An Educator's Reflection

My ah-ha moment came this semester as I was on the "struggle bus" trying to figure out another layer of teaching while in a pandemic. My struggle was with teaching a remote section to remote learners and teaching an in-person section to in-person learners in one combine class period. The feeling of disconnect was apparent to all learners in the one space. I started with trying to find a way to combine there two learners into one space, and have them interact and build a learning community as one. My goal ultimately was to guide my students to learn to interact with via Google Meet while working and engaging in the same task in the same space. I knew it could come together, my questions were how can this smoothly be done and what implementations are needed for this to happen. After surveying my learners and trying new techniques it is coming together.

Throughout this, I have learned to use different techniques to help my learners in this process. And this is really where the ah-ha moment came into play for me. Some techniques learned have been very simple and some more complex, but have serve to be very helpful as I have begun to (re)design this approach in my classroom. Some easy techniques I have incorporated is presenting (sharing) my screen for learners to read and work from, although this sounds silly, I was not doing this and relying on my students just being able to see a screen through a screen. This really was a mind blowing moment for you and helped immensely when teaching and having both learners work together. A more complex moment was when I began implementation of blended space how to deal with the non-willing students who rather work independently or with only other in-person students. Encouraging these type of students was easy but still an obstacle I am tackling. Overall this ah-ha moment of having remote learners and in-person work simultaneously on one task is working and benefiting the class, the learning space and the learners themselves.