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Remote Learning Tools

Promising Practices

Video conferencing tools such as Google Meet & Zoom are reported as a popular way to connect face to face with students and colleagues.

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Promising practices for use with students:

  • Lunch bunches
  • Class check-ins
  • Office hours for students and families
  • Mystery reader/read alouds
  • Mini lessons
  • Sharing student work
  • Synchronous teaching
  • Synchronous escape rooms

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Promising practices for use with colleagues:

  • Staff meetings
  • PLCs
  • Digital drop ins/office hours
  • Grade level meetings

Video Conferencing

Google Classroom is being used by all grade levels to:

  • Push out screencasts and tutorials
  • Foster discussion with students
  • Organize remote learning plans
  • Collect student work
  • Give feedback
  • Communicate with parents/guardians
  • Communicate with students
  • Differentiating remote learning work to meet IEP
  • Daily journals
  • Students annotate work on a mobile phone
  • Add co-teachers (grade level, special education, and EL) into one classroom

Google Classroom

Worcester Public Schools Office of

Instructional Technology & Digital Learning

April 2020

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Screencasting and video creation can be done in tools like Screencastify, Loom, Meet or Zoom. Teachers report so many ideas for using these tools and are getting positive responses from students.

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Promising practices for use with students:

  • Recording tutorials (PE, music, art, math, ela and more)
  • Record a mini lesson or read aloud
  • School wide “we miss you videos”
  • Explaining the weekly remote learning plan and expectations
  • Giving directions in multiple languages
  • How to navigate the remote learning website
  • Responding to Q&A

Screencasting/Video

Google Slides is being used for many different things and has been reported as easy to use for very young learners.

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Promising practices for use with students:

  • Organize remote learning activities in a slide deck
  • Organize remote learning by day
  • Present material, embed videos, links
  • Activities that mirror daily schedule
  • One pagers for directions/infographics
  • Choice boards/learning menus
  • Choose your own adventure
  • Gamification
  • Collect work
  • History in the Making Journal
  • Newspaper Template (write an article)

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Slides

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Tools like Google Voice, Remind 101, and Bloomz are being reported as great ways to communicate with students and families.

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Promising practices for use with students/families:

  • Reviewing remote learning plans
  • Supporting students who don’t have a device
  • Gathering work through a phone call
  • Texting directions, reminders
  • Ability to text with translation
  • Check-ins

Communication Apps

Google Forms appeared many times in the survey results. Forms can be sent to a mobile device or pushed through classroom and can be one question or several.

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Promising practices for use with students:

  • Collecting student questions (responding with video answers)
  • Checks for understanding
  • Quizzes and games
  • Checks for well being
  • Choose your own adventure
  • Forms embedded in a Google Site to collect work

Forms

Thank you to faculty and staff who filled out the form. If you are interested in using any of these tools, please bit.ly/wpsstafflearn for tutorials, professional development, and drop in hours. bit.ly/wpspromisingpractices