technology

Spark Your Students’ Creativity with These Zoom-Friendly Exercises

By Shana Bestock

Bringing creativity into the classroom isn’t only for art teachers! Creativity hinges on discovery, and as educators we can intentionally set the stage for those moments of discovery to happen. Creativity is also intrinsically tied to collaboration–whether individually, by engaging different aspects of the self in conversation, or collectively, by communicating with others to build something together. Creativity is about being ingenious, resourceful, and taking risks. Whether your focus is math or reading, science or history, coding or painting, creativity is an essential ingredient to learning, engagement, and sparking curiosity and joy. Every teacher, no matter their subject area, can borrow from the Zoom-friendly exercises below to jumpstart their students’ creativity and prepare them for the lesson ahead.

Three Myths of Distance Learning

By Ian Kelleher

I have a unique and marvelous job. I teach science to high schoolers every day, but I am also “Chair of Research” for my school, charged with answering this question: “How do we use the science of teaching and learning to improve every child’s whole school experience?” The days of COVID have been difficult, but a fascinating challenge – how can the science of learning help us in this unique time?

Three Resources for Bringing the Joy Factor to Your Online Classroom

By Rachel Fuhrman

This post originally appeared on Tales from the Classroom.

As I gear up for the second half of the most unique school year I may ever encounter, I am focused on what I can do to provide an engaging, enriching, and exciting experience for my students. When I think about my classroom in previous years, I have always prioritized the joy factor through the use of humor and games. Now, I have shifted my focus to what bringing joy looks like online. While I hope to continue to bring my sense of humor to my students virtually, I know that it can be challenging to communicate as fluidly as we once did. Because of this, I am primarily focusing on the use of games and competitions to bring joy. Doing so not only allows students to be engaged with their content, but also provides students the opportunity to engage with one another. Below, I have outlined three of my favorite resources for bringing joy through games and competitions online.

Getting Started with Teaching Online…Again

By Mary Burns

As we put the never-to-be-forgotten school year of 2019-2020 in our rearview mirror, we turn our attention to the 2020-2021 school year. And though we all wish otherwise, the upcoming school year will likely involve more online teaching. During the initial pandemic outbreak, many teachers focused on learning technology at the expense of instruction. Now that we’ve taken some time to learn new technologies, this school year should be about focusing on effective online teaching.

Over the last few months, I’ve been helping teachers get started with online instruction. I’ve organized this blog around their most common questions about teaching online.