Communicate 4.3.1 The Synchronous Session

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I've mentioned in previous posts my experience as a student in an online gifted endorsement.  While I thrived in the asynchronous discussion forums and enjoyed the autonomy of the course work, I especially came to appreciate and look forward to the weekly small group synchronous session.   I learned from my experience that although a virtual course is a distinctly individual environment, interaction through synchronous sessions is necessary to maintain a "true classroom culture."

Simply put, the synchronous session is the human element of a virtual classroom.  Any teacher's goal is to create a community of learners and the synchronous session is the medium in which a virtual teacher builds such a community.  Whether a meeting with students to discuss a topic or open office hours where students and parents can ask questions and receive real-time answers, the synchronous session is a most valuable component of an online classroom.

Communicate 4.2.3 Discussions

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In the online classrooms, discussion forums serve a very important purpose.  They are not only a place for students to engage with one another about a topic of study, but also a place for teachers to evaluate student understanding.  In my own experience taking online courses as part of my gifted endorsement, I found the discussion forum to be extremely effective.  From a student's perspective, the weekly discussion was an opportunity to share my ideas and more importantly to gain a deeper understanding of the topic by reflecting on the ideas of my peers.

Because students are able to gain a more insightful understanding, the discussion forum functions as one of the most important teaching tools in a virtual instructors toolbox.  Yet, the discussion can be used ineffectively.  For example, students may post comments that are too simplistic and do not further engage their peers in the conversation.

To avoid this type of behavior and to make the forum as effective as possible, virtual teachers can adhere to a few best practices for facilitating an online discussion.  The most crucial best practice is clearly communicating the discussion expectations from the beginning.  Students should know the rules for good forum conversation (ie: how to appropriately disagree with someone) and should be given a rubric.  Another best practice for the online teacher in facilitating discussions is to encourage learners to dig deeper and continue the conversation by identifying connections and posing open ended questions.

In all, discussions are a necessary and essential element of the online course.  A virtual teacher must become an effective facilitator who maintains an obvious presence while building a collaborative environment in which students take the lead.

Communicate 4.2.2 Digital Feedback

Feedback is an essential part of any classroom.  For the virtual teacher, feedback must be specific and personable in order to enhance the experience of students.  The digital resources below are excellent additions to the virtual teachers toolbox, especially as a means to provide the feedback students need to be successful in an e-learning environment.

No. 1 Audio Feedback using Evernote
I was first introduced to Evernote a couple of years ago at an EdTech Conference.  I was immediately drawn to its promise to make my life more organized and to be the workspace to get everything done.  My Type A personality was buzzing as I downloaded the app as fast as I could open the iTunes store.

Since then, I have not utilized Evernote as much as I imagined I would... but I am excited about the new prospect of rediscovering it as a means to deliver feedback as a virtual teacher.  Upon reading about 'Speaking to Students' with audio feedback in Online Courses, I was especially intrigued how teachers can email an audio note to students.  This is an excellent resource for giving personable and individualized feedback to students and I am looking forward to trying out this Evernote feature.

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 No. 2 A Kudos & Challenges Email using Mail Chimp
A few posts ago I showcased Mail Chimp for creating beautiful email newsletters to maintain ongoing communication [Read the post here].  I am excited to share another example of how a virtual teacher can utilize Mail Chimp to send out summative feedback to all students with a special focus on discussion forums.

I love the idea of sending an email to students to give kudos for great posts and participation.  This not only calls out awesome work of students, but gives other students an example to emulate.  Students will naturally be inclined to engage at a deeper level.

View this email live: http://eepurl.com/bbafcD

Note: The graphics I used as part of this template were created in canva!

No. 3 Creating images for an Excellent Job using free Meme Makers
Just as effective as sending a mass email to identify and praise students' hard work, virtual teachers should communicate praise-worthy feedback individually.  Free meme makers on the internet are a great way for teachers to bring some humor and personality into their feedback.

Memes can be created very quickly and infinitely individualized.  What's even better, memes are part of our students' digital culture and they make immediate connections to the messages.  It is for this last reason, making relevant connections to students' lives, that I believe memes can be a powerful tool for giving personable feedback in the virtual classroom.

Below are a sampling of memes I created to showcase how they can be used to give feedback.  In my own classroom, I would attach/embed these into an email I was sending to the student discussing their great work!  I would even cc the parent as an added emphasis of praise!

Communicate 4.2.1 Feedback

To introduce my students to the Historical Thinking Skills as part of the newly redesigned AP US History course, I created an 'About Me' Project.  Assigned on the first weekend of school, this project was a perfect opportunity for students to explore the skills that would serve as the foundation for the course and to introduce themselves to me in a creative way.

The project description is below, as well as the images, documents, sample project presentation, and rubric that I used to introduce the project to my students.

 Historical Thinking Skills- An About Me Project

 

Task: Your task is to create an ‘About Me’ presentation within the context of the APUSH Historical Thinking Skills.  This project will count as a Period Assessment.

Your project must be created as a Google Drive Presentation & shared with me- mrscricketbutler@gmail.com- by the due date: Monday-08.18.14 at 8:10 am

You must provide an example from your life for each of the following skills:

1. Historical Argumentation

2. Appropriate Use of Relevant Historical Evidence

3. Historical Causation

4. Patterns of Continuity & Change over time

5. Periodization

6. Comparison

7. Contextualization

8. Interpretation

9. Synthesis

Historical Thinking Skills About Me Project--Grading Rubric:

adapted from Mitch Billings, Catholic High School, Louisiana

9=Filet Mignon: from the first taste to the last bite it is excellent—consistent—no bad moments.  There are “oohs” and “aahs” at each bite.

8=New York Strip: Very good—fairly uniform with just a rim of “fat.”  Tasty and a great steak.

7=T-Bone: Good!  But there is a part of it which is excellent—the small part—the “filet”--and the other larger part is fairly consistent.

6=Chicken Fried Steak: Better than a burger—actually it IS sort of a burger with a little trimming on it.  The meat is rather “pedestrian” with a little “seasoning” to help it.

5=Hamburger: Adequate—OK—filling—a “sameness” about them (however, if you kissed your girlfriend/boyfriend and she/he said it was “adequate,” would YOU be satisfied?

4=Hot Dog: By itself, it isn’t much.  It needs “dressing up” with chili, mustard, onions to make it palatable.  It has the APPEARANCE of something good, but fails to deliver unless it is augmented by condiments.

3=Vienna Sausage or Baloney Sandwich: the ingredients are a mixture of the good, the bad, and the ugly.  You wouldn’t leave the house to go out for a baloney sandwich, would you?  We’re into survival food here—you have nothing else.

2=Spam: down to hurricane rations.  A great mish-mash of all sorts of things—some not good.

1=Potted Meat: We have NO IDEA what’s in it—perhaps everything and nothing—a last ditch effort.

The last three come in CANS—YOU HAVE TO DIG FOR IT!

NOTE: For a grade of 9/9, you must provide a creative and thoughtful example for each of the 9 Historical Thinking Skills.  You are also expected to give a detailed explanation for each example in the notes section for each slide (see my example in the HTS folder).

 A Note on the Rubric: Because the project was designed to take one of the foundational elements of the course and explain it using creativity within the context of my students' lives, I wanted the rubric to reflect the same theme.  To illustrate my expectation of creativity for this project, my rubric encouraged students to produce a fun and informative product. 

  A Note on the Commentary:  Below are examples of the commentary I provided for students on their HTS 'About Me' Projects.  All student samples are used with permission and feedback was given based on the rubric above.  I made it a personal quota to comment on at least 2-3 individual slides within each student's presentation, as well as giving them feedback on their overall project grade.

 

Below are all of the HTS About Me Project links:

Historical Thinking Skills About Me Project Description & Rubric

APUSH Historical Thinking Skills pdf

Mrs. Butler's HTS About Me Project Sample

Communicate 4.1.2 Rubrics

Rubrics are one of the best ways to effectively communicate the expectations of an assignment with students.  Because a virtual teacher must guide students as autonomous learners, assignments and rubrics must be designed to express the criteria of assignments and the specificity of the evaluation procedure.

To illustrate the importance of rubrics in establishing direction for students, I created a blogging rubric for the Selected Topics Project my APUSH students complete.  Below is a screen shot of the blogging element of the project and its corresponding rubric.  The requirement is that students must compose a series of eight bi-weekly blog posts as their project progresses throughout the semester.

Link to live smore flyer: https://www.smore.com/s4tnb-selected-topics-project

Note: My rubric was created and adapted from this digital source.

Communicate 4.1.1 Evaluation Methods & Communication

Students in the online environment must act as autonomous learners, taking initiative to become independently successful in their academics.  However, their independence is not without guidance.  Therefore, one of the most important facets of communication in an online classroom must be feedback.

A virtual teacher must commit to providing authentic feedback that is truly individualized in order to foster continued growth in their students.  Unlike the traditional, brick-and-mortar teacher who can stand beside a student and watch theier struggle and growth, giving personable guidance along the way, a virtual teacher must employ a different set of tools and methods for monitoring progress and providing feedback.

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First, a virtual teacher must consider the forms of assessment.  While online quizzes are good for showing student progress and collecting data, students need the opportunity to explain what they know.  Blogs, discussions, and synchronous sessions are excellent ways to foster the student understanding-teacher feedback cycle.

Another effective means of giving feedback is through online conferences with students.  Online conferences allow a virtual teacher to speak directly with a student regarding their academic performance, as well as giving the student an opportunity to share how they feel about the course. 

Although holding individual conferences with students and providing written feedback on assignments are both time consuming practices, the more personable and authentic a teacher can make this type of  communication, the more students will continue to engage in their virtual classroom.

Communicate 3.2.2 Differentiation

Differentiation is not just a buzzword reserved for instruction.  There are a number of opportunities for virtual teachers to meet the diverse learning personalities of their students, including the modes of communication.  Student preferences for communication will closely mirror their learning styles: visual-spatial, auditory, logical, linguistic, etc.  In order to maintain effective communication, a virtual teacher should be mindful of employing a variety of methods for differentiating news, information, and course updates.

To model an effective way to incorporate more differentiated means of communication, I created a padlet bulletin board titled: APUSH Exam Review Resources.  This digital bulletin board can be embedded onto my homepage and is extremely easy to update and edit.  Through this medium, I am able to communicate and share awesome review resources for the APUSH Exam in May.

I like how padlet is professional, neat, and organized for the logical and spatial learners.  But also how I can add everything from images, audio, video, as well as short textual descriptions of each item in order to meet all learning personalities.

After embedding it onto my course website I would stress to my students that this padlet/bulletin board will be the consistent location of all information, updates, and news regarding the APUSH Exam.  Then, as I add to padlet I can send a mass communication via remind or twitter to tell students to check out any new resources or information.

Created with Padlet

Communicate 3.2.1 The Newsletter

In recent posts I've discussed effective methods of communication including personal phone calls and mass communication via twitter and remind.  I also modeled two awesome digital tools- canva and mail chimp- for designing beautiful graphics, email newsletters, and other communication campaigns. In my attempt to showcase a variety of resources for effective communication in the virtual classroom, I am excited introduce three more tools today!

1. The smore Newsletter
Its easy interface featuring drag and drop tools makes smore a great option for building a newsletter.  What I especially love about smore is the ability to embed your digital flyer onto a website and share it across multiple social media!  I've been using smore in my own classroom for a few years now and it is an extremely effective medium for mass communication of course information as it translates beautifully on all devices and computers.

Click the following link to see my smore flyer live: https://www.smore.com/m04w1

2. The Homepage Scrolling News Reel using emaze

Using the same information and graphics as my smore flyer above, you can see how different the appearance is with a scrolling news reel.  Two features that I love about emaze is their ability to embed the autoplay presentations onto a homepage and their good selection of cool themes and templates.  I like how versatile the scrolling news reel is and how a virtual teacher has the capacity to change the theme without necessarily changing the mode of communication.

3. Interactive News using thinglink

For my final newsletter tool I am excited to showcase thinglink!  Although hesitant at first, when I began to work within their interface I was very pleased with how easy and straightforward it was.  I also like how you can link websites, images, videos, and more with the simple copy/paste of an url!  I believe thinglink would be an excellent way to communicate with students on your homepage... when the picture changes, students know to check out the news and updates.  Pretty cool!

***Special Note of Consideration:

Although I've showcased a variety of tools for effective communication, it is important that a virtual teacher be committed to whichever mode of communication they choose for the term or year.  In order to be truly effective and foster good communication with parents and students, a teacher must be consistent in how and when they share information.

Communicate 3.1.2 News

An important and dominant feature of a virtual course website should be the news items and announcements feature.
 Here, it is important to consistently update the news for the benefit of keeping students and parents in the loop. As an online teacher, I would also utilize twitter and remind for urgent updates beyond the weekly news items mentioned above.  Awesome features of both of these tools is the ability to mass communicate with students and parents while still incorporating graphics and videos to help convey the news item in an appealing way.

Creating eye-catching and appealing graphics is one of my favorite expressions of creativity.   
Whether it is putting a little pizzaz into a boring PowerPoint for lecture capture or producing a series of news announcements for an online course, there are a number of resources a virtual teacher can use to create and share amazing graphics!  My goals to share all of my favorite resources during the course of this TOOL experience and model how I would use them in my own virtual classroom.

For the purpose of this quest, I created two news items using canva and PowToon.   
Canva is my go-to graphic design resource and I use it on almost a daily basis!  The web-based tool allows users to create all types of graphics from social media to presentations to customized projects.  For those who may not have an eye or passion for design like myself, they offer a very large selection of templates that are nothing short of amazing!  The news items I created below are examples of two social media templates.

The PowToon video is one that I created for my own AP European History class this year.  As a means to introduce students to the long-term project: #APEHconnect, I created a video and posted it on our course website.  Students who were curious about the project that I'd mentioned in passing during class had the opportunity to preview it for themselves.  After an initial learning curve I enjoyed working with PowToon and was impressed with the final product.  However, because it was so time consuming, I would not use PowToon regularly to make videos for news items and announcements.

 

Communicate 3.1.1 Hompages

Communication 2.1.3 Ongoing Communication

The sample eNewsletter below was created using Mail Chimp- an amazing email campaign design software available for free on the web!  I love their easy drag & drop features and their wide selection of templates (like the one I've used here).

Users can create beautiful, customized emails to be sent to the masses and the masses can sign up for subscriptions to ensure that they never miss out on the information!  It is a win-win for everyone and truly a better way to send email!

For the virtual teacher in particular, mail chimp is an excellent digital tool for maintaining essential  continuous communication with stakeholders.  Simply save a template in your account's dashboard and you are just a few clicks away from sending your important information in an extremely appealing format.  In my own classroom in the cloud I would send a newsletter like this one biweekly as a means to communicate the ongoing progression of the course and my own continued expectations.

 

To view the email in real time, please click the url below: 

http://eepurl.com/baCSbD

Communication 2.1.2 Communication Guidelines

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An effective communication plan is at the root of a positive and supportive experience in any learning setting.  This is even more true in the virtual environment.  So as I pursue my own classroom in the cloud, it is imperative that I create an Individual Communication Plan as a virtual teacher.

I. Welcome Email
An excellent practice for a virtual teacher is making a phone contact with students and parents within the first week of a course's start.  To continue to establish the foundation for open communication, teachers should also send an email welcoming students and parents to the course.

Below is a sample welcome message to parents:

Mr. & Mrs. __________,

I wanted to take a moment to share with you how pleased I am that Christopher is enrolled in Advanced Placement US History and I wanted to give you an idea of what to expect as the course unfolds.  This course is designed to develop an authentic college atmosphere and many students find the pace and workload more demanding at first.  Please keep this in mind as you establish expectations for Christopher's performance.  It is my hope that you continue to have high expectations while being supportive and understanding of the fact that he is being asked to perform at a much higher level than most students in a regular curriculum.  If the need arises, please contact me with any questions or concerns.  I am looking forward to a successful term.

Sincerely,

Cricket Butler
AP United States History Teacher


II. Personal notes versus mass communication to stakeholders
It may be my Southern roots or my hobby collecting stationery, but I prefer a personal note over mass communication any day.  While there is certainly a time for mass communication- course updates, assignment submission requirements, pertinent EOC information; I believe a personal note to stakeholders makes a lasting impression.  An email sent to parents praising their child's achievements in class or a handwritten postcard welcoming a student to the course are excellent examples of how personal notes encourage a personable environment within the virtual classroom.

III. Stakeholders
There are two major stakeholder groups that a virtual teacher must be in constant communication with: students and parents.  As a high school teacher, the obvious goal is to help students become more autonomous in their online learning experience, including the initiation of communication with their teachers.  However, it is a helpful practice for virtual teachers to contact a certain number of students (and parents) each week.  Both phone and email contacts should be included in this weekly quota.

IV. School Policies regarding Communication
To piggy back off of the weekly contact goal above, it is an extremely important policy to log all contacts.  Emails should be organized and phone conversation notes should be filed for easy access.  Some schools may even require a digital contact log.  No matter what the policy, a virtual teacher must have a system set up for keeping accurate contact records.

V.  Tools available for effective Communication
As mentioned above, there is a time and a place for mass communication and I use a variety of tools to communicate important messages and reminders to my students.  Two of the most valuable tools are twitter and remind.  In my experience, students are both familiar with and appreciative of my communication using these two mediums and even initiate conversation with their peers and myself on twitter.

Communication 2.1.1 Identify Stakeholders

Because virtual teachers are not in front of their students every single day, they must be especially diligent in maintaining effective communication with all stakeholders.  More importantly, online instructors must make themselves available to students and parents.

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To assist students in becoming autonomous stakeholders and effective communicators in an online course, teachers must employ a professional tone that encourages open and continuous dialogue.  In other words, virtual instructors should model appropriate communication skills for their students to imitate and apply themselves.  This correlates into consistent, professional, and open communication.

A virtual teacher must also work and communicate closely with parents to provide the support necessary for student success in the e-learning setting.  I especially appreciate the notion that parents should serve as a "coach" to help their children navigate the virtual classroom.  By working together as a support team- parents as coaches and teachers as models- virtual students will have the solid foundation necessary to succeed.

In all, virtual teachers must implement an effective plan to communicate with stakeholders.  This plan must contain a number of strategies and modes of communication.  In my next few posts, I will continue to explore the role of communication in the virtual classroom.

Communicate 1.1.2 Laws of Communication

Professional educators, whether virtual or brick-and-mortar, must adhere to high standards regarding ethics and laws.  But a teacher can only adhere to these standards as long as they understand them.  FERPA and Copyright laws are two of the most important ethics for a teacher to uphold, yet many educators have a shallow understanding of both.  To try and simplify it for myself and others, I've provided a few basic guidelines to follow.

FERPA
In the opening statement of Faculty Focus' FERPA and Social Media blog post, they appropriately comment that "FERPA is one of the misunderstood regulations in education."  With so much confusion on the rules and regulations of FERPA, it is no wonder that the mere mention of FERPA causes anxiety amongst a room full of educators.  But to relieve some of those fears, one can refrain from violating FERPA guidelines by committing to a few common sense rules:

• DO remember that FERPA, in the most simplistic terms, is a privacy law that protects students' education records.
• Do NOT share any information about a student with anyone other than parent/guardian.
• Do NOT release student grades in an email.
• DO make a phone call in all instances where grades or personal student information must be discussed.
• DO treat your students' personal and educational records as you would like to have yours treated, with discretion, respect, and privacy.

Copyright
It is the running joke among educators that teaching is the only job where it is okay to beg, borrow, and steal.  This is true if we are talking about awesome teaching strategies!  This is NOT true if we are talking about copyright laws!   Images, documents, music, etc... we must build an expectation of sharing and attribution in our classrooms.  Yet, in the virtual classroom, it is not required that all work be original.  So how does the online teacher maintain sound copyright ethics?  Below are some tips to keep your sharing within the boundaries of the law:

• DO remember, most information on the internet is not in the public domain.
• DO properly cite and credit all copyrighted material.
• Do NOT use "Fair Use" as a justifiable means to defy copyright laws.
• When in doubt, DON'T just assume... get permission to share.
• DO make Creative Commons and the public domain your default for images, graphics, print, music, and more!

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Communicate 1.1.1 Definitions of Communication

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The times, they are a changing... and so my communication skills must adapt, too.  I can proudly say that I have witnessed and experienced the communication revolution first-hand.  From the archaic beeper to the first generation cell phones to the introduction of social media through Facebook, I have been at the front end of each major technology and trend, embracing them wholeheartedly.

Most recently I have especially enjoyed refining my social communication through blogging!  As I mentioned in my introductions post, I have been blogging personally for about a year now.  The more I write and share my ideas with the world, the more evolved my communication skills become.  These improved skills have also carried over into my professional communication through my writing of emails, recommendation letters, and even this most recent blog on my pursuit of becoming a virtual teacher.
 
With new innovations in technology changing every aspect of education, how teachers communicate with stakeholders must also continue to evolve.  I said in an earlier post that communication is key and this has never been more true for teachers in the virtual classroom.  Online teachers must be especially mindful of how they communicate with students, parents, and colleagues in order to build rapport.

For my own classroom, I have incorporated my interest in blogging to effectively communicate with students and parents.  By incorporating a blog roll onto my course website, I am able to share class activities, homework, and important announcements every day.  Students and parents can also sign up for an RSS feed of the blog posts.  Beyond this, twitter and remind are two of my favorite ways to communicate.

When I think back to when I began teaching I sometimes wonder how I ever survived without the communication tools I have today.  With all the guaranteed changes in Ed Tech and communication technology, the one element that must remain constant is the teacher's role in modeling exemplar communication skills.  As educators we teach content and standards, as models we show appropriate behavior to be imitated.