Ideas for creating authentic connections, meaningful relationships and classroom camaraderie through the screen.
Barriers to Bridges
Barriers to Bridges (form Anya Grotte-Brown blog)
Since the COVID-19 pandemic has forced schools to close, teachers have served as the main resource on remote learning; supported students’ social-emotional and mental health needs; and broken down multiple barriers to help children learn and grow. Our new report examines the frontline experiences of educators during the COVID-19 pandemic and provides recommendations for education leaders and policymakers based on teachers’ guidance and input.
“The central lesson of this report for school and policy leaders is to empower and recognize the expertise of teachers in responding to this pandemic. They must make room for our teachers to continue to lead planning and bring forth solutions that will benefit students and their learning.”―Roberto J. Rodríguez, Teach Plus President and CEO.
From the Report:
Findings from the focus groups:
- Teachers want to ensure that school leaders prioritize the mental health and well-being of both students and teachers in the coming school year.
- Teachers want specific professional development in order to bring their best in this new era, including on how to teach remotely and on how to integrate social and emotional learning into their instruction.
- Teachers see this moment of crisis as a potential transformative point in education, to address inequities and support innovation in teaching and learning. They believe schools can and must use it to shape longer-term solutions for the future of education.
- Teachers support the use of student learning data — including data collected through diagnostic assessments — paired with curated or “power” standards to tailor their curriculum and pace of teaching.
- Collaboration across school roles and more distributed leadership in schools are needed to meet the challenges of the coming school year. Deeper partnerships and relationships with families and community partners are also urgently needed to better serve students, especially students with disabilities, English language learners, and economically disadvantaged students.
Recommendations for school, district, and state leaders:
- Embrace teacher leadership and include teachers in the decision-making process.
- Prioritize and incorporate the expertise of teachers in school planning and instruction.
- Increase resources for trauma-informed instruction, student mental health, and the well-being of teachers.
- Strengthen communication, connections, and partnership with parents and families to better support students.
- Identify, evaluate, and scale-up promising practices and approaches, particularly from teachers who are uniquely qualified to understand and re-envision how schools can best serve children.
- Prioritize education funding — and pay particular attention to those schools that serve the highest need students.
“Teachers across the country are seeing this moment as an opportunity to be innovative through learning new skills that will enhance their ability to teach virtually and better meet the needs of their students. School districts are now acting with urgency to fund the resources needed to finally close the digital divide. This shift in education opens up a world of possibilities for both students and teachers and may just be the rainbow after the storm we have been looking for.” ― Natalie Brown, 2nd grade teacher at Frank Guzick Elementary in Dallas ISD and Teach Plus Senior Policy Fellow.
Apple Glass: the new AR device?
https://medium.com/macoclock/why-apple-glass-is-way-more-likely-to-succeed-than-google-glass-d1aac5bc51f8
https://www.repubblica.it/dossier/stazione-futuro-riccardo-luna/2020/07/22/news/cosa_sappiamo_degli_apple_glass_gli_occhiali_reinventati-262552616/?ref=RHPPTP-BH-I262428050-C6-P3-S1.6-T1
A collection of useful resources
By Apple, a collection of useful resources and ideas for “by distance” didactics:
Again about teaching by distance
Again about teaching by distance
We all are living in systems that are CLOSED and OPEN at the same time, and sometimes we call them “closed” and sometimes we call “open”, in according by our behaviors, our points of view, our favorite teaching techniques and so on.
So it may happen that the student ON LINE or the teacher ON LINE by their IPAD are closer and performant than they are used to be, “close” in the classroom! Strange, isn’t it?
CLOSE and OPEN, presence and distance, to be (close) or not to be… we must consider “relative”, seriously.
What’s the distance?
What’s the distance?
it is the most pronounced word in relation to school.
if we think of the pre-pandemic school, however, the teachers have always said we need also a “distant school” (eg homework) and as well the innovators have often proposed an absolutely “remote” formula, such as the flipped classroom .
And this is essentially due to the fact that the concept of “presence” is completely relative, from the learning point of view.
We have often admitted that we practice teaching through technological devices, (also) because inside the physical presence of a student there’s a mental distance; it’s that gap many of us have precisely tried to fill with technology.
And it’s the reason I think it is useful today to re-problematize the concept of distance.
Piano scuola del Ministero e del CTS per la ripresa
Piano scuola del Ministero e del CTS per la ripresa
tematiche della formazione dei docenti:
- metodologie innovative di insegnamento e di apprendimento
- metodologie innovative per l’inclusione scolastica
- modelli di didattica interdisciplinare
- modalità e strumenti per la valutazione, anche alla luce di metodologie innovative di insegnamento e di apprendimento realizzate, ad esempio, attraverso le tecnologie multimediali
tematiche della formazione del personale ATA:
- organizzazione del lavoro, collaborazione e realizzazione di modelli di lavoro in team (tutto)
- principi di base dell’architettura digitale della scuola (tutto)
- digitalizzazione delle procedure amministrative anche in relazione alla modalità di lavoro agile (assistenti amministrativi e tecnici).
elementi della Linea Guida per la didattica digitale integrata:
- quadro normativo di riferimento
- come organizzare la didattica digitale integrata (analisi del fabbisogno, obiettivi da perseguire, strumenti da utilizzare, orario e frequenza delle lezioni)
- indicazioni sulla Didattica digitale integrata e integrazione del Patto di corresponsabilità e del Regolamento di disciplina per le scuole secondarie: indicazioni alle famiglie per una partecipazione sostenibile alle attività didattiche a distanza
- metodologie e strumenti per la verifica
- la valutazione
- alunni con B.E.S.
- la gestione della privacy
- gli OOCC e le assemblee
- rapporto scuola/famiglia
Nuovo ruolo per il lab di tecnologia
Everybody knows that ITC lab is one of last dinosaurs, since “pure ITC” skills “abdicated” to WYSIWYG interfaces and more friendly approaches. Interactive boards or monitor brought ITC in the classrooms; and faster telematic, learning apps and mobile devices convinced teachers to use ITC in daily mood.
But… you know exactly what happened. Just a little percentual of teachers do really that and without evident outcomes. The most serious thing is that it’s an individual adventure.
Maybe labs have to come back. But we must think of lab as a big challenging project (on a big subject area? reading and writing and publishing? math and science? art? social? on a big learning project?) and provide some labs to invite classes to go in, with a project in their mind and right TOOLS to explore and live a different learning way!
What do you think?
Innovation is not a new thing
What’s really news in didactics? It’s too long we talk about “innovation” but we don’t know if we really need that.
What we really need is new people who tells different stories.
We invocate “innovation” when we feel tired of meeting non very sensitive people on our way. New technology helps people to tell new stories, for sure. But when we say “new” we don’t think of “used”, but we think of “users”.
What do we need to call it “teaching”?
In Italy we call “DAD” (didattica a distanza, something like teaching by distance) and it means when a teacher uses web to provide content or learning tools. For many years the schools use that in 10-50% perceptual range. Since lockdown caused by covid-19 and as the schools are closed, the school manage 100% didactics by distance.
Thought about 70% of students regret the school in presence, it’s been an important chance to increase digital skills. Many teachers do.
And many school are proud to declare they are ON LINE and cover 100% of school time by the web, thanks to some platforms like WebEx, Google Meet or Microsoft Teams. All we need the platforms to connect, it’s true. But are we sure to call it “teaching”, just because we are connected and look at a webcam??