Week 1 —- Sink or Swim : Delivering without Notice

The COVID-19 Emergency has sent many teachers into a panic with little or no time to set up online and/or distance based learning for their students or to consider a delivery strategy appropriate to the actual skills of their students.

Many have little or only limited skills themselves with technology - very few have any experience or confidence delivering remotely. There is a naive belief that platforms like Skype and Zoom can miraculously replace the physical classroom. More generally, there is understandable angst and sheer terror of being thrown in at the deep end unprepared.

It immediately occurred to me that my own current group’s limited language and digital skills pose critical challenges in this chaotic time. In such a situation it is important to remain faithful to the knowledge gained from working with such learners in the early 1990s - keep it simple and work with what they know and can cope with.

I am determined to pursue the simple delivery strategy I put in place and piloted with my students a couple of weeks before the closures having anticipated the crisis.

With this ‘hibernation’ period looking as if it is going to stretch out for the entire term, I am depending on my downloadable PDF Workbooks to largely fill the content gap with related Weekly videos, screencasts and quizzes being used as supports.

Email, SMS and phone calls provide a reliable, underpinning channel for frequent communication.

My resources are all located at a single, familiar location to minimise confusion. All activity circles around my blog which my current learners have used for a term to access homework and other activities to support their class work.

There are definitely a few students who will need extra support. There are one or two who may even need to have workbooks sent to them by mail. There are one or two students (of about thirteen in total) who do not have internet at home and a few who have little interest in learning by online means. Interestingly though, all have smartphones and data.

So that’s a brief outline of my plan. I’m using some of my ‘holiday’ time now —- is anyone really on holiday? —- thinking the delivery strategy through more carefully and setting up behind the scenes.

What’s missing from the concept? What other problems am I likely to experience? 

My starting point is always the students themselves. My mission is to leave no one behind. Let’s see whether this delivery model sinks or swims.