What did corona do to school teaching?

I am working at my desk. I’m using my iPad and computer.  My Finnish and literature lesson is about to begin in Zoom. My heart is beating more rapidly than usually: Will everything go all right? Why is distance teaching more exciting than contact teaching?

We started distance teaching on the 17th of March in our secondary high school, named Ylitornion yhteiskoulun lukio. We had already practiced using Zoom with my religion class the previous week. Each group had shared their presentation made by Keynote with the group. It is a good side of Zoom that each student can share their assignments with everybody.

Our headmaster Sari Lantto had prepared a plan of distance learning for us.  The only new app we started using was Zoom. Our headmaster also arranged a tuition session for us teachers on how to use Zoom.

We see each other at the beginning of the lesson. 

It is also possible to devide the class into groups.
The teacher can visit all the groups. 

The use of technology is not anything new in my school, which has been an eTwinningSchool since 2018. All of our students have iPads. Our school is also an Apple Lighthouse School. We have had a lot of international connections working via learning technology. We have had Showbie as learning surroundings and we have used Socrative, Quislet and Kahoot for activation of lessons. For presentations we use Keynote and for writing texts Pages. 

The learning apps we use in distance learning are mainly Zoom and Showbie. In Showbie it is possible to share materials, return assignments and give feedback on assignments. It is possible to do it either by marking the assignments or by recording the assignment. I have also used Padlet, Mentimeter and Answergarden. I use also Socrative quite a lot since it functions well with Showbie. In some classes we also use iTunesU. Besides, of course, we also have books.

Yet, distance education is different from contact teaching. More exciting, I would say. We apply the same time table as for normal contact classes. The lessons are a bit shorter than in school. Every teacher starts the lesson by contacting in Zoom. That is followed by a practice session and perhaps we may meet in Zoom again at the and of the lesson. The challenge in distant education is to make the lessons variable and intresting.

During this time there has been debate about the safety of Zoom. It is good that now they have changed the system so that each class has a password. So far we haven’t had any problems with it. We are using the free version of the program so you can be 40 minutes there and then you have to start a new meeting again.

Feedback from students

Our students have attended the lessons nicely and done their homework properly. This is something to be happy about. They really try to study and learn. Obviously for them distance learning is also harder than contact lessons. Many of them have taken this distance learning as a new adventure or challenge.  The experience of online eTwinning projects that our students have help of course the online working.

Our headmaster has collected feedback from our students. Here is something about the feedback of our students:

- This is going well.
- Thank you for streaming the lessons!
- In some lessons we have too much work to do.
- The days are tiring. Could we have less remote lessons?
- I am proud of our school and about how quickly everything has started to function. 

                           
The feeling of community is harder to achieve online. We have had some online competitions on the breaks where the first and second year students have competed with each other. We also have looked at Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet in Zoom organized by our language teacher Hanna Viippola. This is an assignment for the English class.

Romeo and Juliet online.

All in all, it has been rewarding to see the growing responsibility of our students in online learning and how they have done their very best online.  Even the exams were done online successfully.

eTwinning - the power of international community 

It was lovely to get an Easter greeting from Milan, Italy from our eTwinning partners! We teachers can encourage each others in our work in this tiring corona situation. This is definitely the time for virtual connections. We had in November teachers from Portugal visting us and have had online meetings with our eTwinning partner in Denmark.  We have had digital pen pals in Barcelona. We think about our friends abroad and hope for the best for them.

Etwinning means to have an extended contact network. We need courage and resilience in these times. It has been heart warming to read eTwinning stories about Godogne, Italy, and Germany how eTwinning is helping schools all over Europe.

eTwinning has also arranged really useful online seminars about e-learning, its methodology and problem points. It has been useful to participate the online seminars on professional development.

- It is important to use many kinds of methods in distance learning, pointed professor Richard Powers in his online seminar. His tips for activities were that assignments should be short, intense, well-planned, meaningful, easily understood and well-paced. Planning takes more time now, is the experience of most teachers. He urged us teachers to take care of ourselves. We should have some boundaries when working from home.

It helps any teacher to share this unexpected situation with other teachers online and hear about creative solutions in teaching. Thank you all for sharing!

Mirjami Hyttinen