To continue my helps for teachers while dealing with this situation (COVID-19 and having to race to turn F2F classes into online courses) I am sharing some helps for that first day with a Remote lesson on a platform like Zoom.

So far, so good, the Zoom platform has held up, so we’ve been able to have our first  remote meetings. All of my classes voted, they really want to still meet together in a virtual space, despite the craziness of my life – family home, small apartment, etc.  (more on that in a future post). I assume many of you have already had your first day, so I share this for ideas, or if you haven’t, below, you will find some helps.

I found it really interesting to go back and look at the footage of the classes, so that I could see what they could see. Very enlightening, but more on that later!

Here is a link to let you watch one of these classes (raw). By this point, I had figured out a lot of the kinks:

• I pause the recording so that the students at home don’t have to watch dead moments (when students are working in breakout rooms, etc.)
• I give students at home instructions
• I know when to use the spotlight (when I am giving pertinent information) and when to let the camera go to the students (when we are discussing, Q&A, etc.)
• The link is below, I invite you to watch it so that you can see what your students are seeing as you prepare for your virtual classes.

Topic: REL 212 2pm Class – New Testament
Start Time : Mar 19, 2020 01:55 PM

Meeting Recording:
https://byui.zoom.us/rec/share/5ZJbNuzS3CRIRInO0UDic4J9WafIT6a8hnJPrPoNzPUe4cVL0AgorzFRbjIo3Ls

 

Thank you for your reading, sharing, comments (here or on the other channels)!

7. An Example of a Robust At Home Lesson

 

My lesson ideas follow:

This is the item I posted on the white board as the students came into the room:

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Welcome!

Come into the room

Play around with the features of Zoom

• Locate the place to turn on and off your video, mute, etc.
• Locate the controls at the bottom of the screen
• Locate and start the “Manage Participants” feature
• Locate and start the “Chat” feature
• Let me know any questions you may have

This is going to be exciting!

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And this is my lesson plan. I had it ready so that I could copy and paste items onto the whiteboard or into the chat-box so that when they went into discussion rooms they could use the information.

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First Virtual Meeting Schedule

 

1. Welcome and Opening Prayer
2. Check Tech – let the kids play around and see what’s what (White board display “Welcome” with suggestions) 
3. Practice going to breakout rooms
   • Meet each other
   • Get to know the tools of the breakout room
   • Practice sharing your screen with each other
   • Make sure that you can hear each other

3. Discuss logistics
   1. Polls – options
      • Synchronous – (together or with groups during class time)
      • Asynchronous – (together around a certain experience – at home lesson, video, PowerPoint, etc. but whenever we can during the week)
   2. Questions about logistics
4. Lesson
   1. Go to breakout room (10 minutes)
   2. Discuss these things –
      • Are you doing okay – what are you worried about, what are you looking forward to?
      • Discuss the following questions:
        • How has working on memories and histories over the past week helped you feel connected to your ancestors?
        • Why is connection so important, what have you learned as you have been preparing this material for class?
        • Who do you feel the most connected to (if there were a real crisis, who could you call on to help you)?
        • Why are we supposed to connect to our ancestors, how can/has this helped you?
        • Why do you think the Lord has prompted the Prophet and Apostles to do more with connecting families spiritually through the Home Study Program?
   3. Back together:
      • • Questions?
        • Comments?
        • Thoughts?
        • Feelings?
        • Concerns?
        • YOU GUYS ARE AMAZING – WE CAN DO THIS!!!

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