Educators must practice their trade regarding the use of hybrid teaching and at-home learning in the Time of COVID. Plan. Prepare. Instruct. Assess. Adjust instruction to assure learning. We are in the assess and adjust phase of using the hybrid educational model of in-school and at-home learning. We must “rethink” our first thoughts and designs, adjust and use what we know to cause all children to learn.
Last March when schools shifted from in-school learning to at-home learning, a first thought was how to make at-home learning as much like in-school learning as possible. If we could do this, we could mitigate (there is that COVID word again) the loss of student learning due to the pandemic. Much energy and many resources went into bringing children virtually back into school classrooms. This must be our first rethink.
Does at-home learning need to be a mirror of in-school learning?
Not necessarily. Regardless of the learner’s location, we are to teach all children to be proficient in the standards of their annual grade level or subject area curriculum. Does that require the same instruction design, the same exact lesson, for each location? A rethunk answer is no. Children in the classroom and children at home are not always able to do the exact same things within a lesson. Time, materials, and teacher proximity are not the same for each group. Children at school remain on a school clock while children at home have more flexibility. Children at home may use different materials in completing an assignment – what they have available at home. Teacher proximity is a significant difference for in-school children. At-home children, outside the eye and presence of a teacher, do not get the immediate “I see you” and they don’t get the “get busy” attitude over a computer screen. When in-class teaching is slowed by waiting for at-home adjustments, the lesson bogs for everyone. We now are aware of these differences and should adjust our hybrid accordingly.
If our teaching and learning design is outcome-based and student-centered, we do what we always should do – design backwards from the outcome to an appropriate and effective instruction. Appropriate and effective instruction may mean differing the lesson for each location.
At-home learners suffer screen fatigue. Adjust and allow children at-home to work with their screens off. We do not need to watch all children on-screen as they read or write or do the detail of a school assignment. Keep the audio on. Let them turn off or work away from their screen. If they have a question or need assistance, they can return to video. Why this rethunk? Some children are at-home because of parent choice regarding the virus. Other children are at-home because they prefer to be at-home and not in-school. This is a fact that pandemic choice has created. Work toward the benefit of their preference not its downside. Regardless of reason, screen fatigue is real. Be focused on the outcomes not the process. If the outcomes erode, bring them back on-screen for the right reasons.
Flex the time so that children at-home have until the end of the day not the limits of in-class time to complete a lesson. A child at-home has disrupters that we do not know and cannot see on-screen. Their attention goes to parents, siblings, pets, and others in the household at times and for reasons we do not know; it just does. Home noises and sounds distract them as well as the comings and goings of others. Their environment is different than that of an in-school learner. So, understand and be flexible. Learning outcome is the priority, not the window of time allowed for work to be done.
Clearly communicate the lesson outcomes to parents so they can monitor when a child has completed an assignment. Put parents on the same page of concern for learning outcomes not time on task or process. These are the adults supervising the at-home learner and they need to know what “done with an assignment” looks and reads like. Communicating beforehand with parents saves the time of having to correct student work later. Get our at-home parent partners in on the the game plan.
Accept alternative versions of a successful learning outcome. In an old Harry Chapin song, he sang of a teacher who told children that flowers only come in green and red and always are in straight rows. Harry knew that isn’t and so and so do we. Let creativity and interpretation flourish as expressions of the learning outcomes you set. At-home and in-school can appear differently if they achieve the same learning.
Accountability to learn still holds, so don’t go soft on grading. Accountability requirements at state and national levels are dropping like flies, but a classroom teacher’s requirements for curricular and subject learning should not. Give explicit feedback frequently. Require student work to meet your usual requirements and do not create softer pandemic standards. One of the guardrails for at-home learners will be their grades. If an at-home shuts down, don’t let them slide. If children respond to grades, use that lever now. And, of course, use the grades lever with parents. Let parents do the heavy lifting of supervising at-home learners.
The Big Duh of a hybrid design is that in-school and at-home teaching does not have to be identical for all as long as the learning outcomes are the same for all. We can use the advantages of in-school and the advantages of at-home to cause children to learn regardless of location.
When remote education is necessary, we can use our learning to assist all children to learn.