My Presentation on Best Online Practices

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Supporting Struggling Learners

    Lack of motivation is one of the greatest challenges for both students and educators, many students suffering from a prolonged lack of motivation, and many educators suffering from desperation from not being able to motivate students. Many educators take on the question of whether its lack of motivation or a skill deficit, the age-long question creating setbacks in the classroom, teaching lessons, and overall frustration for all parties involved. An efficient way to easily answer this question is the "Can't do/Won't do" assessment which is an assessment that basically tests for the motivation factor. The assessment doesn't need to be hard and elaborate, it only has to be an assessment without additional instruction. This assessment becomes the first step in figuring out what your next move should be.

   After using this assessment you can move on to the next challenge, skill deficit or performance deficit? A student who is struggling with a skill deficit is a whole other challenge, as this student may not only be struggling in your class but in many other areas. Students who are experiencing a skill deficit require more intervention than simply moving them up in the class and giving them different coursework/accommodations. Students who are experiencing these difficulties require a village of support, building knowledge and mastery of the skill, not just changing up a few things here and there. Working closely with a school psychologist, other teachers, and even their parents can assemble a team where you're able to brainstorm the best way to support this student in numerous different ways. In an online environment, assessing kids with skill deficits can be facilitated via zoom calls, online evaluations, and often in-person meetings with your team. If you set your mind to it, you can do it. 

A performance deficit can be an extremely easy challenge to tackle or an extremely different challenge, you should never underestimate it and as an educator, you must validate every reason or cause for this performance deficit. The truth is that we only see these kids for 50% of their day, we don't know what goes on with the other 50% that could be affecting this motivation. Whether it's a mental, physical, or seasonal challenge, you must be available and present for these children and always try your best effort to work and cooperate with them. The Can't do/Won't do assessment presents a new approach to students who lack motivation, by offering an incentive or an easier task first, there are hundreds of ways to motivate students. In an online environment, this can be extremely hard; however, by presenting an easier task and building up from there, you're able to not overwhelm kids and let their grades go up.

    

Motivation

 Student motivation is one of the biggest factors in online environments, with students falling behind, lacking accountability, and often not even participating, motivation is the hardest challenge to tackle. After researching and reflecting on my instructor's practices I concluded the best five ways to motivate students: providing meaningful student feedback and interacting with your classroom is one of the best things you can do for online learning students. Allowing students to virtually interact with you and letting them know that there is an actual person there increases motivation as they aren't just interacting with a screen but with an actual person. The second best way to motivate students is to allow self-monitoring on their learning platforms, keeping track of attendance, computer activity, and course activity enables for students to develop discipline, accountability, and motivation to actually complete the assignments. The third way to motivate students is by encouraging collaboration with other students, assigning group assignments to help foment the sense of a community within an online environment, making students feel more comfortable to post, create, and communicate with peers and the instructor. The fourth way is sprinkling in a variety of different assignments like videos, jamboards, edpuzzles, and a multitude of different assignments that limit repetition. When you create variety, you help the brain stay awake, helping students stay motivated. The fifth and last way to keep students motivated is to make assignments personal and relatable to students' life, by doing this you not only add variety to your assignments but also make students feel like actual human beings, by sharing their experiences, you allow for creativity and the sense of a community to flow.

The application of these tools is all relatively easy, personally, as an online instructor I would host virtual meetings and get to know my students. If a virtual meeting isn't available, I would create a discussion board for students to get to know each other. Through this, when you assign group projects, students are more likely to actually want to work with each other. Additionally, these group projects could also be personal, allowing students to thoroughly get to know each other while also learning the content. As an instructor, I would also make sure to leave meaningful feedback that relates to students, not just generic comments like "good work", but actually discuss what is in their replies or submissions. 

Assessing students in online environments

Nearpod

 In my previous blog post, we discussed the program Nearpod, this blog post will shift its focus from Nearpod's VR capabilities to Nearpods overall qualities as a teaching tool. 

Nearpod has an abundance of different tools that have the goal of aiding teachers of all abilities and all grades, providing a fusion between the tools of the past and the tools of the future. This fusion becomes one of the most important features, as it allows veteran teachers to thoroughly enjoy this program without being pushed out of their comfort zones. On the other hand, the program offers a sleek, user-friendly interface that allows new teachers to feel like they are using a modern tool, and also prevents from children feeling like the program they're using is heavily outdated. Additionally, the program offers many capabilities and different tools that benefit any and every student, from English to science, Nearpod allows students to fully explore their interests in a proactive and educational way. Nearpod's VR capabilities, connections to other Learning Management Systems, and capabilities to assure student interaction at all times make Nearpod one of the most influential and beneficial tools for educators at this moment.

Nearpod shares a number of amazing qualities; however, the platform lacks in various areas. Although its accessibility is one of the most promoted tools, the platform requires payment to maximize its features, starting at $159 a year for just the silver tier, the highest tier can run up to nearly $400 in order to gain access to all of its features. Additionally, if you choose to implement your LMS', your district would have to be the one purchasing the program, dragging out the process. These two became a huge factor in its accessibility as not every district and especially every teacher has the resources for this platform. The platform of Nearpod can also be repetitive, despite its luxurious VR capabilities and teacher communities, platforms like PearDeck that are free are competitors for this platform as they offer almost the same features but are even more user-friendly and accessible. 

Despite its limitations, Nearpod still has a number of qualities that make it a wonderful tool for educators. Nearpod offers a number of already-made lessons that are up to curriculum and standard par, building connections with some of the most known educative resources, Nearpod functions as an amazing tool for a teacher who is in a bit of a time crunch. Moreover, Nearpod also offers a library of interactive videos and games for teachers to teach a lesson, this becomes highly important as it switches up things from the traditional lesson, allowing students to directly interact with the content and have it relate to them. Overall, these features make Nearpod one of the most sought-after and valuable teaching tools of our time, with even its more basic package opening hundreds of doors for educators.

Whats your favorite teaching tool?

VR Tools

    I chose a program called Nearpod as my VR tool, although this isn't a strictly VR program, it also features a range of other helpful tools that educators can use across the board. Nearpod is a free/paid program that districts can purchase for their schools or teachers can sign up for, allowing them to create almost a virtual classroom, merging the traditional classroom of today with the tools of tomorrow. The VR component of Nearpod is one of the most promoted components of this program, working on tablets, ipads, computers, and phones, the VR feature is accessible on every platform. This platform allows kids to directly learn about something as if they were there, allowing them to take what is known as "Virtual Field Trips" and visit historical sites, natural wonders, and even virtual college trips. The program has over 450 ready-to-launch VR programs, and teachers are raving about it.

    I specially chose this program due to its user-friendly nature, combining the traditional classroom with technology, and being able to upload personalized lessons, videos, and activities that allow you to keep a relationship with students while also learning about the technology. The VR program is helpful to every teacher and every subject, history teachers are able to take students to the beaches of Normandy, science teachers taking their kids to a volcano, English teachers starting up a program on expression, and more. This accessibility and the user-friendly platform allow for vast numbers of educators and students to have a good experience with technology.

This VR tool is extremely helpful for students who lack the resources to go on expensive trips and learn world culture, a friendly and united community, especially low-income students who don't have the ability to go on college visits or have access to the same learning tools that many other students may have. Additionally, this tool can help impact students as it allows for creativity and exploration to flow, allowing them to open their minds to a number of places and experiences face-to-face that they traditionally wouldn't have. VR is an amazing tool that can help students, educators, and communities as a whole as they explore this vast world through a screen.

Want to learn more? Check out their site: https://nearpod.com/nearpod-vr

My Bitmoji Classroom

 

here is my bitmoji classroom!