10 Tips for Surviving (and Thriving) with Virtual Teaching
Note from the Editor: I, like our amazing guest contributor, have spent much of this school year virtual teaching. I can relate to so many of the feelings she expresses - particularly ones of despair and frustration! I was so happy to settle in and read what’s worked for her, and you’ve bet I have tried out some of her 10 tips for survival. I hope they’re helpful for you, too in this last home stretch - and as we look forward to next school year!
A few months ago, I almost quit teaching. That is a statement I never thought I’d ever say. I love teaching! Teaching is my passion! I WAS BORN TO BE A TEACHER! Why would a teacher who says all of those things want to quit teaching, you ask?
This is my 21st year of teaching. I have had my share of rough years and have never wanted to quit teaching more than in the first month of the 20-21 school year. What is different? I think it’s because I am a virtual teacher in a face to face school.
The model for my school for 20-21 is that one teacher per grade level is responsible for all of the virtual instruction, and the rest of the teachers are responsible for face to face instruction. At the beginning of the year, students spent one day in person and 4 days at home. We had another group of students that chose all virtual for the school year. That meant that I was putting out content for the entire grade level. I spent less time teaching children and more time in front of a computer screen recording content. I recorded content a week in advance, while meeting with my students about the current week’s content, while also planning content for 2 weeks out with my team. It was exhausting! I would spend my days recording lessons while my teammates were teaching students and having conversations and building relationships. I would work from the time I got to school until I went to bed because of the workload involved. Working 3 weeks at a time, meeting virtually with my students to problem solve technology and help with lessons, and daily grading of student submissions resulted in almost daily breakdowns and crippling anxiety. I knew I was drowning and couldn’t figure out how to come up for air.
10 THINGS THAT HAVE HELPED ME SURVIVE (AND THRIVE)
I incorporate more live times with my students. We now meet 3 times every day. Two of those meetings are academic. The third one is usually a mixture of relationship building and academics. I never realized how much of my day is spent building relationships. As a virtual teacher, talking with students before school, during recess and lunch, and on the way to the bus is something that I can’t do.
Guest teaching in other classrooms has re-energized me in ways I can’t even begin to describe. I love the instant feedback I get from students and truly being able to see if they understand or need help at a glance.
I eat lunch with the in person classes. The rest of the grade level is now in person 4 days a week. When they were at home 4 days a week, I became their main teacher. I love being able to build relationships with all of the students in the grade level. I love hearing their conversations! It is literally the best part of my day!
I am a check-in person for students who need it. Sometimes this is for behavioral reasons. Sometimes it is for academic reasons. Sometimes it is just because I miss face to face interaction with children.
I let go of perfection when recording lessons. At first, I would stop and re-record at the slightest mistake. I would make sure that I had everything I needed right there with me and that everything was just so. Then I realized teaching isn’t perfect. I don’t worry if every lesson is perfect when I teach face to face, so it’s ok that they’re not perfect virtually. We even laugh at the ridiculous thumbnails that get chosen.
I teach asynchronously the same way I teach in person. I was sort of doing this, but got the most feedback from students when I was my authentic teaching self. I love the in-person students talking to me about lessons they watched me teach. “Mrs. Hutchens, I felt like you were in my kitchen talking right to me.” I use students’ names when I’m recording, I use unexpected props, and room transformations to keep engagement high.
I tell myself this is temporary. This virus won’t last forever. I still have a lot of years of teaching left in me.
I learn daily from great people like Wade and Hope King by listening to the podcast, The New Edu. I watch Dr. Jody Carrington’s daily live sessions on Instagram. I am doing 2 book studies. One using The Distance Learning Playbook by Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey, and John Hattie. The second one will be using Connecting with Students Online by Jennifer Serravallo.
I take breaks from school work. I have worked really hard the last several years to develop a work life balance. That all went out the window at the beginning of this school year. Some of the ways I unplug are watching Facebook Live from the Lagoons from the Dolphin Research Center in the Florida Keys with my husband. I stop working on schoolwork by 4:00. This allows me to get in a workout, cook a healthy dinner, and prep things for the following day. When possible, I don’t do schoolwork on the weekends. I admit that I am working on getting better at this. I will do a brain dump of all the things I need to do and then take just a few hours to work on school work rather than the whole weekend.
I receive and seek out lots of support from colleagues, family, and friends. I find it hard to ask for help. Thankfully, my teammates saw that I was drowning and helped me come up for air by taking some of the workload. This is the primary reason I am able to guest teach in their classrooms and eat lunch with their students.
Virtual teaching is HARD! John Maxwell said, “Success is a series of small wins.” When I stopped focusing on how hard virtual teaching is and focused on being the great teacher that I know I am, the small wins began to happen (or I just noticed them more). My breakdowns and anxiety attacks are way less frequent. I am building quality relationships with my students and they are making strides in their learning. I will come out on the other side of 2021 better!
Diana Hutchens is a veteran classroom teacher with more than 15 years of experience. She currently teaches fourth grade in North Carolina. You can follow her on Instagram at @tales_of_ a_fourth_grade_fam.