How to take online teaching back to the physical classroom

Hello, and welcome.

Thankfully, lockdown is

either over or coming to an end for a lot of us,

which means we’re slowly starting to turn

our focus to going back to the physical classroom.

So in today’s video I’m going to be talking

about the teaching practices

that I’ve developed in my online classroom

that I want to take back to the physical classroom.

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let’s get on with the video.

Personalisation.

Being in their own home has meant

that our students have been allowed to share aspects

of their lives with both us

and their classmates like never before.

In my classes,

they’ve talked about and shown aspects of their home lives,

their hobbies,

and, in some cases,

even their family members have all been weaved

into my classes.

This last clip

in particular shows the power of personalisation.

We were doing a lesson on question formation,

and I asked one student to bring in one family member

and to ask them one question.

But that one question

then turned into a 30-minute activity,

in which all of the students

were asking this one poor family member question

after question after question,

and he just couldn’t get away.

It was really clear to see

that when you personalise their classes and put English

in a real and relevant context,

their engagement and motivation levels just go up.

This was something that I did before,

however after teaching

online I’ve realised I didn’t do it enough.

Now, when I go back to the physical classroom,

I’m going to make sure

that I take the time to get to know my students more

and then personalise their classes more.

A big example of this will be asking them to bring realia

or physical objects from home, something I hardly did before.

So this could be asking them to bring in

a photo when teaching prepositions of place,

or bringing in a random item

from home when teaching them functional language

for describing unknown objects.

Technology.

I’ll be honest with you, guys,

using technology hasn’t always been my strongest point.

However, since teaching online,

I’ve had my eyes opened to two things.

Firstly, that students

react really positively to technology in the classroom,

and, secondly,

that it can help you a lot yourself,

as a teacher.

Games such as Kahoot

and Baamboozle have been really great for testing

vocab and grammar,

while ClassDojo has helped me keep track of how many points

each student has.

And tools like Google Classroom have been a great help

with the whole homework process.

There’s no more lost homework, there’s no more

I didn’t write down the homework,

there’s no more not being able to read the homework.

Simply, it makes the whole homework process easier.

And aside from programmes,

it’s been really good to both use and experiment

with audio and video recordings.

Most platforms offer a function to do this,

and it’s really opened my eyes.

I’ve had students making

their own listening comprehension activities.

Like Victor.

When I travelled there, I felt very motivated.

I’ve had other students

recording themselves doing exam activities,

for example like José Manuel.

An attraction that seems to be really dangerous,

we see people shouting and laughing at the same time.

And I’ve even had some students video-recording roleplays

with a language point incorporated.

You alright, mate?

Yes, I’m good, mate.

How are you doing?

Yes, I’m fine, thanks.

Whatever its form,

I’m definitely going to be using technology more upon my return

to the physical classroom.

Flipped classroom.

So this was an approach I wasn’t aware of before I

started teaching online.

Flipped classroom is an approach

in which students study content before class,

and at their own pace.

This then means

that valuable classroom time is freed up for using the language.

It’s true that the input stage

of an online class can be a bit flat at times,

because students need to pay attention to a teacher

for long stretches of time.

So for some classes,

I avoided the input part of class by setting

it for homework.

And it was a bit of a revelation.

As the students were allowed to study the input at home,

at their own pace

and given the time to absorb the language,

the weaker students came

to class much better prepared for activities

than they would have done if we had simply gone

through it quickly in the classroom.

As there were many more students in the class

who understood the input more than normal,

it then meant

that the classroom activities went a lot smoother

and the students got more from them.

I will say that you need a certain amount of trust

in your class to study the input at home,

because if they don’t,

quite simply they’re going to struggle come lesson time.

However, it certainly

an approach that I’m going to use in my physical classroom

when I think it’s going to benefit my students.

So what will I continue doing

when we go back to the real classroom?

Personalise my classes more,

use technology, and adopt a flipped classroom approach.

So there you go,

the practices that I’ve developed online

that I’m going to take back with me into the physical classroom.

As I’ve mentioned before,

please don’t forget to subscribe to the channel,

to like this video,

and to share it absolutely everywhere.

And if you enjoyed this video,

please take a look at another one of my online

teaching tips videos,

How to Stay Motivated Whilst Teaching Online.

But yes, that’s a wrap.

Thanks for stopping by, it’s been great to see you.

Take care,

and I’ll see you next time for more language fun.