Overcoming the Challenges of Teaching Kids Online

In the online classroom, a teacher's grasp of learner traits, prior knowledge, digital literacy level, the learning management system (LMS) used, and environmental influences is paramount to overcoming the challenges of modern online education. This understanding is pivotal in crafting dynamic and engaging lessons in a positive virtual learning environment that transcends traditional boundaries and captivates students' attention.

The transition to a virtual classroom brings a distinct learning journey for students compared to the traditional classroom setting. Young learners, in particular, may find themselves juxtaposing the two experiences, often perceiving virtual learning from the comfort of their homes as an extension of homework, or as a directive imposed by their parents. Consequently, they may approach these online sessions with passive tendencies and preconceptions, reducing engagement and being easily distracted by their household environment, such as siblings, toys, and loud noises, in comparison, to traditional classroom settings.

Thus, the online teacher has to surmount the online learners’ preconceptions and behavior by understanding the young student’s profile, using a variety of instructional strategies, and teaching in a virtual classroom suited for young learners.

Course material for the online classroom needs to be visible, engaging, and interactive for the students so that the learning sticks. Designing digital learning material and lesson plans for the Virtual Classroom involves several steps:

1. Digitization: If you have numerous teaching textbooks as all teachers do and would like to use them in your Online Classroom, simply scan or obtain digital versions of these textbook pages. Ensure the quality of scans or digital copies is high to maintain readability and upload them into the whiteboard. Teacheridoo Digital Whiteboard has two view formats for scanned or pdf documents which are, book or PDF format view with a zooming option, giving the students the flexibility to choose which format they can see, read, and interact with better.

2. Digital Whiteboard: Having A digital whiteboard is crucial for visualizing and interacting with learning material, whether in traditional or virtual classrooms. It facilitates active engagement and participation, preventing passive learning. Teacheridoo's interactive whiteboard enables typing, formatting, drawing, and incorporating multimedia elements for effective teaching.

3. Interactivity: Sitting for a long time is boring and restrictive for kids and can lead to behavioral issues so make sure to add interactive multimedia elements such as images, videos, audio clips, and games in your lesson to enhance engagement and understanding. This could include a short video or audio, video games, or regular games to encourage body movement and interactive exercises such as topic crosswords, consolidating learning that you have previously covered.

4. Organization: Organize the digital material logically and intuitively to facilitate navigation and comprehension for your students. This may include dividing lesson plan content into different whiteboards such as a whiteboard for introduction, another one for Presentation, another whiteboard for Practice, and so on.

5. Customizations: The virtual classroom doesn’t have to be sterile, tailor the virtual classroom theme and digital material to suit the specific needs and preferences of young students and the learning objectives of the lesson you are teaching. This could involve adding decorative elements and fun backgrounds, maps or stickers.

6. Home Advantage: Take advantage of the home environment to create materials and activities that can be found and done at home. If you are teaching young learners, we find that parents and guardians are often thrilled to collaborate with the teacher in creating memorable learning experiences. For example, to teach cooking vocabulary or measurements, you could ask the parents to provide the young learner with specific kitchen items and food to prepare a recipe that matches the learning goals of your lesson.

7. Extensions: When designing a lesson plan, make sure to include Extensions that will help you take the learning further to match the student’s needs to avoid awkward silences or finishing the lesson too early leaving the student feeling discontent. This could involve adding more advanced explanations, multimedia, real-life applications, and extension activities and discussions for additional practice. Often when students are curious about a specific topic for example a country, take advantage of online maps and explore with your students by sharing your screen. This will spark more conversations and engage your students.

8. Testing and Feedback: Do a pilot test of the digital material and the virtual classroom with someone before you go ahead and start with your students to identify any issues or areas for improvement. Gather feedback from students and instructors to refine the content and functionality of your lesson.

9. Classroom Management: Young learners' susceptibility to computer distractions leading to behavioral issues can be challenging, particularly in online environments where the traditional authority of a teacher may be limited. Choosing an LMS like Teacheridoo, designed for young learners, facilitates classroom management. Teacheridoo incorporates features to prevent excessive drawing, typing, or unintended deletions on the whiteboard, reducing distractions. With class management settings, teachers can enable/disable whiteboard elements, lock the board, or disable chat/writing tools, effectively mitigating distractions for young learners.

10. Know the LMS: Knowing how to use the learning management system (LMS) to host and deliver the digital material. Consider factors such as accessibility, compatibility with your students' computer or tab screen size, and internet speed when designing your lessons. Reach out to the Teacheridoo team for a tour of the classroom and for any assistance you need.

In traditional classrooms, educators typically aren't required to teach digital literacy until a certain developmental stage is reached. However, online teachers must introduce digital literacy to young learners regardless of age to ensure that students can use their computers and digital whiteboard functionalities to participate in the virtual classroom, preventing passive learning, and also using the internet safely.

Enhancing digital literacy in young learners involves a multifaceted approach that integrates education, practice, and responsible usage. Here are some strategies to achieve this:

1. Start Early: Introduce digital literacy concepts and skills at the beginning of the course, integrating them into the lesson plan as learning goals alongside the traditional subjects you are teaching.

2. Virtual Classroom Tour: In your first class, as you introduce yourself, and get to know your students, include a tour of the virtual classroom. You can show the students that they can draw on the board, the different features of the writing tools such as the pen, shapes, text, eraser, highlighter, or, the chat to say hi, and the video features such as enabling/disabling the video and audio. These easy-to-use features will help them be independent learners, start interacting with the whiteboardboard and engaging in the classroom.

3. Hands-on Practice: Offer opportunities for hands-on practice with the keyboard, and mouse allowing students to explore and experiment in a safe and supervised environment. If you are teaching phonics as an example: to help students find sounds, you could help them draw a circle on a specific sound or word by teaching them how to click select the “brush” icon and draw by demonstrating and offering positive encouragement. The Teacheridoo virtual Classroom has features that encourage young students or students with disability, to write on the whiteboard without having to use the mouse. The Teacheridoo team designed a feature called “select for student” that allows the teacher to select a text box for their student by simply clicking on ‘TEXT’ on the writing tool and then right-clicking and selecting ‘select for student’. The learner can then directly type an answer on the board.

4. Interactive Learning: Utilize interactive and engaging tools, such as educational games, simulations, and multimedia resources, to teach further digital literacy concepts in a fun and accessible manner.

5. Ongoing Support and Guidance: Offer ongoing discussion, support, and guidance to students as they develop their digital literacy skills, addressing questions, concerns, and challenges that may arise.

6. Real-world Application: Connect digital literacy skills to real-world scenarios and applications, showing students how these skills are relevant and useful in their everyday lives.

7. Structured Education: Provide structured lessons and activities focused on digital literacy, covering topics such as internet safety, online etiquette, critical thinking, and evaluating online information.

Teaching online comes with its own set of challenges. It's like crafting a new recipe, blending traditional ingredients with digital spices! As we, Online Teachers navigate this digital landscape, we're challenged to reinvent our teaching strategies, be creative, design engaging activities, and explore technologies that might feel like uncharted territory at first—for both educators and students alike. But fear not the Teacheridoo team, knows and understands your challenges through experience and is dedicated to improving the Virtual learning environment! Keep adapting your lessons to your student’s needs, nurturing constant communication, and adding doses of excitement through interactive learning to deliver unforgettable educational experiences.