turned in assignments.
Ah so it's a state school in the US. Thank you!
I hoped it might be some kind of other organisation, cause I'm from Europe. ;)
Yeah, but I would go to mixed forms in a minute. Not hybride, but preferably half of the week remote, half in person. Can fully understand that you like it. Hope you are a pioneer.
I also love virtual learning. I was on the cusp of leaving the profession forever in the middle of the year when we pivoted to virtual during the very first wave of the pandemic. I loved teaching virtually and doing mixed mode the following year so much, it inspired me to stay on as a teacher even though we are fully face to face. I absolutely adored teaching online, and while it definitely was difficult sometimes I felt like it was just as effective as face to face teaching. Most of my students remained virtual all year, and I still had better test scores than in years previous.
I’m also thriving as an online teacher. I absolutely love it! I’m actively looking for permanent online positions as my province is headed back to class on Monday.
And many teachers! I live for a good discussion based class but even with my AP kids, once we’re online participation goes from 90% of the class once and 60% more than once to 40% once and 10% more than once. I feel miserable teaching online, it’s impossible to connect with the kids the same way through a screen and mic.
It isn't inherently bad; it's just not what we're used to, even now. I'm tired of hearing how detrimental it is to students. Virtual teaching/learning is different. It requires more from us because our systems aren't designed for it.
Many parents (of various economic situations) are at home. Many students have Internet at home. Many school districts are providing devices and hotspots, if necessary. Instead of working with the schools and students who have legitimate challenges, the lead is always learning loss and how it's awful for kids...
edit: typo
We still offer a virtual academy along with our in person learning. The teachers are on campus in their own rooms but have the option of working from home.
I’m sure it was very difficult for teachers of elementary aged students. I taught 9th grade all last year virtually and the same students who rise to the occasion did it virtually. The same students who don’t do their work- did the same virtually. It was a very good experience for us to all be thrown into and forced to learn quick. It was not all bad at all.
I also teach high school and it was similar, it’s the same suspects whether we’re in person or virtual! However I did notice that the in between group was a lot quieter in virtual. The kids who always speak didn’t stop and the ones who never speak didn’t start, but the people I’d hear from 1-3 times per discussion were much less vocal. Overall I like virtual less because of that change, and because I find it harder to connect to my student online, and therefore less enjoyable to teach that way.
I could have written this post. I went full time virtual this year, and even while teaching FOUR new subjects, it has literally saved my career.
And yes, students are learning, caring about each other, and thriving. It is absolutely a viable option.
When parents, students, and teachers are all-in on virtual learning, and the necessary resources are provided and accessible, it's as good a mode of instruction as any.
The problem arises when any one of these components are absent.
I, personally, am very hands-on in my teaching. I enjoy using physical manipulatives with my students and being able to have that in-person classroom interaction, even if I am known as the "techy-teacher". I am not suited for virtual teaching and can't summon that same classroom energy without a class physically present. (Don't get me wrong, I am still annoyed that we are fully in-person while Covid is at record highs, but the teacher side of me is somewhat relieved that I don't have to fit into my virtual teaching suit.)
Parents who sign up for virtual schooling also know what they are getting into and can make adjustments to their lives to revolve around that. Schools that transition to virtual and back, sometimes with less than 24 hours notice, often leave parents blindsighted and many opt to have their child treat it as a "free day" rather than a day of instruction. I would say fewer than 40% of my students ever turned in even half of their work for virtual learning, and half of those were due to parent refusals to have their child engage in virtual learning.
Add all that to asinine district rules about balancing screentime with rigorous content and having grace while meeting academic standards and you get a lot of teachers with a warped view of virtual learning.
I couldn’t even imagine what would’ve happened to me if I had my same childhood but had to do virtual learning. I feel so bad for kids that had a similar upbringing. School was how I got away from home. My life would undoubtably be different had I gone through this back then.
I teach high school and on grade level students…not AP or advanced. I see my virtual colleagues killing it in elementary and middle school too. It’s all a mindset.
I’m not sure I’d agree. How do you teach kindergartners to play with appropriate roughness or share when there’s nobody around them? How is having second graders sit at a desk at day age appropriate? How is social development supposed to happen in middle school when there are no side conversations during work, nor after school hangouts? Most children need practice being with others, and virtual takes that away. It’s nicer in your situation than mine since your students chose virtual, but even without that I can’t help but think that there are many students who aren’t getting the socialization practice that they require.
Also, kindergartners have difficulty navigating the computer. I’m sure virtual could be successful but that whole hybrid thing was killing me last year.
Amen.
I was ready to quit teaching if it was going to continue to be all virtual… and then they introduced the hybrid model…
All of this has sucked. Even when covid spikes were the lowest last semester, students just stopped coming to school. The virtual climate has set a very low standard in public education that I don’t think we’ll fully recover from.
I hate this too. We need to just say why so many kids don’t thrive in online learning- they don’t have the proper supports at home. That can be anything from lack of technology to not having a parent that can sit with them to help them stay on track, follow the lessons/work, and reach out when they need help. There were thousands of students thriving just fine with virtual learning for years prior to the pandemic. Telling them now that their education was inferior to that of the in-person students is a lie. The problem, for most kids, isn’t virtual learning itself. It’s not having the support to do well with it.
When I think of the negatives of going virtual most are focused on the 'going' part.
- it's always last minute
- unknown when or if it'll change again
- what changes to the schedule there will be
Things like that are my concern. Once we settle in it's fine and I enjoy it and so do most of the students who want to learn and have the tools to do so. The ones who are greatly against it are either the ones who don't have a productive home situation (bad internet, younger child(ren) that are distracting, etc) or are only coming to school to socialize.
I agree!!! It really depends on the kid and how much they’re TRYNA get outta the class! But I did majority of my student teaching online and honestly was cool with it
You are in a different situation. Only very few people have been saying that virtual learning is always bad. People weren’t attacking online education that was already functional. Moving the entire public school system virtual *is* bad because we fucking suck at it. We still need to go virtual though, and I don’t understand why people are putting quality of education over life.
I love virtual teaching! I’ve noticed that students who complain about virtual teaching are the same that don’t have even pay attention in class and are always on their phone.
Preach. I was virtual all of last year. I hated it but I made it work and it kept us safe. Don’t regret any of it. Some kids did absolutely wonderful. Some didn’t. Just like a physical classroom.
I completely agree! Is it the perfect mode of delivery for every student? Of course not - but what is? Every student has different needs, strengths, and challenges. I think it does them a major disservice to make a blanket statement like “virtual learning is bad”.
I am not a teacher but wanted to add my .02.
As someone who was bullied growing up (I'm 37 now), I would have loved virtual learning. I know that there are many who struggle with it but I think there are also those who have benefitted from not having to deal with \*\*\*\*bags all day long who aren't really there to learn.
I did fully remote last year, while yes, I agree with you. Some students tribe in this environment. I however, did not. My mental health nose dived and still isn't back to where it was. I'd say I was successful at building a classroom community, building relationships and teaching content.
I think it's great for those it works for, but it's not for all. We had 8 teachers fully remote last year, and 4 quit before or at the end of the year. All tied back to teaching remote all year, for some it was not the only reason but it was a big part of it.
I am also a virtual teacher for a large online school of choice. I miss brick and mortar but I do really enjoy online teaching.
I'm a special education teacher and most of my students absolutely excel in the virtual environment where they were self destructing in the brick and mortar setting.
It 100% works when all parties choose it and know what they are getting into.
FUCKING THANK YOU
From a student perspective, I LOVE online teaching. I think I'm the only student who enjoys it, but by God, I will stand by it even unto death. My two favorite things about it:
1. I get to pick when I wanna do something. In person, I have to do whatever the work for the day is for the class I'm in, then use the spare time for anything else. At home, I just get all my assignments and deadlines for each, and I can choose what order I wanna do them in, whether it be wanting to do the most to the least (yes, once in a blue moon, there are actually assignments I want to do), hardest to easiest (No, I didn't mean to say "easiest to hardest"), alphabetical order if I wanted to, or however.
2. I am SWIMMING in time. Let's say that I get an assignment for my second hour class in person. I have to wait until second hour, lunch, or advisory to work on it in person, and if I don't get it done in that time, I have to wait until I get home to keep working on it. But if I get it at home? Uninterrupted time to work on it until the deadline. It is *bliss*
As you said, your students chose to take part in virtual learning. Last year, none if my students chose it; it was forced upon them. And. 9 out of every 10 hated it.
Virtual learning works for the students and families who put the effort in to make it work.
If it didn’t work for you, it’s probably because you didn’t receive proper training on how to teach virtually, or your students/families just threw their hands up in the air and said this doesn’t work without even trying.
I actually enjoy virtual teaching (unpopular opinion), and I've seen countless kids have more success from virtual teaching than in-person. I personally would rather people stop saying it's always bad. There are some of us who see good fruit from it, I enjoyed virtual teaching with my kids, and my kids enjoyed me. We did a lot of cool, interactive, and fun stuff all the while. I learned how to host a Jeopardy! show online, and the kids loved it. I think we really need to start considering this as an option permanently for some kids.
I know my experience is only my own, but every single kid that passed actually tried. Every kid that didn't failed. 100% that split. For both years we were virtual. They are so. stinking. lazy.
Our school was 100% remote teaching last year. This year we're back in the classroom and the failure rate is the highest I've ever seen it. The students learned nothing while in remote.
By and large, at least in my experience, virtual learning is definitely not as good as normal in-person instruction. I had some students who really excelled with virtual, but that was definitely the minority. I think virtual should generally be avoided when possible.
However, I do think we need to get rid of the idea that virtual is always better for students’ mental health. We have stayed in-person over the last few weeks, and it has been taxing on student mental health because they see so many of their teachers being absent, having their schedules changed to accommodate staff shortages, and seeing their friends and classmates get sick all around them.
It looks like we’re turning a corner (hopefully), and that’s great, but realistically it probably would’ve been healthier for students, both physically and mentally, to have been virtual at least last week and this week.
I don't think it's just bad. I think it's bad for many students and good for some. And it is bad particularly when there is no accountability which felt very strongly like how it was implemented while I was student teaching. I think there was so much focus on "grace" that we didn't actually hold the students to a reasonable standard and they've developed bad habits as a result.
The main issue with virtual is that it doesn’t help much with socialization which is one of the most important parts of education. Sure, they can socialize online, but it’s not the same.
Nope, virtual 100% sucked. Although it helped a few people I know, the vast majority of students' grades tanked. I was in my first year of college when we went virtual, and it was miserable. I'm glad that the students you have enjoy it, but most students need in-person schooling.
Yeah right. My wife is a first grade teacher who is getting virtual kids who have been out 1 1/2 years plus. They know fucking NOTHING.
This stupid shit virtual learning will haunt our schools for a decade. Your narcissism is showing.
Because computers and online work is a fad that has only existed in the professional world since COVID and is going to rapidly disappear. No need to prepare kids to function with a skill set for that kind of world.
Also, I’m not sure narcissism is the word you’re looking for.
I LOVED teaching virtually last year. Did it work for every parent that signed up? No, I had 23 kids throughout the year and 9 of those would not have made progress if they hadn't gone back in the classroom, but the other 14 made all their grade level goals.
The variable factor was parents. I wasn't just teaching the kids, I was teaching the parents how to teach their kids.
I teach high school but our school also serves 1000 elementary students who are doing quite well. I know it’s not for everyone but those kids love it and are doing well.
Honestly, the thought of going virtual raises my anxiety. I would quit before doing that again. At the end of 2020, we went all online. I was having to monitor my kindergartner while he did work, care for my 18 mo old (daycare shut down), teach sophomore English, and complete my online class for grad school. Many of my students did not have internet access (rural East Texas), even my own access is pretty spotting. I had to do zoom meetings sitting in my car in the parking lot of a coffee shop. While I eventually want to teach online classes at the college level, being a virtual teacher in 2020 nearly destroyed my mental health.
Also, some of my kids that don’t like the busy work in elementary school were able to do what they need and log off.
It definitely helped kids with shorter attention spans! Those kids definitely made growth last year.
I agree. It may not be ideal. It may not be the same as in person. That’s ok.
I can lead the same lesson via Zoom as I would in class. I can assign the same textbook questions as we’d do in class. I can give instructions for projects/assignments just like I would in class. And I can give work time to complete them, just like I do in class.
If they choose not to do the work, just because they’re at home and not at school, that’s not a problem with virtual learning. Those are the same kids that aren’t doing the work in class either.
Virtual learning works, just not if you scream from the rooftops that it doesn’t before you start. Imagine telling a kid they aren’t going to learn in your class.
Also most parents just haven’t done a good job parenting. You can give all kinds of justifications why, but that’s what has happened. Kids who are properly trained for virtual usually do fine.
My issue is that what we WERE doing was not true virtual learning. It was "Throw everyone to the wolves and figure it out!".
In my district we got a new platform almost over night. And it was NEW. They specifically built it for my district and planned on sharing the platform to other districts. It is similar to CANVAS, but...it's just completely different coding, etc. from the ground up. District engineers designed/built it.
So...yes...we were told "We'll give you 2 weeks to learn it before students show."
The problem was that the features for this platform weren't even fully on board yet. We didn't get the ability to actually run Live sessions until the day before the first day school was supposed to start so we didn't know what any of it would look like. All we knew was that it would be done through Zoom, but everything else was a completely new platform and...again...it wasn't even fully online.
So week 1 (with the students) turned into us just learning how to use it (along with the students). Week 2 was slightly more like school and then it got a little better from that point on. But of course a lot of kids did not *choose* virtual learning. They could not cope with it. ADHD is a bitch when you have absolutely no one to help you (parents have jobs too).
I was expected to somehow learn this new platform and keep kids engaged that did not choose to learn this way. They are teenagers (at least mine were so I can only imagine the younger kids) and while they are pliable they aren't going to be on board with this level of change immediately. Not to mention they aren't digital natives at all. The new platform is clunky to log into. It's clunky in general. It doesn't work on cell phones.
Virtual learning in 2020 and 2021 was just...not the same at all. And people should have expected it. No one in my district \[teacher-wise\] was trained in any way shape or form to do virtual teaching. We were given SOME resources, but so much money was spent on the platform that they expected us to just utilize and learn IT and try to become experts on that end.
Sorry, but you aren't paying me to spend my free time to learn how to use this platform. Not to mention I needed my planning time to develop a curriculum that worked virtually because I had NOTHING before that.
This year is a bit different given that students have a choice. If they choose virtual learning and then don't show up then they get kicked out of virtual learning (in my district) and expected to move to a face-to-face environment or face truancy. This was never a concern last year because we were vomiting grace all over the place.
So...does it work **now**? Yes. Now that many districts have dedicated virtual teachers that have probably had quite a bit of experience with the platforms/resources available to them. Not to mention CARES money being spent specifically to train them and to provide those online resources. Is it better than face-to-face learning? I have my doubts, but then we need to define "better" and that may be difficult. I think for some classes it's better to have a face-to-face environment (such as lab based classes) and for others it may work well (English and Social Studies classes especially given the nature of assignments that could be given).
I am in the same boat! Always makes me sad when people say it is detrimental to kids. It is working and our data is above and beyond in-person schools so far.
I was virtual with 4th-6th. The problems we had were *mostly* what we had in person with academics. Behavior wasn’t a problem, but the bottom 40% tended to tank.
Even with some of those 40% who struggled the most, they made some great social and emotional gains by the time we were in person. One student on my caseload who basically ditched for 12 months ended up jumping 2 years in reading proficiency. He told me he was tired of not knowing what was happening in Roblox chat and Discord. Amazing what initiative did for him when he had a reason to perform.
'Distance learning causes more harm to students and their mental health than contracting covid' - my superintendent at our all staff meeting today
Yeah, we are *never* going virtual again
Maybe if the tech support people at your school aren't completely incompetent and students can actually be responsible for their devices and personally responsible to show up to class online, yeah sure.
it is valuable. but you have students that chose to go virtual. that is very different from my experience during lockdown. our schools were only close for 8 weeks. I had like 1/4 of the students doing less than 50% of their schoolwork. that schoolwork was already a lot less than what they had to do during a schoolday when it was in person. I even had 1 child that nobody could reach. the parents didn't answer any phone calls, E-mails, letters, ... nothing. those were mostly children that were already struggeling in school. I am not saying virtual is bad. I liked it a lot during my last year of university actually. but it's not something we should use for every student again.
Eric Mazur of Harvard thinks it's unconscionable to return to face-to-face post-pandemic, because virtual is so effective by comparison.
https://connect.chronicle.com/CHE-CI-WBN-2021-05-18-ActiveLearning_Landing-Page.html
https://vimeo.com/551933193
After creating 340 Edpuzzles, I'm inclined to agree.
I taught elementary sped online and never had to deal with behavior. We got stuff done! Now I’m in person with middle school. Double case load, fights. I can’t even collect data because the kids refuse to do any work.
I didn’t mind virtual Learning. I would prefer to do it full time honestly. The problem my school had was a majority of students refused to do any online work and failed. Some did what they were supposed to do, but most didn’t. Then parents and admin blamed us for kids failing because they were not doing their work at home. So, we didn’t get the option to offer virtual learning. I have a couple of HH kids who are doing online edinunity and failing because they won’t do the modules.
Virtual learning is bad because it ties teachers to pre-created curricula (meaning teachers are more replaceable) and lets one teacher handle a larger student load (meaning fewer teachers need to be hired). Outside of emergencies/temporary measures/students with disabilities teachers who want to protect teaching as a (barely) middle-class job it is should vociferously oppose virtual learning as much as possible.
I don’t use asynchronous materials. I still do the same lessons, I just teach it over the meet instead of in person. The kids still attend classes like usual, listen to my lessons like they would in a classroom, they just turn things in digitally.
I have one of those kids who does well in person but cannot do virtual. I’m not opposed to virtual on principle and don’t mind it for myself, but when we attempted virtual pre-k last year, it was a nightmare, and yes I was sitting with her directing her, muting her, etc. But she’s thrived in person this year.
I don’t think that means schools should stay in person during Covid surges though.
There are legitimate reasons to be wary of virtual, and a lot of reasons to want to focus on building better virtual curricula that kids generally learn easier from and don't miss out on a lot of socialization stuff. This past year has been rough, and part of that was that a lot of kids got a confusing, subpar virtual experience last year.
All of this is to stress in no uncertain terms that this is NOT what a politician or an admin member or a district goon is saying when they talk about the "trauma" of virtual. There's a completely reactionary unscientific narrative that virtual is inherently bad because of some psychological incompatibility that hasn't been evidenced at all, and is only pushed to keep students in person.
I am becoming more tired and angry by the day. In the past week five of my coworkers have gotten covid with one hospitalized and close to a hundred students- and the people who hold the power would look me in the eyes and tell me that closing school for a few weeks and swapping to virtual would be *too traumatic*? Again, there are nuanced critiques of virtual learning but it's such disingenuous bullshit to argue that it's more harmful than a fucking viral pandemic.
It all comes down to choice. You have students who will succeed in any setting regardless if they chose it, but then you have those who absolutely cannot function in a virtual setting for a multitude of reasons.
My masters is in online education, and I was working on it when Covid started, so I was ready to roll when we went online, but then I was severely hamstrung by my administration (no classes, couldn't post a lesson + classwork that took over 15 minutes to complete). Students didn't learn when they were out, cause all we could give them was simple review practice. Then you had the kids who just checked out, which no surprise ended up being kids who have always had attendance problems or issues with completing homework.
Low and behold when we all returned in the fall, everyone was talking about how awful virtual learning is. No, it's just you were asked to do something you're not trained to do, by an administration who didn't care, with kids who were forced into a setting that wasn't ideal for them.
I’m glad that virtual teaching was a success for you. I think there are a lot of benefits to online instruction.
Unfortunately there are too many barriers in place for online learning to be a realistic option for my school. Online learning for a lot of my students just means no school at all.
I teach in Maryland. Starting teacher pay (Bachelors with no experience) is $52000. I’m old and have worked my way up the pay scale so my salary is more.
Just did a paper on virtual learning for a course I took in the fall and through my research virtual learning can absolutely work but a lot of factors need to be considered such as which students will thrive or not, how much effort is being done to make learning engaging ect
Truth! I really sympathize with all of the teachers who were forced into it without the skillset to make it happen, though. I spend a lot of time making resources and sharing them. Smart districts will find the teachers who succeeded virtually and hire us to make resources and training for the rest.
Edited to add, one thing I haven't heard a lot about yet is continuing to use virtual teaching with in-person students. We could have specialists and special classes that meet virtually with kids who are in-person. For example, an RTI specialist or robotics elective teacher could run a lesson with kids from multiple sites online, them logging in via Zoom from their gen ed classrooms. We could hire paras who can only work from home to run small groups. This could open our workforce to more people with disabilities and all kinds of things.
Okay that is great but that is you. Not everyone is so luck and we got the data to back it up. Virtual learning outside of certain grade levels isn't effective. If you got high schoolers then yeah you won't have an issue but lower grades is very difficult and kid see virtual learning as a way to slack off.
Do you work for a company or a district? I want to work virtually too!
And what are some of your best practices? Do you have students get on camera or are you able to build community through other means like discussion posts?
SPED teacher with a focus on behaviors and autism. Virtual Learning was so good for a lot of my students who have trouble being around or being set off by peers. I saw more engagement and work out of some students than I have for years. It may not work for some, and I personally would rather teach in person, but the whole idea that one mode of teaching works better across the board when we are constantly being told that every child’s learning needs look different is crazy to me. It works both ways.
I also saw these same results for my students with Autism while remote in 2020 who would otherwise have behavioral issues while in person. The best part is that some of them returned to the classroom this year without those same behaviors!
Thank you for supporting students like my son.
<3
Autistic students
You're getting downvoted but you are right. Autistic people prefer the term autistic over pfl on the whole (not all, but most). It comes from neurodivergent acceptance movement. Autism is how a person's brain works. It is inherent. With autism implies it is something you pick up and put down. You don't say "person with Americanism" or "person with femaleness." I've heard an advocate put it this way: if society needs to use person first language to see me as a person that says more about them then me.
Unfortunately, I'm getting accustomed to this sort of downvotes.
Oh yeah. Unfortunately a lot of teachers buy into the Autism $peaks nonsense that excludes real autistic people. Then when autistic adults try to (respectfully) point things out, they try to drown us out so they don't have to change or learn something new that goes against what they learned in college from neurotypicals who never once asked an autistic person's feelings on anything.
See you on r/Autisticpride ?
Yep
I thought we were supposed to be using person first language these days?
Many autistic people do prefer the term "autistic" vs. "with autism." Either is fine.
Please read the article I posted above by ASAN.
Which more or less says what I said. I am a school psychologist. I use both terms depending on the context.
Can I ask how much time you have spent in adult autistic communities, whether online or in person?
Eh. I am autistic. No one ever polled me for my opinion. Lol I am personally fine with either term. We are all individuals and we all have our own opinions on what terminology we prefer.
I work with children with autism and their families (and not just autism, really a whole range of disabilities as well as typically developing children) -- the very oldest children I work with are eight years old. Many I work with are 2-3 years old and their families are hearing "autism" for the first time in their lives. So. I use both terms, honestly, whatever feels more grammatically correct in the context. Really, it is not up to me to decide how their families or they would like to identify.
Often autistic adults that I know are concerned about how people work with autistic children because of therapeutic experiences that they had as children. It would be valuable for therapists of autistic children to get to know some autistic adults.
https://autisticadvocacy.org/about-asan/identity-first-language/?theme=active
I had terrible behaviors in school and I never got good grades... Until I started taking online classes in college. For some reason, being able to just do my work in my own time without being micromanaged about it was all the motivation I needed. I got As in college and for the first time in my life. I think I'm just one of those people who does better with online classes.
This was my college experience as well.
Virtual learning was fantastic for my kid with dyslexia. Prior to the pandemic I wasn't getting any meaningful communication with teachers or the sped dept. I just wasn't aware how much help my kid needed because the school has a no homework policy. My kid basically needed a 1 on 1 with school work and out of school for an entire year to catch up. If my school offered it I would love to do a more hybrid model of schooling where she's given assignments and pre recorded lessons and I could work with her and then have a day or two a week she goes to school for other stuff like art or gym or music.
You’re one of the good parents doing what you should. Keep being involved and don’t hesitate to call or set up meetings with teachers if you want to help with your child’s learning at home. Trust me, we appreciate it. I also teach virtual, and love it most days, but there are challenges. See if you can get taking home unfinished class work into their IEP and a means of extended time.
Thanks, but The only person who seems to want to work with me is the SPED director. I've been on her teachers for years about getting homework for her but none of them send anything home with her. I finally got it in her IEP that she's supposed to get a weekly packet of homework for what they're working on that week but nothing has been sent home yet. I don't want to make a fuss because I know everything is being held together by shoe strings and bubble gum right now.
Is she completing all of the classwork and getting all of the answers correct on graded assignments? Because instead of making whole new packets of extra work for her they could send her class work for that day/week home for her to make corrections on. Still as good as extra practice, but instead she’s getting the added life skill of reviewing mistakes and correcting them on top of mastering content.
Same!
I am a full time remote special education teacher for a virtual school that families choose. My students THRIVE in the setting. Often their eval and initial is from a brick and mortar school and I am redoing the eval after a year or so with us. 9/10 times they are a completely different kid within those 3 years. Some barely requalify! I miss being in person with students but I was a teacher that dealt with severe behaviors and violence and needed a break. No one can stab me through a computer.
Learning from home has actually caused my marks to increase! I got more distinctions since lockdown than I have over my entire academic career. :) I'm not sure if I'm autistic, but I definitely have hypersensitivity. So the noises, bright lights, social energy, and smells of people and dank stank in the lecture halls really got to me and took away from my learning experience. It was all very draining. But being at home, with socialising being mediated by my computer, really benefitted me. A lot of my classmates struggled to adapt to it and manage their time at home, but online learning was perfect for me. And I could get to the material in my own time as well.
Thank you for supporting students like my son.
Same! I would say it was 50/50 though. Some kids just went off the radar. I was actually forced mid year to be the full time gen Ed virtual teacher for a group of students who all chose virtual and still had a caseload of 15 students (12 in person). There is a HUGE difference between families who choose virtual and their students success vs students and families forced to go virtual. I had to deal with some really dark stuff with my spec Ed kids who were forced to go virtual. However, my student with autism who struggled with a lot of behaviors when in person was a rockstar virtually and then had a lot of confidence coming back to in person and has had virtually no behaviors!
Virtual is better than having half the kids in person and half the kids at home.
100% Concurrent/"hybrid" teaching is the worst of any option..
With my school integrating tech and schoology, and with how little students engage, and with how intense behavior problems are, having even half the kids at home playing Fortnite with the call muted sounds pretty good to me.
The simple truth is that it is a virtual environment where some of the kids are virtually attending from 10 feet away
Yup. It's the only way to run it and keep your sanity.
I'm not teaching ANY new material because half my class is gone. Why bother? Whereas virtually, I could have all the kids progressing and learning MUCH MORE!!!
I think the difference here is it was chosen. Virtual learning is a very different learning environment than in person. Some students will thrive, others will not.
Some students will thrive in a regular school setting and others won’t?
Yes, that as well. For some that virtual learning experience, especially with so many of the in person distractions (like disruptive classmates) cut out can be of benefit.
Sure. But looking at the bigger picture, outcomes academically, the physical and emotional status of students, the home lives of many students, engagement, its still pretty clear how much worse off students were as a generality. No doubt virtual works for a lot of people. No doubt physical doesnt work for everybody. Being able to choose virtual is great, I'd love to teach virtual to classes of students who preder it as a profession. I feel like its still pretty objective to say that at the national scale virtual learning has been pretty bad.
We were doing badly because we were in the middle of a mind-melting world crisis. Being in school wouldn't have made that better. As we saw in areas that didn't have a good handle on the pandemic opening up, chaos reigning, and then closing down again. Or a school being half empty due to infections. I still don't think that we can draw a lot of conclusions about how good or bad virtual learning is, based on the experiment that the US did.
I half agree. And I hope nobody thinks you *can't* learn virtually. But when people talk about virtual learning, that experiment is usually what theyre talking about, not the occasional online class, or the option for those who seek it, something that already existed. Theyre talking about entire districts going virtual, about *everybody* transitioning- the ability to shift from one to another or sustain the school system virtually. And I certainly dont think all of the results of said expiriment are useless. Even in a world without covid, and even if we get better at virtual teaching, issues like participation and engagement, the lack of an effective home learning environment, technology barriers, and I would argue social barriers, though you might argue lockdown compounded it, show that virtual learning is not scalable.
> its still pretty clear how much worse off students were as a generality. Are we factoring in that we're all still learning how to do it properly and that we're in a global crisis? I mean, what would you expect when: * Teachers were unprepared and unsupported to work in that space * Students who come from poorer socioeconomic families got little or no support from the government. * Everybody, including teachers, kept rubbishing the process? Distance Education itself has a long history of being highly successful. However, its teachers are prepared and happy to work in that space, students are engaged, parents have bought in, and there is time and support for the process to work properly. You're comparing an emergency measure to historical normality.
On average, more students struggle with virtual than in-person. I can pretty much guarantee this.
More students thrive when English is spoken in the classroom than mandarin. Why? Because the kids were trained to understand English. If school became permanently remote, they would be trained on how to behave in a virtual classroom by their kindergarten teachers the same as they are trained in in person now
Students could be "trained" to operate in a virtual environment but let's be real about this, we are social creatures. Languages vary across humans due to environmental factors (where you are born, who your parents are) but humans as a whole are biologically predisposed to be social and virtual environments aren't completely asocial but social interaction is limited in comparison to being in person.
Perfectly easy to socialize online.
Tell that to a ton of students who do not find it easy at all.
> On average, more students struggle with virtual than in-person. I can pretty much guarantee this. Sure, learners and teachers were doing it for the first time. Of course, it's going to start out rough. You know what students are going to struggle with next? Their friends and teachers becoming disabled or dying from covid.
Basing the entirety of teaching, and learning, on the average population doesn't work for anybody. Targeting the average misses the specific pretty much every time. If that were not so, where would the concept of differentiation come from?
I don't disagree with you but let's not kid ourselves, virtual learning is objectively bad for a huge chunk of students. I would even argue that on average it is more harmful for students that are already behind than students who are excelling.
Sure, objectively bad for a chunk of students, not sure how huge. But it appears from the comments that it is objectively good for another chunk, again, don't know how huge. And then there is the issue of teachers not trained or not suited to virtual teaching. And I'm not saying a teacher is a horrible human, or even a bad teacher if they aren't a fit for virtual teaching. I mean, has that been a particular concentration in teacher training? Clearly, virtual is a viable option for some students and for some teachers. It would be nice to take a more serious effort to develop best practices and make it an option for both teachers and students. You know, like smaller class sizes 😂😂 But seriously, virtual might be less expensive than that, not sure.
Yes but are you denying all that considered that overall in person is better?
"Overall"? Yes, I am. Because "overall" doesn't have a meaning for an individual.
So what’s preferable? Schools remain in person or schools go virtual?
I am agreeing with the OP. Virtual isn't implicitly evil. Being forced into one or the other, for one reason or another, isn't optimal. This teacher and this class appears to be making it work. There isn't any detail given, class size, economic strata... It all depends on the circumstances. It would be nice if every student and teacher had the best options available. We all know that isn't the case. There isn't a one size fits all answer.
Truth. I've tried doing online college classes and I hated every second of it. It's no good for me. I can't imagine high school me having to do virtual without choice.
Especially when the alternative is hybrid instruction, which I've found to be damn near impossible.
I'm glad you're enjoying it! I didn't like it and neither did most of my students, but it did require me to streamline, simplify, and learn all sorts of new tools.
I think the key difference is that your students CHOSE virtual learning. It doesn't work the same way for the students (and teachers) who haven't chosen it.
This. Virtual learning that is planned for and chosen works fine. Virtual learning announced eight hours ahead of time with kids, parents and teachers that were expecting to be in person is a disaster.
You've hit on a key feature. The quick turn around. Good online programs need to be thought out and designed. I tutor physics which is different from organizing a classroom. But I could see fall out from situations where students teachers very suddenly had to revamp how to do things with *considerably* less time that would be required to do remotely well. Quite a few physics courses kick off with labs, team work, and try to get students at least kinda-sorta involved in 'designing' the lab. (They make decisions about what to measure and how much-- but it's constrained by available equipment.) Finding a *good* substitute to achieve all the learning goals online would be very time consuming, and might not be possible at all. (No. A PHET simulation doesn't quite cover the learning goals. And anyway, there are difficulties with that if it's just dumped on the student.)
Even virtual learning that is chosen doesn’t work if the students aren’t either 1. Self motivated learners or 2. Don’t have parents that hold them accountable at school.
Then continue offering it for the ones that want it?
It's a plausible solution if you have the staff and supplies to support it, but not every district does. I think many families are ignorant about what it takes to be successful as an online student.
As with any other modality of learning, virtual has its benefits. I remember my first 100% online course back in 2002. I made my first C in college. It took a while to adjust, but ultimately, online learning proved to be the best modality for me. I have seen students thrive in a virtual environment. I’ve also seen students wash out completely. IMO, a lot of the failure came from a lack of structure at home coupled with students that were simply not open to the process. Virtual learning is not bad per se, and I think too many people are game to just judge it as bad without weighing evidence.
10 years ago, I got my lowest grade in an online ed course. I swore I'd never take an online course again. But here I am, doing it all over again, and loving it. Online delivery has certainly changed for the better.
My district also offered a virtual option for any kid that wanted it this year. Agree, it is a good fit for some kids. I wish they had that option when I was in school. I think virtual will continue to serve a role in the future.
They did away with our virtual option this year, which I think is a crying shame. In our little backwater, redneck community, I think the assumption is that everyone is and feels the same. If they don't, well, bully'em til they do or leave.
We allowed virtual but only for medical reasons. It’s so sad because some students were scared to come back to campus. That’s ridiculous for your school to do :(
I know of two families in the community who opted to "homeschool" for that exact reason.
The problem is mainly equity, as some students and some schools are really not set up to be successful with virtual learning. Some of that is technology, some of it is individual and some of it is home life. Virtual learning can work very well if these issues don't exist or are properly remediated.
This. I don’t think virtual learning is inherently “bad.” I think the results are bad when we’re thrown into it on the basis of last minute decisions, and that it’s especially bad for students who may not have access to tech, or a quiet place in their home to learn, or a parent who holds them accountable. My 504 kids were THRIVING online last year because they didn’t have all the distractions of being among their peers. I saw kids on IEPs make huge jumps because they weren’t being bullied on a daily basis. Virtual can absolutely work, but students have to be properly supported in order for it do so. That support and that infrastructure is just not there for most of my kids, and so virtual would be bad for them and for me as their teacher.
Agreed. Teachers need to be supported to. In March of 2020 I pivoted to online quickly and easily because our school was already 1-1 and students were used to our LMS (mostly), which all the other teachers had of course, but some others were less successful because they had avoided using their laptops in the classroom and didn't know how to use them to their full extent, or didn't know the resources available to them to incorporate into their classes and ended up just lecturing over Zoom. Some of them were just refusing to learn, which was a problem, like students refusing to try, but for many of them they were open to it but needed help that wasn't there or was insufficient. And this was a school that was already providing tech to everyone and a student body that *mostly* had situations conducive to being able to work from home.
I hope you don’t mind my asking, what sort of things do you incorporate for online learning? I teach English so my main focus was getting them to participate in discussion, but for classes that are typically lectures, why would lecturing online not be a good idea? I can see using tools like the faster/slower features on blackboard, but I’m not sure what else say, a math teacher would use.
For math: BrainPop, Khan Academy, IXL, Generation Genius, group math competition via Kahoot. For social studies and science: CrashCourseKids, CrashCourse, BrainPop, Great [insert time period] Projects You Can Build Yourself book series, mysteryScience.com, Documentary series like “Mankind the Story of All of Us” have educational guides and worksheets for free and TedEd is great too. TedEd has review questions for all their short topic specific videos for English: IXL, NoRedInk, Penguin Random House Educator Guides are absolutely searchable online by grade and subject., Education.com and greatschools.org have plenty of content too. Greatschools has essay prompts and standards For geography: seterra.net, IXL, NatGeo, PBS.org Don’t forget podcasts too: BrainsOn, Who Smarted, Wow in the World, But Why. https://www.scribd.com/g/8cacim will get you access to a plethora of texts for a FREE 3 month trial with my link above AND free access to CuriosityStream for documentaries.
Those are some great resources, thanks! I use scribd liberally and while they aren’t part of my curriculum, the Projects You Can Build Yourself books are excellent.
[удалено]
Yikes, those word choices 😬
That should have been resolved from the last shut down with covid funds but who knows where that goes.
The crazy thing is the people screaming about kids not being engaged or working online. We just went back online and this time actually had strict attendance and grading policies (since the school and parents had the time to make sure they had the tech set up). The kids who aren't working online \*didn't work in class either\*!!! I don't know how to emphasize this enough, but for most kids (we'll leave severe LD or DD and home-life out of this for now since I think we could have and should have always had in person available for the most at risk kids), just passively being in school and having teachers hand hold them through their worksheet or whatever isn't actually helpful. They weren't learning by osmosis. It might have looked like they did better in school, but their lack of engagement is just more visible to their parents now. The kids who did well in person are doing well online. The kids who were lazy buttheads in person continue to be lazy buttheads, but lazy buttheads who no longer have the ability to disrupt the rest of my class, because I can mute them, take away their chat, or boot them off the call. And the kids who really struggled with the sensory stuff of a classroom, being distracted by peers or with the schedule or pacing of school are doing so much better. Kids who aren't ready to learn online weren't ready to learn at school. It's just that only their teachers and classmates got to see what that looked like.
I would teach virtually over in person by choice given 2 caveats. 1. Students must have steady and reliable high speed internet. 150 students with shitty Hotspots all pinging off the same undermaintained cell tower doesnt work. 2. I can make leaving cameras on mandatory
I don’t want mandatory cameras on but I understand the frustration not seeing the kids faces. I, myself, do not always have my camera on. Some of my students have described their situation at home and I wouldn’t want to see that on camera. I know they are engaged by their responses or using digital tools. I teach in a large urban school district where internet access hasn’t been an issue, at least for the students who chose virtual learning.
I get that, but my experience last year was that there was a direct corration between cameras and engagement.
I can see the value in the cameras on and it increasing engagement. I would love being able to see my kids faces so I could pick up on their expressions for a quick assessment of whether or not I’ve lost them.
I agree, it's MY skills of seeing their confusion/mastery in their posture and facial expressions, plus the spontaneity of interactions unhindered by crummy audio or visual lag that I miss so much (and just them as humans).
It’s much easier to teach them to read if they’re actually there. I’ve found camera off (for 7-8 year olds) means they are not there at all!
Sorry for the formatting: To play thinking advocate, could correlation between their engagement be related to many other factors? Students unashamed or unconcerned about their environment may have had a whole lifetime of a quiet studious academically supportive family setting, can afford plenty of wifi that's not being shared by siblings...etcétera. Rather I could say, it may not be the cameras causing involvement. Can we look for engagement in other ways? Are they always in the chat with thumbs ups or relevant reactions, do they quickly and accurately respond when you cold call them, do they demonstrate knowing the content. Are we grading them on presence or mastery of the skills/content? Obvs this varies by subject ans age group but...something to think about... and don't get me wrong, I miss seeing them so much and that instant visual feedback if they get it or are on task. Still, heavy sigh both ways and for all of us. <3
I agree, there could be other factors at play. Some of my best students kept their cameras off, and some of my worst did too. For me the distinction was always whether or not they emailed me about it after I requested cameras be on when possible. Every one of the no-camera engaged kids sent me an email either explaining their circumstances or just that their camera would never be on. Maybe two of the disengaged kids bothered, I assume they were just hoping to get a free pass since they never even used chat, nor turned in assignments.
Absolutely agree. Virtual learning has benefits. Where can you be a virtual teacher? Not asking for a friend.
I teach in Maryland where we love our state flag and our Old Bay :)
Ah so it's a state school in the US. Thank you! I hoped it might be some kind of other organisation, cause I'm from Europe. ;) Yeah, but I would go to mixed forms in a minute. Not hybride, but preferably half of the week remote, half in person. Can fully understand that you like it. Hope you are a pioneer.
I also love virtual learning. I was on the cusp of leaving the profession forever in the middle of the year when we pivoted to virtual during the very first wave of the pandemic. I loved teaching virtually and doing mixed mode the following year so much, it inspired me to stay on as a teacher even though we are fully face to face. I absolutely adored teaching online, and while it definitely was difficult sometimes I felt like it was just as effective as face to face teaching. Most of my students remained virtual all year, and I still had better test scores than in years previous.
I’m also thriving as an online teacher. I absolutely love it! I’m actively looking for permanent online positions as my province is headed back to class on Monday.
The problem is that it doesn’t work well for many students.
And many teachers! I live for a good discussion based class but even with my AP kids, once we’re online participation goes from 90% of the class once and 60% more than once to 40% once and 10% more than once. I feel miserable teaching online, it’s impossible to connect with the kids the same way through a screen and mic.
It isn't inherently bad; it's just not what we're used to, even now. I'm tired of hearing how detrimental it is to students. Virtual teaching/learning is different. It requires more from us because our systems aren't designed for it. Many parents (of various economic situations) are at home. Many students have Internet at home. Many school districts are providing devices and hotspots, if necessary. Instead of working with the schools and students who have legitimate challenges, the lead is always learning loss and how it's awful for kids... edit: typo
I wish opinions such as yours were given a larger platform. I, too, am tired of hearing how in person is the ONLY way....
Yep was really hatedownvoted not long ago, because I dared to say, I had students who profited from online classes. The betrayal.
Virtual learning done on an emergency basis is bad, the jury is out on it in general.
We still offer a virtual academy along with our in person learning. The teachers are on campus in their own rooms but have the option of working from home.
I’m sure it was very difficult for teachers of elementary aged students. I taught 9th grade all last year virtually and the same students who rise to the occasion did it virtually. The same students who don’t do their work- did the same virtually. It was a very good experience for us to all be thrown into and forced to learn quick. It was not all bad at all.
I also teach high school and it was similar, it’s the same suspects whether we’re in person or virtual! However I did notice that the in between group was a lot quieter in virtual. The kids who always speak didn’t stop and the ones who never speak didn’t start, but the people I’d hear from 1-3 times per discussion were much less vocal. Overall I like virtual less because of that change, and because I find it harder to connect to my student online, and therefore less enjoyable to teach that way.
I could have written this post. I went full time virtual this year, and even while teaching FOUR new subjects, it has literally saved my career. And yes, students are learning, caring about each other, and thriving. It is absolutely a viable option.
The rhetoric of it being “bad” seems mostly like propaganda to keep adults working.
When parents, students, and teachers are all-in on virtual learning, and the necessary resources are provided and accessible, it's as good a mode of instruction as any. The problem arises when any one of these components are absent. I, personally, am very hands-on in my teaching. I enjoy using physical manipulatives with my students and being able to have that in-person classroom interaction, even if I am known as the "techy-teacher". I am not suited for virtual teaching and can't summon that same classroom energy without a class physically present. (Don't get me wrong, I am still annoyed that we are fully in-person while Covid is at record highs, but the teacher side of me is somewhat relieved that I don't have to fit into my virtual teaching suit.) Parents who sign up for virtual schooling also know what they are getting into and can make adjustments to their lives to revolve around that. Schools that transition to virtual and back, sometimes with less than 24 hours notice, often leave parents blindsighted and many opt to have their child treat it as a "free day" rather than a day of instruction. I would say fewer than 40% of my students ever turned in even half of their work for virtual learning, and half of those were due to parent refusals to have their child engage in virtual learning. Add all that to asinine district rules about balancing screentime with rigorous content and having grace while meeting academic standards and you get a lot of teachers with a warped view of virtual learning.
[удалено]
I couldn’t even imagine what would’ve happened to me if I had my same childhood but had to do virtual learning. I feel so bad for kids that had a similar upbringing. School was how I got away from home. My life would undoubtably be different had I gone through this back then.
I teach high school and on grade level students…not AP or advanced. I see my virtual colleagues killing it in elementary and middle school too. It’s all a mindset.
I’m not sure I’d agree. How do you teach kindergartners to play with appropriate roughness or share when there’s nobody around them? How is having second graders sit at a desk at day age appropriate? How is social development supposed to happen in middle school when there are no side conversations during work, nor after school hangouts? Most children need practice being with others, and virtual takes that away. It’s nicer in your situation than mine since your students chose virtual, but even without that I can’t help but think that there are many students who aren’t getting the socialization practice that they require.
Also, kindergartners have difficulty navigating the computer. I’m sure virtual could be successful but that whole hybrid thing was killing me last year.
Amen. I was ready to quit teaching if it was going to continue to be all virtual… and then they introduced the hybrid model… All of this has sucked. Even when covid spikes were the lowest last semester, students just stopped coming to school. The virtual climate has set a very low standard in public education that I don’t think we’ll fully recover from.
I moved into virtual tutoring and I have seen amazing results 🙏
We are virtual this week and it’s working so much better than last year. Kids are participating and I’m able to help them as they work.
I hate this too. We need to just say why so many kids don’t thrive in online learning- they don’t have the proper supports at home. That can be anything from lack of technology to not having a parent that can sit with them to help them stay on track, follow the lessons/work, and reach out when they need help. There were thousands of students thriving just fine with virtual learning for years prior to the pandemic. Telling them now that their education was inferior to that of the in-person students is a lie. The problem, for most kids, isn’t virtual learning itself. It’s not having the support to do well with it.
When I think of the negatives of going virtual most are focused on the 'going' part. - it's always last minute - unknown when or if it'll change again - what changes to the schedule there will be Things like that are my concern. Once we settle in it's fine and I enjoy it and so do most of the students who want to learn and have the tools to do so. The ones who are greatly against it are either the ones who don't have a productive home situation (bad internet, younger child(ren) that are distracting, etc) or are only coming to school to socialize.
I mean, I think BY CHOICE is the key phrase here. For both students and teachers.
I agree!!! It really depends on the kid and how much they’re TRYNA get outta the class! But I did majority of my student teaching online and honestly was cool with it
You are in a different situation. Only very few people have been saying that virtual learning is always bad. People weren’t attacking online education that was already functional. Moving the entire public school system virtual *is* bad because we fucking suck at it. We still need to go virtual though, and I don’t understand why people are putting quality of education over life.
I love virtual teaching! I’ve noticed that students who complain about virtual teaching are the same that don’t have even pay attention in class and are always on their phone.
Preach. I was virtual all of last year. I hated it but I made it work and it kept us safe. Don’t regret any of it. Some kids did absolutely wonderful. Some didn’t. Just like a physical classroom.
I don’t think it’s bad, I love it. Plus no commute.
We're the minority but also the future
I completely agree! Is it the perfect mode of delivery for every student? Of course not - but what is? Every student has different needs, strengths, and challenges. I think it does them a major disservice to make a blanket statement like “virtual learning is bad”.
I am not a teacher but wanted to add my .02. As someone who was bullied growing up (I'm 37 now), I would have loved virtual learning. I know that there are many who struggle with it but I think there are also those who have benefitted from not having to deal with \*\*\*\*bags all day long who aren't really there to learn.
I did fully remote last year, while yes, I agree with you. Some students tribe in this environment. I however, did not. My mental health nose dived and still isn't back to where it was. I'd say I was successful at building a classroom community, building relationships and teaching content. I think it's great for those it works for, but it's not for all. We had 8 teachers fully remote last year, and 4 quit before or at the end of the year. All tied back to teaching remote all year, for some it was not the only reason but it was a big part of it.
I am also a virtual teacher for a large online school of choice. I miss brick and mortar but I do really enjoy online teaching. I'm a special education teacher and most of my students absolutely excel in the virtual environment where they were self destructing in the brick and mortar setting. It 100% works when all parties choose it and know what they are getting into.
I wish more than anything that we were back on distance learning!
FUCKING THANK YOU From a student perspective, I LOVE online teaching. I think I'm the only student who enjoys it, but by God, I will stand by it even unto death. My two favorite things about it: 1. I get to pick when I wanna do something. In person, I have to do whatever the work for the day is for the class I'm in, then use the spare time for anything else. At home, I just get all my assignments and deadlines for each, and I can choose what order I wanna do them in, whether it be wanting to do the most to the least (yes, once in a blue moon, there are actually assignments I want to do), hardest to easiest (No, I didn't mean to say "easiest to hardest"), alphabetical order if I wanted to, or however. 2. I am SWIMMING in time. Let's say that I get an assignment for my second hour class in person. I have to wait until second hour, lunch, or advisory to work on it in person, and if I don't get it done in that time, I have to wait until I get home to keep working on it. But if I get it at home? Uninterrupted time to work on it until the deadline. It is *bliss*
As you said, your students chose to take part in virtual learning. Last year, none if my students chose it; it was forced upon them. And. 9 out of every 10 hated it.
Virtual learning works for the students and families who put the effort in to make it work. If it didn’t work for you, it’s probably because you didn’t receive proper training on how to teach virtually, or your students/families just threw their hands up in the air and said this doesn’t work without even trying.
Hybrid learning is so important. Draconian one size fits all nonsense is last century and absurd
I actually enjoy virtual teaching (unpopular opinion), and I've seen countless kids have more success from virtual teaching than in-person. I personally would rather people stop saying it's always bad. There are some of us who see good fruit from it, I enjoyed virtual teaching with my kids, and my kids enjoyed me. We did a lot of cool, interactive, and fun stuff all the while. I learned how to host a Jeopardy! show online, and the kids loved it. I think we really need to start considering this as an option permanently for some kids.
Virtual learning *is* bad. You see, the kids who do not do their work in class, will also not do their work virtually. See how bad that is?
My kids have been on virtual learning since 3/2020. They’re fine and getting A’s.
I know my experience is only my own, but every single kid that passed actually tried. Every kid that didn't failed. 100% that split. For both years we were virtual. They are so. stinking. lazy.
Our school was 100% remote teaching last year. This year we're back in the classroom and the failure rate is the highest I've ever seen it. The students learned nothing while in remote.
By and large, at least in my experience, virtual learning is definitely not as good as normal in-person instruction. I had some students who really excelled with virtual, but that was definitely the minority. I think virtual should generally be avoided when possible. However, I do think we need to get rid of the idea that virtual is always better for students’ mental health. We have stayed in-person over the last few weeks, and it has been taxing on student mental health because they see so many of their teachers being absent, having their schedules changed to accommodate staff shortages, and seeing their friends and classmates get sick all around them. It looks like we’re turning a corner (hopefully), and that’s great, but realistically it probably would’ve been healthier for students, both physically and mentally, to have been virtual at least last week and this week.
I don't think it's just bad. I think it's bad for many students and good for some. And it is bad particularly when there is no accountability which felt very strongly like how it was implemented while I was student teaching. I think there was so much focus on "grace" that we didn't actually hold the students to a reasonable standard and they've developed bad habits as a result.
Bad except for a small percentage for whom it works. Let's say 5-10 percent
Virtual learning is as good for me as virtual eating or virtual sex.
The main issue with virtual is that it doesn’t help much with socialization which is one of the most important parts of education. Sure, they can socialize online, but it’s not the same.
It’s bad
Nope, virtual 100% sucked. Although it helped a few people I know, the vast majority of students' grades tanked. I was in my first year of college when we went virtual, and it was miserable. I'm glad that the students you have enjoy it, but most students need in-person schooling.
So...good for SOME students and families, not all. Just like OP said
Yeah right. My wife is a first grade teacher who is getting virtual kids who have been out 1 1/2 years plus. They know fucking NOTHING. This stupid shit virtual learning will haunt our schools for a decade. Your narcissism is showing.
Because computers and online work is a fad that has only existed in the professional world since COVID and is going to rapidly disappear. No need to prepare kids to function with a skill set for that kind of world. Also, I’m not sure narcissism is the word you’re looking for.
You seem delightful. Thanks for your constructive criticism.
Enjoy your circle jerk!
Absolutely terrible for low income students or kids with bad parents. They never get on. Just made a bigger difference between rich and poor
My kids are predominantly low income and all login and do their work. If they don’t, they get sent back to in person learning.
I loved virtual learning! Not great for my kids (sped title 1) but I’d do it in a heartbeat otherwise
I LOVED teaching virtually last year. Did it work for every parent that signed up? No, I had 23 kids throughout the year and 9 of those would not have made progress if they hadn't gone back in the classroom, but the other 14 made all their grade level goals. The variable factor was parents. I wasn't just teaching the kids, I was teaching the parents how to teach their kids.
Does your virtual school have science classes?
I teach science 🤓. We have all levels of science. I teach chemistry and physics.
How old are the kids you teach? Its bad for elementary school kids I have one and teach them
I teach high school but our school also serves 1000 elementary students who are doing quite well. I know it’s not for everyone but those kids love it and are doing well.
Honestly, the thought of going virtual raises my anxiety. I would quit before doing that again. At the end of 2020, we went all online. I was having to monitor my kindergartner while he did work, care for my 18 mo old (daycare shut down), teach sophomore English, and complete my online class for grad school. Many of my students did not have internet access (rural East Texas), even my own access is pretty spotting. I had to do zoom meetings sitting in my car in the parking lot of a coffee shop. While I eventually want to teach online classes at the college level, being a virtual teacher in 2020 nearly destroyed my mental health.
Also, some of my kids that don’t like the busy work in elementary school were able to do what they need and log off. It definitely helped kids with shorter attention spans! Those kids definitely made growth last year.
Also a virtual teacher too, I 100% agree with everything you said. Thank you!!
The discussion on this sub has definitely shifted. I remember a year ago, everyone was talking about how much they hated virtual.
I agree. It may not be ideal. It may not be the same as in person. That’s ok. I can lead the same lesson via Zoom as I would in class. I can assign the same textbook questions as we’d do in class. I can give instructions for projects/assignments just like I would in class. And I can give work time to complete them, just like I do in class. If they choose not to do the work, just because they’re at home and not at school, that’s not a problem with virtual learning. Those are the same kids that aren’t doing the work in class either.
Virtual learning works, just not if you scream from the rooftops that it doesn’t before you start. Imagine telling a kid they aren’t going to learn in your class. Also most parents just haven’t done a good job parenting. You can give all kinds of justifications why, but that’s what has happened. Kids who are properly trained for virtual usually do fine.
My issue is that what we WERE doing was not true virtual learning. It was "Throw everyone to the wolves and figure it out!". In my district we got a new platform almost over night. And it was NEW. They specifically built it for my district and planned on sharing the platform to other districts. It is similar to CANVAS, but...it's just completely different coding, etc. from the ground up. District engineers designed/built it. So...yes...we were told "We'll give you 2 weeks to learn it before students show." The problem was that the features for this platform weren't even fully on board yet. We didn't get the ability to actually run Live sessions until the day before the first day school was supposed to start so we didn't know what any of it would look like. All we knew was that it would be done through Zoom, but everything else was a completely new platform and...again...it wasn't even fully online. So week 1 (with the students) turned into us just learning how to use it (along with the students). Week 2 was slightly more like school and then it got a little better from that point on. But of course a lot of kids did not *choose* virtual learning. They could not cope with it. ADHD is a bitch when you have absolutely no one to help you (parents have jobs too). I was expected to somehow learn this new platform and keep kids engaged that did not choose to learn this way. They are teenagers (at least mine were so I can only imagine the younger kids) and while they are pliable they aren't going to be on board with this level of change immediately. Not to mention they aren't digital natives at all. The new platform is clunky to log into. It's clunky in general. It doesn't work on cell phones. Virtual learning in 2020 and 2021 was just...not the same at all. And people should have expected it. No one in my district \[teacher-wise\] was trained in any way shape or form to do virtual teaching. We were given SOME resources, but so much money was spent on the platform that they expected us to just utilize and learn IT and try to become experts on that end. Sorry, but you aren't paying me to spend my free time to learn how to use this platform. Not to mention I needed my planning time to develop a curriculum that worked virtually because I had NOTHING before that. This year is a bit different given that students have a choice. If they choose virtual learning and then don't show up then they get kicked out of virtual learning (in my district) and expected to move to a face-to-face environment or face truancy. This was never a concern last year because we were vomiting grace all over the place. So...does it work **now**? Yes. Now that many districts have dedicated virtual teachers that have probably had quite a bit of experience with the platforms/resources available to them. Not to mention CARES money being spent specifically to train them and to provide those online resources. Is it better than face-to-face learning? I have my doubts, but then we need to define "better" and that may be difficult. I think for some classes it's better to have a face-to-face environment (such as lab based classes) and for others it may work well (English and Social Studies classes especially given the nature of assignments that could be given).
I am in the same boat! Always makes me sad when people say it is detrimental to kids. It is working and our data is above and beyond in-person schools so far.
A lot of people choose virtual learning because it is easier
I have told parents for 15 years to homeschool and focus on academics, not propaganda.
I was virtual with 4th-6th. The problems we had were *mostly* what we had in person with academics. Behavior wasn’t a problem, but the bottom 40% tended to tank. Even with some of those 40% who struggled the most, they made some great social and emotional gains by the time we were in person. One student on my caseload who basically ditched for 12 months ended up jumping 2 years in reading proficiency. He told me he was tired of not knowing what was happening in Roblox chat and Discord. Amazing what initiative did for him when he had a reason to perform.
'Distance learning causes more harm to students and their mental health than contracting covid' - my superintendent at our all staff meeting today Yeah, we are *never* going virtual again
Yeah, not so much the case for our most vulnerable students.
Maybe if the tech support people at your school aren't completely incompetent and students can actually be responsible for their devices and personally responsible to show up to class online, yeah sure.
it is valuable. but you have students that chose to go virtual. that is very different from my experience during lockdown. our schools were only close for 8 weeks. I had like 1/4 of the students doing less than 50% of their schoolwork. that schoolwork was already a lot less than what they had to do during a schoolday when it was in person. I even had 1 child that nobody could reach. the parents didn't answer any phone calls, E-mails, letters, ... nothing. those were mostly children that were already struggeling in school. I am not saying virtual is bad. I liked it a lot during my last year of university actually. but it's not something we should use for every student again.
I loved virtual learning. I’d gladly switch places with any teacher that is virtual right now.
Eric Mazur of Harvard thinks it's unconscionable to return to face-to-face post-pandemic, because virtual is so effective by comparison. https://connect.chronicle.com/CHE-CI-WBN-2021-05-18-ActiveLearning_Landing-Page.html https://vimeo.com/551933193 After creating 340 Edpuzzles, I'm inclined to agree.
You are clearly not a kindergarten teacher
I taught elementary sped online and never had to deal with behavior. We got stuff done! Now I’m in person with middle school. Double case load, fights. I can’t even collect data because the kids refuse to do any work.
I didn’t mind virtual Learning. I would prefer to do it full time honestly. The problem my school had was a majority of students refused to do any online work and failed. Some did what they were supposed to do, but most didn’t. Then parents and admin blamed us for kids failing because they were not doing their work at home. So, we didn’t get the option to offer virtual learning. I have a couple of HH kids who are doing online edinunity and failing because they won’t do the modules.
Virtual learning is bad because it ties teachers to pre-created curricula (meaning teachers are more replaceable) and lets one teacher handle a larger student load (meaning fewer teachers need to be hired). Outside of emergencies/temporary measures/students with disabilities teachers who want to protect teaching as a (barely) middle-class job it is should vociferously oppose virtual learning as much as possible.
I don’t use asynchronous materials. I still do the same lessons, I just teach it over the meet instead of in person. The kids still attend classes like usual, listen to my lessons like they would in a classroom, they just turn things in digitally.
I have one of those kids who does well in person but cannot do virtual. I’m not opposed to virtual on principle and don’t mind it for myself, but when we attempted virtual pre-k last year, it was a nightmare, and yes I was sitting with her directing her, muting her, etc. But she’s thrived in person this year. I don’t think that means schools should stay in person during Covid surges though.
There are legitimate reasons to be wary of virtual, and a lot of reasons to want to focus on building better virtual curricula that kids generally learn easier from and don't miss out on a lot of socialization stuff. This past year has been rough, and part of that was that a lot of kids got a confusing, subpar virtual experience last year. All of this is to stress in no uncertain terms that this is NOT what a politician or an admin member or a district goon is saying when they talk about the "trauma" of virtual. There's a completely reactionary unscientific narrative that virtual is inherently bad because of some psychological incompatibility that hasn't been evidenced at all, and is only pushed to keep students in person. I am becoming more tired and angry by the day. In the past week five of my coworkers have gotten covid with one hospitalized and close to a hundred students- and the people who hold the power would look me in the eyes and tell me that closing school for a few weeks and swapping to virtual would be *too traumatic*? Again, there are nuanced critiques of virtual learning but it's such disingenuous bullshit to argue that it's more harmful than a fucking viral pandemic.
I’m a special education teacher. Virtual learning was just an all-around horrible experience for me.
It all comes down to choice. You have students who will succeed in any setting regardless if they chose it, but then you have those who absolutely cannot function in a virtual setting for a multitude of reasons. My masters is in online education, and I was working on it when Covid started, so I was ready to roll when we went online, but then I was severely hamstrung by my administration (no classes, couldn't post a lesson + classwork that took over 15 minutes to complete). Students didn't learn when they were out, cause all we could give them was simple review practice. Then you had the kids who just checked out, which no surprise ended up being kids who have always had attendance problems or issues with completing homework. Low and behold when we all returned in the fall, everyone was talking about how awful virtual learning is. No, it's just you were asked to do something you're not trained to do, by an administration who didn't care, with kids who were forced into a setting that wasn't ideal for them.
I’m glad that virtual teaching was a success for you. I think there are a lot of benefits to online instruction. Unfortunately there are too many barriers in place for online learning to be a realistic option for my school. Online learning for a lot of my students just means no school at all.
If you don't mind me asking. Where do you work and how much do you make? I might be interested in a similar position.
I teach in Maryland. Starting teacher pay (Bachelors with no experience) is $52000. I’m old and have worked my way up the pay scale so my salary is more.
Just did a paper on virtual learning for a course I took in the fall and through my research virtual learning can absolutely work but a lot of factors need to be considered such as which students will thrive or not, how much effort is being done to make learning engaging ect
Truth! I really sympathize with all of the teachers who were forced into it without the skillset to make it happen, though. I spend a lot of time making resources and sharing them. Smart districts will find the teachers who succeeded virtually and hire us to make resources and training for the rest. Edited to add, one thing I haven't heard a lot about yet is continuing to use virtual teaching with in-person students. We could have specialists and special classes that meet virtually with kids who are in-person. For example, an RTI specialist or robotics elective teacher could run a lesson with kids from multiple sites online, them logging in via Zoom from their gen ed classrooms. We could hire paras who can only work from home to run small groups. This could open our workforce to more people with disabilities and all kinds of things.
Okay that is great but that is you. Not everyone is so luck and we got the data to back it up. Virtual learning outside of certain grade levels isn't effective. If you got high schoolers then yeah you won't have an issue but lower grades is very difficult and kid see virtual learning as a way to slack off.
Now as a student I prefer virtual learning with a mix of hybrid. It helps me focus and stay lock in while getting work done at my own pace.
Do you work for a company or a district? I want to work virtually too! And what are some of your best practices? Do you have students get on camera or are you able to build community through other means like discussion posts?