Back to school for the next chapter

It’s now been 102 days since we reset as a team here at ClickView. While our community was teaching students remotely, our team was remote teaching to our ClickView schools.

We’ve spent hundreds of hours working with you to help you use ClickView for your own remote teaching. And during this time, we’ve also been learning. We’ve had the time to really listen to our schools. To hear what works for you and, most importantly, what you need now that school has returned.

We’ve seen significant developments during this time

• Students developing digital literacy skills to access online resources independently. 
• Parents engaging and connecting with the school community and student learning.
• Teachers developing new, deeper connections with students.
• Students taking ownership of the pace and direction of their learning.
• The number of ClickView users has tripled during the remote learning period, with video views quadrupling.

How did the learning experience look for students?

While teachers were thrown in the deep end with remote teaching, so were students. They were forced to be more ‘online’ by engaging in different platforms, learning through doing and communicating with their teachers in a unique way. There were challenges and roadblocks at times, but also many positive outcomes. The sheer number of students logged into ClickView, a rise in student video views and student-created interactive videos throughout this period all demonstrate just how far their digital literacy skills have come.

These important digital literacy skills include:

• Developing their independent technical proficiency 
• Using ClickView in a more collaborative and communicative manner
• Practising online safety skills

How can we continue to build student digital literacy skills?

Now that we’re back in the classroom, it’s a great opportunity for us all to continue to promote independent online learning with ClickView. Here are some ways you can help students build on their digital literacy skills.

Encourage practical skills

Students love to get involved and be active in their learning. Get students to search for content they think relates to the topic you’re learning about. They can use the ‘search’ button or look through the libraries.

Support critical thinking skills

Skills students relied on during remote teaching can now be embedded into their daily learning. Student-created interactive videos are great for asking higher-order questions, creating a glossary of definitions, for project work and assessing their understanding of a topic.

Foster collaboration and communication skills

After a period of online learning, students are generally more skilled and confident using tablets or laptops and navigating web pages. Lessons including ClickView for collaborative work will likely run smoothly.

How can students continue accessing videos independently?

Before class

When students engage with content before stepping into the classroom, you get time. Time for deeper conversation and for more creative learning activities. Time to embrace teachable moments without abandoning your plans.

Teacher tip: Share a video by sending the link to your students and putting it in your LMS.

During class

Students can access videos independently during class time. 

Teacher tip: To give the internet a hand, use video in small groups during rotation-based lessons. This limits the number of devices trying to access the internet. It also encourages group work that promotes peer understanding.

After Class

Students have access to engage with videos in meaningful ways post-class.

Teacher tip: Share a weekly playlist of the videos used so students can re-watch them in their own time.

How can we keep our parents engaged?

We know parent involvement in student learning makes a huge difference. Out of necessity, many parents became very engaged during the remote learning period. Parents discovered more about their child’s abilities, learning styles and teacher expectations. As a result, the teacher-parent partnership is now stronger than ever.  It’s important we maintain this for improved learning outcomes.

Let’s give parents the confidence to engage with their learners from K-12

By empowering parents with the tools to help their children, you’ll help equip them with the confidence to become more involved in learning.

Here are some suggestions for maintaining engagement with parents:

• Consider providing instruction for parents to help with set homework and assignments.
• When scaffolding student learning for an assessment task, consider including an explanation for parents.
• Use the instructional videos you create to explain student tasks, outcomes and learning goals with both students and their parents. These videos can be watched together, opening up the chance for conversation and equipping parents with the tools to facilitate discussion on various topics. 

What next?

By adopting these practices into your classroom teaching, you open up a meaningful dialogue. Parent-teacher conferences then become an opportunity for parents to discuss what their child is challenged by, what they’re enjoying and what sparks their interest. When we involve them in the learning journey, parents can be our greatest advocate with students.

As we move into this next chapter of education, we’ll take our recent learnings with us to better serve our ClickView community. What will you do?

Written by:
Arti Kotecha, Jack Whitehead & Eliescha Bazley