Good morning Amy,
That does sound challenging! This is Cory Wilkerson, and I am the Education Manager for the Educational Theatre Association. I've been working on building resources for virtual and hybrid learning since April on our learning center at
Theatre Educator Pro. (just scroll down on the home page to the logo and click to access).
I have a question for you and then some ideas for resources.
First off- did your school clarify what they mean by online learning for the cohorts? Do they mean that students will be asked to log on in groups and meet together or could it possibly mean that students will simply be asked to access online course work and lessons? It is possible they are referring to online course work and lessons that require a log in for the student to access housed in folders on your Google classroom or as videos, etc. in Google Drive for access through Chrome.
In this case, you would create lesson materials such as videos, PowerPoints, worksheets, etc. for the students to do as independent study but to be accessed online. There are some great tools for creating these -
Flipgrid, Nearpod and
Screencastomatic all work well for creating online lessons that you record on your computer and can share with students.
Flipgrid works well for sharing videos and allows you to create student groups who can upload videos to share with you and each other.
Nearpod allows you to upload a PowerPoint and turn it into an interactive lesson, or start from scratch to make one complete with quizzes and activities. Screencastomatic allows you to record anything you do on your computer- so you can narrate a PowerPoint lesson or record yourself going out to a website to share a video you want your students to view. Once your materials are in Google Classroom, you can set up deadlines for the students to access the materials or projects with deadlines, etc. and then you can review the homework and their progress during your time together in person.
Are you an EdTA member? You will find a wealth of useful material on Theatre Educator Pro in the
Resources for Creating Online Learning. We polled teachers for their favorite tools and then found the best tutorials on the web for you - one stop shopping to learn about the aps I mentioned above (Flipgrid, Screencastomatic, Zoom, Google Classroom) and more. Also check out the lesson plan libraries and resources for full teaching PowerPoints you can use for instruction.
If your school district intends to have your students meet in online groups without you, one suggestion may be to look at the
"Click to Teach" lesson plans on Theatre Educator Pro. It would provide a framework and context for their learning and keep them focused on a goal. Right now there are 11 of these available to all, with more to come for our members by end of August.
These are project based units which contain all of the materials needed in one place. They are written in a student voice so that they are perfect for student independent study or hybrid instruction. You could assign one of the learning activities to be completed by your students during their "online" rotation, then when you have them in class, you can review their independent work and put them in small groups to begin working towards the larger end of unit project.
Please feel free to reach out if I can give you a tour of the site or answer any questions- you can reach me best on my work email -
cwilkerson@schooltheatre.org and best wishes to you!
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Cory Wilkerson
Education Manager
Educational Theatre Association
Palmyra PA
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Original Message:
Sent: 08-03-2020 21:10
From: Amy Sando
Subject: distance learning
My school has adopted a hybrid model where students are broken into 2 cohorts that rotate in-person and online classes. When one cohort is online, teachers are instructing the other cohort live. We will not have the ability to interact live with students when they are online. This eliminates live video conferences or teaching, Google meets/Zoom because a teacher must moderate, the ability to give immediate feedback, and answer questions. There also is not enough time to teach face-to-face full-time and then watch recorded videos of online students, for example. I could use some ideas. We use Google Classroom and google tools & chrome extensions. I plan on using flipgrid, and we must use weekly Learning Plans or Playlists (which we´ll learn next week). Can anyone give me ideas on how to make this work? How can students work together virtually safely & securely if I am not there? I have a Drama 1 & then Advanced Drama. I use a lot of DTA curriculum from theatrefolk. I don´t want to resort to online learning to be homework. I want it to be engaging and valuable.
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Amy Sando
Minden NV
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