Creating Communities �with Online Learners & Families

In Online and Virtual Settings

Your presenters:

Jennie Stoltzfus and

Lisa Zimmerman

Eastern Lancaster County School District

New Holland, PA

Jennie’s Family

Lisa’s Family

Show and Tell

Show your partner some pics of your family!

ElancOnline �Virtual Academy

Eastern Lancaster County School District online program.

Relationships with Learners and Families = a Community

01

Daily Class Meetings

Weekly Family Check-ins

Spreadsheet Organization

Wacky Wednesday

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Optional for all!

What is Wacky Wednesday? Here is a brief overview with more details to come!

Wacky Wednesday

• Good-bye Summer, Hello Fall
• Farmer Day/Apple Stem
• Game Day
• Thanksgiving
• Peppermint Ukuleles
• Polar Express
• Winter Wonderland
• MLK day
• Snowflake STEM

Social and Community Building Fun

Seesaw

I. Fun Friday examples

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II. Reading Connections

EOL Colleagues

Transparent

Open

Accepting

Helpful - I need your help!!!

Constant Communication

Report Card

Creating a Community

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How to create community with asynchronous learners?

02

Relationships during Daily Meetings

i. Academic Topics

ii. Community Building

iii. Pure Fun and Smiles!

iv. Share Personal Stories

v. Share Hobbies & Daily Stories

Similar Sorts

Zoom rooms/ small groups

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Non-Threatening Questions; Fast and Easy to Answer

Find someone whose first name starts with the same letter as yours

Find someone whose birthday is in the same month as yours

Online Primary Teachers/Online Intermediate Teachers/Admin/Classroom Teachers

Community Building During Online Meetings

Online Games

Daily Theme Days - holidays

Motivation Monday, Taco Tuesday, Wacky Wednesday,Thankful Thursday, Fun Friday

Birthday Celebrations

Accomplishments of Learners celebrations

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Taco Tuesday! Turn and Talk:

• Motivation Monday
• Taco Tuesday
• Wacky Wednesday
• Thankful Thursday
• Fun Friday

How do you engage learners in conversation to build relationships in a virtual format?

OR What is your favorite style of taco and most importantly, the drink that goes with it???

Weekly Family Check-ins

iii. Synchronous academic checks

ii. Help/reteach opportunities or successes of thriving students

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iv. Teaching, reteaching, reviewing, preteaching

v. Weekly Emails to keep daily emails to a min.

vi. Share Hobbies & Daily Stories = creating community and relationships with the adults in the family.

i. Grades

Help

b. Parent initiated

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• Student initiated

Reaching out to teacher for help via text or email

Special Activities

To create community

ii. Virtual Field Trips

• CILC - Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration
• Streamable Learning
• Discovery Ed

i. Wacky Wednesday

• Theme Days - examples to come
• STEAM activities
• Social opportunities for learners

iii. Lunch Bunch

Iv. Monthly Special Events- holidays, RRW, Read Across America, etc

Fun FriYAYs!

Scattergories

Toot or Boot

Google Santa Tracker

Zoomed in Halloween

Kahoots

SeeSaw Photo Challenge outside

Candy Corn Stacking Games

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Directed Drawings -- Art for Kids Hub

Scavenger Hunts

Read Alouds and Video Read Alouds

Academic and nonacademic songs/ videos

Holidays around the world

Virtual Egg Hunt

Arts and Crafts --like Thankful Turkey Headbands

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Field Trip to JA BizTown in York, PA!!!

Field Trip to Hawk Mountain

Learner Discussion and Participation in the Community

03

Asynchronous

Our learners spend most of their time working and learning asynchronously. The following slides are tools we use to motivate and engage our learners asynchronously.

Novel Study Discussions

Blended Learners

• Novel Study
• Wacky Wednesday
• Weekly Check ins

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Questions?

Happy Holidays!

Examples of Asynchronous discussions

Just for fun on Seesaw

ELA questions and comments in AE

Asynchronous Discussions in 4th-6th grades

Asynchronous Discussions in K-3rd grades

The Key to Asynchronous learning: *Relationships *

All of the asynchronous learning is built off of the relationships formed between the teachers and learners.

Synchronous Meetings/Discussions

We make time to meet with our learners on a daily basis.

Academics

Tutoring

Re-teaching

Interventions

Clarification

A Resource for Parents

Grading Feedback- Bitmojis

Sample Daily Student Schedules:

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6th Grade Daily Schedule

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2nd Grade Daily Schedule

Wrap Up

04

How can we take some of these ideas and apply them to our classroom or setting?

Some favorite tools of ours: What can you use tomorrow in your classroom?

• Make a plan to check in with families
• Weekly , monthly, quarterly
• CILC - virtual field trips
• ElancOnline Blog
• Fun Friday activity
• Streamable Learning Virtual Field Trips or Discovery Ed Virtual Field Trips

• Daily or Weekly Class Meetings
• Virtual or in person Wacky Wednesday Ideas to help your learners bond

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• Make a Seesaw Activity
• How are you easily accessible when your virtual learners need help?
• How can you organize one of these ideas to help make things easier for you?

Thanks!

Do you have any questions?

Lisa_Zimmerman@elanco.org

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