How to teach online for home learning

You might be finding yourself in a situation where you have to adjust your teaching practice for home learning. Or, you might be looking for strategies to help flip your classroom. Either way, I am going to give you some tips for how to teach online for home learning.

The majority of these tools I also used in my general education classroom and my STEM classroom. These practices can definitely be applied to any type of classroom aside from home learning.

Create a daily agenda

With all of the teaching strategies I will be sharing with you, it’s important to create a daily agenda for your class. This doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but something students can see in one place what they need to complete.

I would suggest creating a Google Slide with the share settings as ‘Anyone with the Link can View’ and share that link with students. Add a new slide on the top for each day. That way, students can see the changes you make in real time, but have no need to edit this slide.

If you can make it printable, this might be helpful as well for families to check off the tasks as they go.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #1: Screencasting

This is the number one tool that I would suggest for teaching online. Pre-record your lessons and students can re-watch as often as needed. Screencastify is my favorite Google Chrome extension to install.

Here are the main features you should know about this extension:

Record just your computer screen, computer screen & face, just face
Record up to 5 minutes/video with the free version. (Unlimited video time with paid version)
Videos recorded save automatically to your Google Drive. You can download videos if you need
Once recorded, there are multiple sharing options: Shareable link from your drive, Google Classroom and YouTube

How to teach online for home learning Tip #2: Consistent platform for posting

Find an online platform or two to streamline and post your students’ work. Too many platforms are hard to keep track of; for both teachers and students.

Some of my ultimate go-to’s for elementary students are Google Classroom and Seesaw. These tools allow teachers to post different types of digital files that students can access in one place.

Likewise, many districts purchase learning management systems that they prefer teachers and students to use. (Schoology, Microsoft OneNote, Canvas, Blackboard…)

How to teach online for home learning Tip #3: Digital Interactive Notebooks

Interactive notebooks don’t always have to be printed. I typically make my digital interactive notebooks in Google Slides for easy sharing in Google Classroom.

Skills that can be embedded in Digital Interactive Notebooks are:

Using an online dictionary
Copy & Paste
Typing
Resizing an Image
Resizing Text
Dragging & Dropping
Using Shape & Line Tools
Labeling a Digital Image
Clicking Hyperlinks
Toggling between Browser Tabs
Online Videos
Digital Note Taking
Reading and Responding to Digital Text

Need help getting started? Click here to go straight to my YouTube video playlist for tips & tricks when creating with Google Apps.

Want something already pre-created for you? Here is a Digital Interactive Notebook you can edit and add your own content.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #4: Digital Choice Menus

Choice menus are a great way to give students voice and choice with their learning about a given topic. When creating a digital choice menu, try keeping it concise on one page so the choices aren’t too overwhelming.

The great thing about having a digital choice menu is you can link websites, examples, and resources within the menu that help guide students to complete the activities.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #5: Digital Journals

If you’re expected to be out of school for a long time, those classroom relationships are more important now than ever. In fact, you can still connect with your students virtually.

Create a digital back and forth journal that you can learn about your students’ days and keep tabs on them.

I even created a digital break journal that you can use for free! Just click here to get the link and share on the platform of your choice.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #6: Online Morning Meetings

Did your class typically start with the morning meeting? You can still do this! Continuing those positive routines for kids is so important.

Here are a few things you can easily do at home during this time:

Calendar (so many printable options online)
Weather
Show & Tell (schedule a day where students can share one item from their house)
Quote of the day (something positive to keep them going)
Question of the day (students share their response)
Kindness Chore of the day (students report back the next day if they completed the task)

You can pre-record your morning meeting with Screencastify (mentioned above), or you can go live using Zoom. Students can see you and each other in real time.

Other similar platforms are: Microsoft Teams & Google Meet/Hangouts

How to teach online for home learning Tip #7: Create with technology

There are a lot of websites out there for students to “sit and get” information. However, when students are learning at home, think about what they might be doing before they are coming to learn.

Oftentimes, they might be playing video games and watching TV. Give students opportunities to interact and create their learning experiences.

This could be a good time for project based learning, research projects and collaborating with other students in their class.

Seesaw, Flipgrid, Pic Collage Edu (app) and Shapegrams are just a few platforms where students have the opportunity to create and demonstrate their learning.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #8: Digital Breakouts

The beauty of digital break out boxes is there are no locks to set or materials to print beforehand.

Definitely creating your own using multiple online tools, like Google Forms, is possible. Or you can grab some that are ready to go on Breakout Edu.

If you want to make it more competition based for your class, set a timer and send the breakout link. Students will have that amount of time to work on the challenges. This can be a great opportunity to get siblings involved as well!

How to teach online for home learning Tip #9: Virtual Field Trips

Currently at the time of this blogpost, there are a lot of zoos and museums offering opportunities for students to go on a virtual field trip.

Depending on the site, students can see what’s happening live. Some of the virtual field trips are in virtual reality form. This means it feels like they are in that digital space and pan around the room to get a closer view.

Some Virtual Field Trips to try out are:

This is a great opportunity to add in reflection questions about their experience.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #10: Video Creation

Kids LOVE making videos. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard students say they want to be a YouTube Star when they grow up. (and they aren’t joking).

Give students an opportunity to create a video with purpose. It can be a topic that you are teaching them about. Or, since they will be home for awhile, they can create a video to teach someone about a talent they have and others can learn how to do it by watching their video.

A few great video editing platforms are: iMovie, WeVideo, Flipgrid & Seesaw.

Stop motion animation has been a popular filming technique in my classroom. Often, students will go home and create these on their own! The app Stop Motion Studio is free and works on most devices. You can find out how to get started with Stop Motion animation with your students by clicking here.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #11: Reading Challenges

We all know that reading is important. Right now, the kids have A TON of time to do it! However, we know kids and we know their stamina.

Mix up their reading experience. There are wonderful platforms like Epic! Books, ReadWorks & National Geographic Kids that are my go-to’s.

You can also create fun reading challenges or tic-tac-toe boards for students to complete.

Some fun things to add could be:

create a fort to read your book in
read outside
read to your favorite stuffed animal

How to teach online for home learning Tip #12: Show math work

Again, there are plenty of websites that allow students to practice quick facts and keep up with important basic skills.

Continue to help students show their math work virtually. GoFormative is a great way to assign questions to your class and students can show their work in a variety of ways, including drawing.

Students can still even solve problems on paper! Have them share their work by taking a photo in Seesaw.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #13: Video Conferencing

Continue to conference with students one-on-one virtually. Pre-record your videos and send them the link (Screencastify) or connect with them live (Zoom).

Make a schedule of conferencing times so students know when to check in. Connect with your students personally and also how they are doing with their work. This will help continue to build those relationships you’ve worked so hard on all school year.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #14: Virtual Class Party

When I was a classroom teacher, we would always have an incentive that our class was working hard towards with great behavior and work ethic. Typically, the incentive was in the form of a class party.

Continue to encourage that collaboration virtually. Create a slide that graphs the progress on turning in assignments on time (or another goal you can think of). If your class reaches that goal, host a virtual party! Host your class party using Zoom.

Here are some virtual party ideas:

Pajama & stuffed animal
Snack party (everyone brings their favorite snack)
Fort party (everyone build a fort and attends the party inside)
Costume party

How to teach online for home learning Tip #15: Live Science Experiments

Kids LOVE science. I do too, hence, I became a STEM teacher. Mystery Science right now is opening up access to their content and you can share with students.

Do you have science materials at home? Host a live science experiment in front of your class! Before, during and after, have them go through the Scientific Process or Engineering Design Process. Then, demonstrate the experiment on camera for them and keep checking in on the progress the following days.

Test student predictions as well! Write down what they think might happen. You can create a makeshift anchor chart by taping a few pieces of paper together and hanging it up on the wall behind you.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #16: Educational Shows

The kids are probably watching a lot of TV and movies right now. Why not suggest some educational ones that go along with what you are learning about in your virtual class?

Netflix has some great selections:

Storybots (for K+1)
Magic School Bus, new & old episodes (2-5)
Disney’s Oceans (2-5)
If I were an Animal (K+1)

I have a longer list of suggestions by grabbing my 50+ Free STEM Resource Guide here.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #17: Pen Pals

Make writing time fun and personal by creating pen pals. They can be virtual pen pals or real paper ones. If you make the pen pals virtual, make sure you can see what the kid’s write first, before sending.

As the teacher, try and send at least one real piece of mail to each student. This can be an exciting thing for them to look forward to.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #18: Podcasts

Podcasts are a great way for students to build their listening comprehension and visualization.

When I introduce podcasts to students, I have them draw the pictures they are seeing in their brain. Again, this drawing can be done virtually on a platform like Seesaw or real paper.

Some of my favorite podcasts for kids are:

I have a longer list of suggestions by grabbing my 50+ Free STEM Resource Guide here.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #19: Inside Recess

For the days that don’t have great weather to play outside, encourage active inside recess.

My go-to favorite is GoNoodle, which they always have home-access for students.

You can have students log into GoNoodle on their own. Or, you can do a class inside recess. Have kids take turns each day to choose the video. From the teacher side, share the video on your screen on Zoom. That way everyone is participating at the same time.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #20: Digital Worksheets

This is an easy way to assign work digitally for students. This is something you would share in a platform like Google Classroom since it can automatically make a copy for each student.

However, how do you assign a worksheet that’s a PDF and it doesn’t give students spaces to type?

In my quick video tutorial I show you how to make a PDF editable to share with students.

Kami is also a Google Chrome extension that can be installed and help annotating over PDFs.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #21: Hands-On Tasks

Virtual learning really doesn’t mean students have to complete every task on an actual document. Hands-on learning is still just as important!

Encourage play, building, inventing and creating. In our Innovative Teacher Facebook Community, we shared 10 STEM challenges that students can complete at home. Come join us to get freebies and connect with other teachers around the world.

How to teach online for home learning Tip #22: Read Aloud

There are a lot of great websites that have online read alouds for you to share with students: Vooks, Epic! Books, Storyline Online and even YouTube offer a variety of books.

You can even be the one reading your book! I would suggest recording ahead of time (with Screencastify) and schedule the link to be pushed out at the same time each day on Seesaw or Google Classroom (or the platform of your choice). You can get all your read alouds done in one day and planned out for a couple weeks!

What will you try?

Overall, I know that it can be a hard transition from face-to-face to online teaching. However, you are still using your great teaching skills, just in a different way. A silver lining to this is you are most likely strengthening your technology skills which in turn, can be used in your regular classroom.

What else would you add to this list? What would you continue to do and take back to the regular classroom? Feel free to direct message me on Instagram, @naomimeredith_ and I would love to chat with you!

Other blogs about how to teach online for home learning to check out:

3 comments

at

Jessica says:

This is so useful. Thank you, Naomi!
at

Elisabeth Frank says:

This is an unbelievable resource. Thank you so much for sending this info. I need to learn how to use screencastify right away among other tips you listed.
at

Laura says:

Naomi, thank you so much for this excellent list of resources and ideas!!

Comments are closed.