DISTANCE LEARNING Plans
This page explores how I flexibly responded to our change in learning environment. Outlined below are the new routines for communication, delivery of content, as well as the adapted learning activities I implemented as an apprentice teacher in a world of Distance Learning.
The New Norms of Distance Learning
In this time of distance learning the objective is to continue to engage students with accessible and meaningful learning activities about new content. Listed below are the four main pillars of my plan.
Weekly Activity Overviews
Interactive & Creative Learning Activities
Daily Virtual Office Hours
Responsive Feedback & Accessible Support
Distance Learning Activities
Cells & Cell Division | April 6 - 9
Students will review key cell unit concepts by watching videos, playing an Animal Cell Explorer game, and participating in a Kahoot review. Then their knowledge will be assessed with a Unit Concept Check. Finally, students will learn about cell division and record a homemade representation to explain the steps of mitosis on Flipgrid.
Check out these student artifacts!!
Intro to the Human Organ Systems | April 13
In this lesson, students will be introduced to the human body's organ systems and their general structures and functions. Students will complete a KWL chart before and after they take notes and follow a video lecture about the levels of organization in the body and one about the organ systems. Each of the following activities will investigate the organ systems in more detail.
Integumentary System | April 14
In this lesson students will learn about the structures and functions of the Integumentary System. Then they will create a homemade model of the layers of the skin and explain the layers and their functions through a Flipgrid video.
Digestive System | April 15 - 17
This three day lesson is based off of a Digestive Menu Choice Sheet. Each student will pick out their individualized "meal" of assignments by completing and submitting one activity from each of the sections of the menu. This menu was designed to engage students in learning about many facets of the digestive system while offering them freedom in choosing how to learn and express their learning.
The underlined sections of the PDF bring students to videos or supplemental materials that will help them complete their menu.
Skeletal System | April 20 - 23
In this three day lesson sequence students will learn about the main functions and structures of the skeletal system and apply their knowledge in creating prototypes of prosthetic joints.
The first day, students will watch videos to learn about the skeletal system-- from its function to the joints, ligaments, tendons, and more that compose the system. Then the next two days, students will follow the posters to the right to create prosthetic joints to help patients visualize parts of their skeletal system. Students will present their work in either office hours or by submitting a flipgrid.
Immune System | April 27
To learn about the immune system, students will watch a video then create an animation to describe how our immune systems respond to a virus. The animation must include discussion of temperature regulation and white blood cell response. The product can be made on Scratch, Animaker, Pixteller, or any other animation software.
Respiratory System | April 28 - 29
In this lesson, students followed a self-paced interactive lesson created on Nearpod. They first started with a deep breathing exercise and answered questions about how and why air went in and out of your lungs. Then after watching videos about a balloon model of the diaphragm and lungs working together, the students revisited their understandings of the lungs. Finally., students watched a video about the effects of COVID-19 on the respiratory. system, learned about ventilators, and then compared the functioning of ventilators to that of the lungs in our body. In the second day of the lesson, students created prototypes or drafted ideas for low-cost ventilators to help the crisis.
Nervous & Muscular Systems | April 30 - March 4
To study the nervous and muscular systems, student participated in a two day activity that was adjusted from the classroom to fit distance learning. The first day, students participated in reaction time tests to see how fast they could respond to visual and auditory stimuli.
In the normal lesson sequence, students would then create an LED circuit to model the nerve impulse pathway from the onset of a stimuli to the performance of a voluntary motor output. Instead, students watched an instructional video I made that went through the content and creation of the circuit!
After or while watching the video, students answered questions on a Google Form to synthesize their understanding of the activity.
Keys for Making While Distance Learning
Keep Making Open Ended
When creating assignments, we tried to account for equity across our student population. We found that one of the best ways to do that was to keep the making prompts as open ended as possible to allow students to make products using the resources and time they had. For example, some students created storyboards with pencil and paper instead of animations on a computer. It wasn't important how they made their product, it was more important what the product said about their learning.
Include Digital & Non-Digital Options
Even though our school provided students with Chromebooks and hot spots, we still included work products that were non-digital in order to ease the reliance on technology and the need for access to it. Most of our communication was through Google Classroom, but we were accommodating to students who had limited access to the tech throughout the day. Additionally, by including both digital and non-digital assignments, students had a variety of learning experiences and at times, choices of how they wanted to demonstrate their learning. For many students, the choices also brought freedom for them to work within their comfort zone while stuck in such an unusual time.
Give Ideas to Fuel Innovation
While it was important to keep the activities open-ended, it was equally important to give students a few ideas to jumpstart their making! Students used household items to create their projects and the wide range of possibilities was overwhelming for some. By throwing out some ideas to students, about the materials they could use, we ended up getting more diverse projects because we helped students visualize the possibilities.
Be Flexible
When we began receiving student work, we quickly realized the need for our flexibility. At home, students have new challenges and we are not there to control the environment and directly support their innovation. Because of this, we received a wide range of quality in student work. Some students went above and beyond what we could have ever imagined and others made good attempts, but still fell short of what we imagined when writing prompts/requirements. When assessing student work, we decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and be flexible in the requirements. We were proud of our students' work, gave them specific feedback, but then were flexible when it came to due dates and assessment.