Aim: This task invites you to take part in a live lesson via WhatsApp as a ‘learner’, and to share your thoughts on the experience.

Time: 60 - 75 minutes

Instructions

You will take part in a WhatsApp live lesson as a ‘learner’. The lesson will be delivered synchronously (in real time) by your trainer, in a WhatsApp group, and will last 45 minutes.

Note:

• The content of the WhatsApp Live Lesson comes from real EFAL learning materials, and during the course, you will experience WhatsApp live lessons for a range of grades at both primary and secondary level.

• The WhatsApp live lessons showcase a range of strategies and ideas that you can use in your own WhatsApp lessons, whatever grade or subject you teach.

Immediately after the live lesson, your trainer will invite you to share some ‘hot notes’, or immediate reactions and impressions of the lesson in the WhatsApp group. This is a chance for you to reflect on the experience, and to think about the strategies your trainer used during the WhatsApp live lesson. It’s also a chance to consider what you’d need to take into account if you decide to teach your own learners via live WhatsApp lessons. This ‘hot notes’ part of the lesson will last about 20 – 30 minutes, and it also takes place in WhatsApp, using text or VoiceNotes.

Finally, you can download the lesson plan that your trainer used to deliver the WhatsApp live lesson. It’s better to look at the lesson plan after you’ve experienced the lesson as a ‘learner’, simply because it’s easier to understand that way. A good way to review the lesson plan is to compare it to the interactions in WhatsApp group where the live lesson took place. This way you can easily see how the lesson plan translates into specific activities and interactions in the WhatsApp group.

In the next task (Task 1.6), you will have a chance to discuss your experience of the Module 1 WhatsApp lesson in more depth, during a video conferencing session.

The Module 1 WhatsApp live lesson is based on the Grade 1 EFAL materials from the DBE workbooks. We invite you to prepare your own WhatsApp live lesson, using this lesson as a model. For your own lesson, you can use:

• Your regular workbook/coursebook

• A lesson plan from the National Education Collaboration Trust (NECT) website (Grades 1-12, any subject)

• A lesson from the Primary School Reading Improvement Programme (PSRIP), also on the NECT website, if you teach Grades 1-6. Click on PSRIP FP and PSRIP IP.