Zoom classes with young learners

'No, I am not zooming with my Pre-K and Kinder students. This is not developmentally appropriate at all. This is just adding more screen time for them and I don't see the purpose for this.' 

This was what I said when I first heard that the upper grades in my school are doing zoom classes. At first, I was very against the idea, as any early years teacher would, before actually thinking it through and listing the pros and cons. None of us knew this pandemic will last this long when it first started. We all thought, and hoped it would pass by and everything will go back to 'normal', instead of adopting to this 'new normal'. But I was reminded that we need to constantly reflect and change as teachers, as the world continues to change. And this is the one of the fun parts of teaching, we grow with our students as we teach! 

'I can't believe you gave in and zoom with young learners!'

Photo from Zoom official website

So, why did I decide to give it a go? 

Here are some rationals behind my decision on Zooming with young learners. 

English Language Learner (ELLs): To some of my students, school is the only English environment and ever since school went online, they lost the opportunity to interact in English completely. Yes, there are educational apps and shows, however those are mostly not interactive and one-way. Plus, if they are going to be on their screens anyways, might as well be on screen with their friends and teacher, right? We also received feedback that some parents struggled support their child due to the language barrier. 

Socio-emotional health: Another reason was providing a platform for students to still meet and chat to their peers. We often forgot how much this pandemic is affecting these little ones, whilst they do not have the full grasp of what is actually happening. Of course we explained what is happening in the world in their words, but their childhood are heavily affected. 'I can't go to school, or the playground. I have to stay home all day and I don't get to see my friends????' What an unfortunate time for these little ones! 

Stay connected (students and parents): On top of providing a window for students to communicate, zoom also allowed me to be available to parents. Since most parents were there, either right next to the child, or in the house, I could talk to them about any concerns or parents will initiate conversation, which was great! 

Little background information of my class
- class of 14, with students aged from 4 to 6, so pre-k and k grade. 

- half of my students are English Language Learners(ELLs). 

- we are an IBPYP school and play-based learning class. Unfortunately, this was one thing I had to modify. I struggled to make cyber learning fully play-based as parents support are limited. Please share your ideas and suggests if you have any! I would love to learn from you!

How I started to plan out my zoom classes

As I stopped and think from an objective perspective of why zoom would, or would not work. I realised that it is how teachers use it that make it good, or bad. So I decided to give it a go, while making plans the fits all my differentiating teaching. 

Before I started zoom, I assigned learning activities on Seesaw. I would create short videos of myself teaching or demonstrating what is the activity all about. Activities such as counting things they have at home, reading a bed-time story to their toys and more, which I am happy to share in a separate post. Anyways, for each of my seesaw activity, there will be a video of my demonstrating the steps, or an audio instruction. There are also written instructions for parents when they are assisting or supervising their child. 

Sorry I had to share this with you, isn't this so cute?

She read a bedtime story to her toys for one of our literacy activities!

My first draft schedule for zoom

Ok, enough with all that. Let me show you my very first draft for my zoom classes. 

As an early year educator, and knowing my students pretty well, I started the sessions in 10-15minutes blocks at the very beginning then extended it to 15-20minute one week in. 

Students are grouped with similar learning progress, in groups of 2-5. During these sessions, we read together, practiced using our reading strategies or sometimes just chat and play games. In the afternoon, students either completed their seesaw activities, which I had cut down from two activities daily to one per day. Why? One, to minimise their screen time. Second, since most of the learning and observations were done over zoom already. 

Also, I assigned two days worth of activities only on Monday, Wednesday and Friday to give students a choice. They can choose which activities they want to work on first. 

Parent support: Parents support were not heavily needed through zoom sessions. All I needed from parents are to help set up and make sure students come on on time. They are welcome to sit and be part of the learning, which some do sit out of the shot. This is refreshing to parents as they get to see how their children learn.

What happened then?

Social zoom: After zooming for a week, my students shared that they want to see other friends too. So I decided to add another block, purely for students to social. My aim was to create a platform for students to just chat and 'catch up' with each other. There are no intentional teaching and I am just a facilitator. Sometimes we would play games too. I also invited our specialists to join in our zoom meetings, just to talk and play games together. These were 20 minutes sessions and attendance were not taken. Some students showed up everyday, some once a week, some never, which was completely fine. 

Support groups: As we continue to zoom, I noticed that certain students would benefit from additional meetings. So I asked those parents if they are able to support for extra sessions. These groups are grouped by their reading levels particularly, just like how I would work with smaller group in the classroom. 

K1 zoom: This zoom was particularly set up for pre-K aged students. I admit that I struggle teaching a mix aged class and find it hard to meet all the learning needs. So I set up a separate time to focus on them. 

Here is my modified schedule: 

What did we do in our zoom meetings:
   - read together
   - play games 
   - draw or write stories and share with each other
   - talk and catch up, share our weekends or days
   - show and tell with our toys
   - ask students what they want to do for the day~~

Finally, I know educators all around the world are finding the best way to support our students in this change. We know our students the best, how my class worked might not work in yours. And my perspective might not align with yours. Thank you for reading my blog with an open-minded attitude. Feel free to leave friendly comments and suggestions!