Education is evidently being a need more than a want to any person, to shape a unique perspective for a person to look at the world, to develop skills and avoid living in a blur. In short, it is a necessity that no one should overlook or demean. Traditionally, learning and teaching are set upon a classroom with tactual assets and facilities.
But this traditional method has constraints that do not permit the teacher-student relationship to be maintained uninterruptedly. These constraints can come in many ways such as,
- Preferred teacher’s classroom located far from the student’s home
- Teachers who live close by don’t meet the standards of the student’s knowledge gaining requirements (teacher-oriented teaching)
- Language boundaries between teachers and students
- Uncertainties such as epidemics, security threats, weather conditions, classroom renovations where a recent example being the COVID-19 pandemic
- Teacher-oriented classrooms that use a static method to deliver, question and evaluate ‘an eclectic set’ of students
Technology intervenes… as always
As the prevailing and emerging cutting-edge technologies at every point of the globe which gives us more reach into life than technology have ever given. Education was immensely contributed by these digital remedies. Among them are IoT, web-based compound software systems for learning and teaching, e-payment methods, Virtual and Augmented Reality, smart interactive whiteboards and many more. These technologies helped teachers to break free from one-method-fits-all delivery and allow customisable teaching mediums that could pave the way for students to learn in a more fun and attentive manner.
What is Online Teaching?
Hence, a new mode of a teacher-student relationship was introduced by the internet to overcome all conventional class-oriented challenges to provide a compatible education platform for teachers to convey their knowledge to their students in an easier and more lucid manner. This mode is known as ‘online teaching’. This term when further elaborated means ‘an online medium for teachers to conduct lessons, evaluate student performances, mark assessments and all other activities done in a class’. It is a structured method of teaching students regardless of the student’s presence in a physical class. It widens the gyre of opportunities for students to learn efficiently. Online teaching can be of two modes:
- Synchronous online learning
Online learning allows both the teacher and student to communicate in real-time. This method is mainly used when the teacher is teaching on-demand. For example, through software such as Skype, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, where the teacher and the student either talk to each other at the same time during the class. - Asynchronous online learning
This mode allows online teaching platforms that don’t allow the teacher and student to communicate directly. The student can comment or email the teacher to clarify doubts or share their ideas. This suits best for elder students who don’t need close supervision.
E-classroom Planning
Are you an amateur online teacher hoping to help your students to get quality education and prosper in society? Then read this blog article to learn how to start up an unwavering online platform for your lessons to effectively attract students from all around the world.
First of all, you must have a keen understanding of Educational Technologies, also known as EdTech that could assist you in planning effectual lessons. As students are more inclined to technology than teachers, they would be more comfortable adapting to a hi-tech classroom comparatively. There are many digital products available online to assist you with teaching and planning lessons. Deciding what tool is more compatible with our teaching nature and field or level of education is very important in planning your lessons out.
EdTech tools that would assist in effective lesson planning
1. Cloud-based Lesson Delivery planning
Reliable digital solution providers can engineer made-to-order systems that allow the teachers to plan their lessons without blindly walking into an online platform of a whirl of online students waiting for quality education. They can be developed to be interfaced in mobile too. This software is a cloud-based solution that can house many subsystems that can break down the complex lesson planning processes to clever steps that will allow the teachers for stress-free preparation. The teachers can ask the service providers for what sort of interface or what sort of gadgets that he/she wants the solution to inhabit. Given below are steps of these subsystems that could heed in post-planning an online lesson:
a. Analytics
This is one of the software that assists in planning lessons limitlessly. Teachers can use analytics tools that are integrated into education systems to better understand the behaviour of the students. They can scale, assess and replan their lessons in the best manner that would be effective and efficient to both the students and the teachers. The best times when students come online, price ranges that are preferred by students, the demands that students make from a teacher and more. It is in a way a third eye that allows you to adapt your lessons to be the most attractive and useful to the right students. The teacher must refer to this system before proceeding with planning the lesson. This is mostly recommended as the first step of planning, therefore.
b. Availability
Electronic calendars, work logs, curriculums can be installed in the system to help the teacher to navigate to plan the best times and days the teacher has to conduct a class. They can update their schedules via reminders and alerts to avoid class times overlapping with others. They can also use this subsystem to plan what part of the lesson will be covered in class and what are the tasks to be assigned to students
c. Attendance
Teachers are also education managers, they have to keep track of attendance. Teachers can house a system to automatically update the arrival and end times of students in a cloud database. The count of students who are in the class and their details can be accessed any time by the teacher because the systems are always connected to the main management system.
d. Class-in-progress assistive tech tools
This is where the main advantage of online learning comes into play. The teachers can also plan what are the teaching tools that they will use to help their students to better understand the lesson. They can upload graphs, videos, pop quizzes, infographics, animations and more related to the lesson so they can be readily accessed by their students. Smartboards or video conferencing allows the teacher to use a traditional board at home. Teachers can open portals before starting the class where students can share their ideas and work in the class to either encourage or take corrective approaches based on their comments.
e. Assessments
Assigning assignments can also be technologically elevated! Subsystems that allow the teacher to upload assignment topics, requirements like word counts, mandatory structures, plagiarisms percentages, deadlines and other rules can be uploaded by the uploads. Web portals can be used to upload lessons to assist the student to study harder at home after class. The students can also use the portal to submit their work on time. Another advantage of this system is that it allows plugins and tools that will help the teacher before and after the student sends their submissions. Students would be obliged to work on time since these methods establish class democratisation. No student will be allowed to gain specific benefits or favouritisms. Since technology doesn’t adapt to biases or interests.
It is fascinating because all these planning systems are interconnected by one system where you know everything about everyone at any time. Planning lessons using a customised system are very advantageous but the initial investments would be costlier than off-the-shelf education systems.
2. Virtual Assistants
Teachers can also use virtual assistants like Cortana, Siri and Alexa to help in planning online lessons, but their assistance is limited to the prewired instruction that their developers have allowed them. So, the freedom of planning is barricaded to the limited options that these virtual assistants offer.
What are the advantages of planning lessons online?
Given below are some advantages that you have in planning online lessons rather than manually jotting down your class activities.
- Very cost-efficient – Planning online lessons will cut down many unnecessary costs and stresses. Because it’s timely and faster than any other planning method. Even teachers who are already teaching I school can earn extra income. Teachers have no travelling costs or costs that are mandatory to be spent for the teacher to go to an institution to plan classes and lessons.
- Interactable and scalable interfaces- Highly flexible interfaces can be used by the teacher to scale batches, examine time-based classes, upload lesson materials to the cloud, navigate through schedules and more. Planning has never been made easier than using a cloud-based system, even if there was a hardware fault, they could use another device to conduct the class and refer to schedules and propagandas as required.
- Resilient to threats- No human-errors can be seen whatsoever because inhouse plugins and subsystems will detect if they detect abnormal data behaviour of timetable clashes. The teacher will be alerted by reminders or notices if any fault was smartly discovered. Also, Protective software can save and secure the teacher’s plans and class interactive tools appropriately.
- Big Data analytics- Knowledge economy generated by big data analytics collected allows the teacher to plan appropriately.
- Teachers can learn too! – Online experiences will help the teacher to naturalise to the online world that is now devouring traditional methods of teaching. Teachers will be exposed to students from different cultures, backgrounds, geography locations etc. that will automatically result in teachers to learn more about interesting facts that students have to say.
- Take the lead in class and in your career – Last but not least, teachers can use online planning methods to take lead as the instructor of the virtual class, they will also be leading in their careers. Since adapting to latest technologies allows teachers to be thinking ahead of time giving them the competitor advantage in their field of teaching.
Disadvantages of online lesson planning?
- Ready to plan? – planning for online lessons requires you to have compatible hardware, software, network connection and access to education cloud. Installing all these components can be costly but they are required to enjoy the advantages given by online lesson planning.
- Digital divide- many conventional teachers still find it difficult to use computerised lesson planning tools because most of them are not tech-savvy.
- Digital use divide- not every tech-savvy teachers are active users too. There are passive teachers who are aware of online teaching but prefer to teach in a physical class rather than a virtual classroom.
In Conclusion
Online Learning is now rapidly increasing in gaining acceptance and application after the coronavirus. Education in a virtual space is most encouraged by schools and even parents to not allow ‘social distancing’ come between students and their education. Which is why being keen on how to plan and conduct lessons is very important for teachers. Using technologies to plan your activities is cost-efficient, simple, fast and mutually advantageous to all institutions, teachers and students. It is also less space-consuming since you can get rid of complexed paperwork and classily use a device to carry out your processes. Security of your sensitive data is not to be rechecked or supervised, because cyber assistive software can support you in keeping your data safe.
Explore a world full of opportunities by upgrading your planning activities to provide a concrete stage for your students to learn with no barriers anchoring them down. As fascinating as it sounds- students all around the world connecting with teachers from another corner of the world- this method is a landmark for global education.
