The Challenges of Teaching over Zoom!
As the semester draws to a close, our last teaching lab occurred over zoom! This was a great opportunity to test out teaching over zoom in a low risk and safe environment.
Another challenge we faced during our last teaching lab was using a lesson plan written by National FFA Life Knowledge as opposed to coming up with our own lesson. I found this surprisingly challenging. The lessons were meant to be taught over 100 mins and we were tasked with rewriting it for a 25 minute class session without changing the activities too much.
I learned pretty quick that rewriting someone else's lesson plan is in some ways harder than writing your own lesson plan. I decided that the easiest way to do this was to follow the lesson plan as much as I could and fit as much as I could in 25 mins instead of trying to modify the whole 100 min lesson into 25 mins. I then ended the lesson with a ticket out the door question that would continue into the next class session.
My other challenge was making sure I didn't go over the time allotted as it would affect my other classmates and cause class to go over. Some ways I tried to overcome this was by using polls and timers. The polls allowed for discussions to take place more naturally because you aren't just asking for volunteers. I found that using these polling services, such as Slido and menti, made my lessons go much smoother and the times when I asked a question not using polls the discussions were much more forced and I had to volunteer people to answer.
In order to keep my lessons on track while also lightening the mood, I used videos of Christmas songs on youtube. I embedded these videos from youtube into my slides presentation and set them to start and stop at designated times.
The next issue I faced has to do with slido. When you insert a poll into your presentation anything you add to the slide disappears when you start the polls. So on those slides, I played the music off my phone and once everyone had answered the poll I stopped the music. This worked well and got rid of that awkward silence while everyone is working.
Overall, I felt like my lesson went pretty well and I actually enjoyed the challenge of teaching in a new format!
Emily, what a great idea to play music during times when students were working. This eliminates awkward zoom silences. I saw a teacher present a webinar and she did this, too! She even found songs that related to the topic. We were learning about photosynthesis and she played the song "Here Comes the Sun". I am so excited for you to return home to Florida for what I know will be an amazing experience. And just think...no more missing campus dining ranch and cold PA winters! Best wishes!
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