Teachers Resource Force Blog

Supporting students' Social Emotional Learning while distance learning

19/10/2020

Teaching remotely makes social-emotional learning more important than ever because your students have to distance themselves away from everything familiar to them: be that in school, with their peers, with their teachers and their whole experience of education. But how are you supposed to fit SEL in as well as catch up on all their missed academics?

Supporting student SEL while distance learning | TRF.one

Social distancing is affecting your students’ social and emotional needs:

Now with blended learning and the change in how schools are working post-pandemic, your students might not be getting the support that they need or are used to receiving, and social distancing is in some way, affecting their growth and development.

You're not alone if you're worried about your students keeping up academically and catching up on all the work they have missed. But for students to make progress at school, it's essential to tend to their social and emotional needs too. Not all students have positive experiences at home and school is often their escape; not being able to have that space or the security of being near you and their peers, is challenging for them. Thus it's more important than ever that you support their social-emotional needs and help them build character in their personal development during these unprecedented times. Keep reading to learn how you can support your students' social-emotional learning, even from a distance.

You can integrate social-emotional teaching within your remote lessons:

There is always pressure to focus on academics, especially after students missed many months of school last year. It can be agonising wondering how you are going to squeeze social-emotional learning into your day on top of academics. But it doesn't have to be one or the other. You can integrate SEL into your regular teaching, and it doesn't have to take much time out of your day to support your students with their well being. Here are a few steps that you do to can integrate SEL and well being into your regular teaching that will make a world of difference for your students.

You can integrate social-emotional teaching within your remote teaching | TRF.one

Ideas for integrating SEL and student well being into distance learning:

If you've not tried affirmations with your students yet, they are incredibly powerful if used in the right way. If you would like to learn more about how to use affirmations, you can check out this article on Why affirmations haven’t worked for you and the key step you are missing. You can download a set of resilience affirmations for free at the end of this article, to share with your students. These particular affirmations are great for wellbeing because students can colour them in and also answer the questions that help reinforce and develop resilience.

Another way you can help develop your students’ well being is through one-to-one attention where possible. This can be in the form of online calls or direct messages via email, Google Classroom or whichever Learning Management System (LMS) you are using. By providing opportunities for one-to-one attention, even if it's just for a few minutes, will make all the difference in helping you understand your students. Furthermore, your students will feel comforted in knowing they are being listened to and that you care about them.

Of course, sometimes one-to-one calls might not be possible. In this case, the use of check-in forms such as these, is very beneficial. You can share a Google Form with your students, and they can express themselves and their needs through this form and feel heard. It is straightforward for you to analyse the information and see where particular students might be struggling; that will enable you to support them individually based on their own needs.

Another effective way to support your students SEL is by helping them focus on their goals or their purpose. This is especially important at this time where routines are very different; being home all day can make anyone feel like their purpose is lacking, and thus it can be harder to set and stick to goals. One way you help your students through this is via a Goal-Setting Journal. This journal will guide them through setting goals for various areas of their life, and it will help them structure their goals so that they are more likely to achieve them. By sharing these journals with you, you can help keep them accountable by checking up on them and seeing how they are making progress.

Finally, you can support your students’ social and emotional learning by helping them develop character. You can help them do this via the use of Daily Morning Meetings for Character Development. You can choose a character trait for the month, and every day in your online call or via your LMS, you can start your day with a quote and a prompt. Students can document their responses to these prompts using the included journals, and this will encourage them to think about developing specific character traits and how they can incorporate these skills into their own lives.

Daily morning meetings to help develop character | TRF.one

You can also encourage them to think of others during these challenging times by developing the character trait of kindness. You can easily do this through colouring compliment notes, which come in both printable and digital versions. You can learn more about how to use these notes to start a kindness project in your own school here. By encouraging your students to offer people compliments and do good deeds for others, it will help build character and develop their social-emotional learning.

To conclude:

Try using some of these ideas to integrate social-emotional learning into your remote teaching. As you can see, they do not have to be complicated or take much time away from academics. But by showing your students that you care and are helping them through these challenging times, will make all the difference in their lives.

Download resilience colouring affirmations for free to support your students with their social-emotional learning:

Remember, you can download the free resilience animations here to help your students develop their resilience, especially during these unprecedented times when they need it more than ever.

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Bell ringer starter activities to do with your online class during distance learning

21/9/2020

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It can be tricky knowing what kind of bell ringer starter activities are suitable to do with your online class while you're waiting for everyone to arrive. Distance learning is a very different world to navigate!

Bell ringer starter activities to do with your online class during distance learning | TRF.one

It can be challenging keeping students engaged from a distance:

You’re not alone if you’ve been finding yourself stuck not knowing what to do with your students while you’re waiting for them to arrive online. You want to have fun yet meaningful activities to do with your students and ensure that they are engaged and excited to be there. If you’ve been struggling to think of suitable digital bell ringer activities for distance learning, keep reading for some ideas to help.

Distance learning bell ringer activities can transform your online lessons:

Imagine preparing for your online lessons, and instead of the awkwardness as you are waiting for students to join, you can have a foolproof list of go-to activities ready in your arsenal. Knowing that these activities will help keep your online calls fun and engaging as well as help build a classroom community, tenders them influential in encouraging attendance to your online lessons.

Quizzes are always an engaging and meaningful way of keeping students entertained:

Fun tools to keep in your online lesson arsenal are quizzes. For example, many students love riddles as they stimulate their minds. Theseriddle bell ringers are easy to use in an online call: you can share your screen with the class and then click to reveal the answer when you're ready. It's a good idea to leave some time for personal reflection before you do so. To encourage engagement, students can record on a piece of paper or device what they think the answer is, and then everyone can hold up their answer on the screen at once! If you would like a set of riddles to try out in your online classroom, you can download a week's worth of questions for free here.

Another fun game you could introduce is "True or False". These games are ideal if you want full participation from all your students as you can send them a link to a true or false web-deck where there are a range of questions based on a particular theme. Students flick through each fact and select whether they think it is true or false. They receive immediate feedback on the answer, so as they are playing, they are learning facts about that particular topic as well. The beauty of this method is that every student can participate! If you would like to try out the true or false web-decks, you can check out this one for free on the Coronavirus.

Quizzes are always an engaging and meaningful way of keeping students entertained | TRF.one

There are also some physical games you can do during online calls which are great to get students moving. Some examples include scavenger hunts, virtual contests and show and tell activities. If you would like to learn more about how they work, you can read the article on building community while distance learning here.

Finally, if you are looking for some interactive activities where the whole class is involved and playing together, here are some great online quizzes that would work exceptionally well for online calls:

Kahoot is one of my all-time favourites, and students cannot get enough either! You reveal a question on your screen, and students can use their devices to select the answers simultaneously. This means everyone is involved in taking part, and it's always an enjoyable time for all concerned!

Some other sites that work similarly are Quizizz and Gimkit: all students are interactively involved in competing against one another based on a topic of your choice, and engagement is always through the roof!

To conclude:

There are lots of fun activities that you can do in your online calls to help your students remain engaged, motivated and excited! In addition, these games can help increase attendance and help keep the classroom community spirit alive while distance learning.

Download free riddles to use as bell ringers for your online lessons:

Students love riddles, so if you would like to download a set of riddles for free, you can download them below:

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Distance learning backdrop ideas for online calls

17/8/2020

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Tired of that blank wall behind you during online calls? Or are you someone who scrambles to tidy up your background before an online call to make sure it looks presentable? Backdrops can actually be a lot of fun and can make your online lessons with your students that extra bit more special too!

Distance learning backdrop ideas for online calls | TRF.one

Why do you need backdrops for your online calls anyway:

With more lessons being delivered remotely via online calls such as Zoom, Teams, or Google Meet, you and your students might be missing the special decor from your classroom. Those personal touches and pops of colour you use to decorate your classroom, help reflect your personality. It's not particularly inspiring for your students to be looking at a blank wall behind you while you're talking to your class, but you're certainly not alone if you haven’t had a chance to think about this. It's hard to know where to begin, and many wouldn’t have even considered creating special backgrounds for online lessons.

It’s worth considering though if you have some time this summer, as students love seeing your personal touches in your classroom decor. So keep reading to learn some fun, easy, and cost-effective ways that you can add the element of your personality into your online calls through decor that is easily interchangeable to keep things fresh for your students.

Have fun with backdrops for your online distance learning lessons:

There are so many different options for backdrop ideas for your online lessons, and they don't have to be complicated or challenging to set up. You could change them up seasonally or random times just to keep things fresh for your students!

Distance learning backdrops don’t have to cost you a fortune:

Who doesn’t love cozy coffee shops? Now you can easily bring those hygge vibes to your own online classroom! If you would like some free bunting in a cozy coffee shop theme, you can download a sample here. The bunting is really easy to use: you just add your own text or letters to the page. They can be resized to fit the space that you have behind you perfectly, and the full set of coffee shop bunting contains 26 unique styles. Team it with your own favourite hot beverage as you teach, and hello Starbucks! You could also amp up the cozy hygge vibes with these wooden or slate calendars to highlight important dates coming up for your class.

Another way to decorate that blank wall behind you is by putting up photos of your class! You can find pictures that you have taken together in the past, or perhaps pictures that they sent through especially for your wall. You can then display them proudly behind you, and that will help your students feel really involved in the classroom community. You can even have a different student featured every day for fun! You may find this also encourages regular attendance to your online classes, as it’s exciting for them to see who is going to be featured on your wall that day!

Another idea is to use technology to help you with your backgrounds. You could add a virtual background if you are using Zoom, Teams or Meet, and you could even use a real photograph of your classroom for that familiarity. Alternatively, have fun with themed virtual backgrounds! If you’re teaching about the Egyptians, why not place yourself in front of the Pyramids for example? The world is literally your oyster!

Use technology to create virtual backgrounds for your online classes | TRF.one

And finally, for you DIY types who like getting hands-on, you could dress up your background very easily with props such as fairy lights! Or what about different scarves and have them pinned up or draped in different places and positions? and if you want to get really fancy, you can actually purchase special backdrops that are used in photography, that look exceptional. They’re simply fabric that you can pin up on your wall making it easy to change the background frequently to keep things interesting for your students. Here are some of my favourites from Amazon: affiliate links included below:

To conclude:

Changing up your background for your online classes is a fun way to keep things fresh and interesting for your students, and helps keep that personal touch in your lessons when you're not able to be physically close. As you can see, it doesn't have to be expensive or complicated: it's really easy to change things up and personalize it to your class!