One of my favorite cartoons when was a kid was the Jetsons. With their robot maids, houses in the clouds and flying cars. Flying Cars! Why don’t we all have flying cars??
Also … our video call classes are great for what they are … for seeing and hearing people but … what about smell and taste? Why haven’t we found a way to deliver those senses?
Yesterday we had a Zoom webinar for all staff with updates from our President and executive team. And of course, Google had a critical issue that stalled the video so … after testing it all on our end, we resolved to go on and just do an audio webinar. Almost 200 of of our staff tuned in to hear what was up and … we didn’t even provide breakfast! It is just a reminder on how thankful I am for digital tools that work most of the time, but also that we remember to have a plan B.
Every day, new questions come up about how to simulate the class experience in a virtual space. Today we had two requests for showing a movie to a film studies class synchronously. The copyright protections of the movies prevented the film from being shown on the shared screen. These copyright protections are not appropriate when being used for educational purposes but the dvd, of course does not know of our good intentions. Running the film through a decoding program seems to be the way but … it would great if anyone has a better solution for this.
I remind our folks many times a day that it is helpful to manage expectations for interacting in virtual learning environments. We mostly all agree that face to face is preferred but … what about now when you can’t meet face to face? I recommend first acknowledging the elephant in the room … this is different and it will feel awkward or limiting at times. Some things that can help mitigate the limitations of these 2 dimensional learning spaces are:
We are all standing apart to flatten the virus curve, but are standing together to let love and peace and compassion and curiosity push back the dark clouds of fear and ignorance.
We may not have flying cars in our driveways and still cannot email the smell of a fresh baked cookie, but it turns out it was never just about the tools. It is still all about who we are together and … even though we may feel apart and alone, take a minute to FaceTime, zoom call, text someone else. I still think there should be flying cars …
Let me know how it is going from your learning community.
One of my favorite cartoons when was a kid was the Jetsons. With their robot maids, houses in the clouds and flying cars. Flying Cars! Why don’t we all have flying cars??
Also … our video call classes are great for what they are … for seeing and hearing people but … what about smell and taste? Why haven’t we found a way to deliver those senses?
Yesterday we had a Zoom webinar for all staff with updates from our President and executive team. And of course, Google had a critical issue that stalled the video so … after testing it all on our end, we resolved to go on and just do an audio webinar. Almost 200 of of our staff tuned in to hear what was up and … we didn’t even provide breakfast! It is just a reminder on how thankful I am for digital tools that work most of the time, but also that we remember to have a plan B.
Every day, new questions come up about how to simulate the class experience in a virtual space. Today we had two requests for showing a movie to a film studies class synchronously. The copyright protections of the movies prevented the film from being shown on the shared screen. These copyright protections are not appropriate when being used for educational purposes but the dvd, of course does not know of our good intentions. Running the film through a decoding program seems to be the way but … it would great if anyone has a better solution for this.
I remind our folks many times a day that it is helpful to manage expectations for interacting in virtual learning environments. We mostly all agree that face to face is preferred but … what about now when you can’t meet face to face? I recommend first acknowledging the elephant in the room … this is different and it will feel awkward or limiting at times. Some things that can help mitigate the limitations of these 2 dimensional learning spaces are:
- While it is possible for more than one person to talk at a time, plan your virtual class discussion time to allow individuals to respond to a question or prompt so there is not audio chaos.
- Tell students you will ask one or two of them to share their screen at some point during the session. This can help keep them engaged as no one will know when they may be called upon.
- Create polls for your Zoom calls to quickly gauge student knowledge on a topic or get clarity on areas where you may want to focus. After you schedule a meeting, you will see the option at the bottom of the page to add a poll.
- Breakout rooms are a great way to break up a large class into smaller groups for discussions. These can be set up in advance when you schedule a meeting or when you are in a call.
- Ask students questions that involve telling something about their physical/geographical location. Context is always important in how we learn, so maybe take the negative that we are all disbursed and find ways of making that an opportunity to expand the learning environment to include where students are.
We are all standing apart to flatten the virus curve, but are standing together to let love and peace and compassion and curiosity push back the dark clouds of fear and ignorance.
We may not have flying cars in our driveways and still cannot email the smell of a fresh baked cookie, but it turns out it was never just about the tools. It is still all about who we are together and … even though we may feel apart and alone, take a minute to FaceTime, zoom call, text someone else. I still think there should be flying cars …
Let me know how it is going from your learning community.