This is the 15th post in Over a Cuppa, a series which offers prompts to reflect on learning and teaching during the time it takes to make and drink a cuppa.
As anticipated, Over a Cuppa posts have been sporadic this session. The previous post, How full is your cup? was written in August, in lockdown while working and learning from home. After 106 days, we are slowly emerging. The intensity of this time has changed what reflection looks like, with limited air and light and time and space (to borrow Charles Bukowski’s words).
This post is inspired by a comment by Rex di Bona in the Teaching and Leadership community of practice about the student experience during lockdown: “I found that the students were lonely.” Students made this clear in the feedback they provided on the experience of learning during lockdown.
In the TECHE series Spotlight on Practice, teachers reflected on what worked in the transition to teaching fully online, and the value of connection was a recurring idea:
Janet Dutton summed it up well: “The notion of connection and care … is really a core dimension of my work as a teacher. I found that was heightened in the shift to online learning – the students really needed that connection.” Others echoed these words, with Andrew Burke emphasising the importance of “just really caring about the students.”
Shifting online changed the ways in which teachers connected. John Knox saw Zoom as a valuable tool but noted “the lack of non-verbal feedback from students is challenging – you can’t ‘read the room’, and you miss all those subtle clues.” Max Harwood spoke of “trying to replicate the physical presence of the teacher/student dynamic as best you can.”
There were also advantages to Zoom, as Fay Hadley revealed: “I really feel that as a result of COVID I got to know those students so much better than I’ve ever got to know them in the past. It is so wonderful with Zoom; their name is there – it’s just so good.”
For Yi Li, building an online learning community was critical: “I show students that I pay attention to them. Students easily feel left out, alone, and invisible in the online environment.” John Burrt’s performance students reimagined group work online, creating videos “where they were passing objects from one frame to another, or juggle in patterns, or do hand stands together. They explored things like connectedness, identity, and how they felt because they were all in isolation.”
With twenty years’ experience teaching in distance mode, Phil Chappell’s “golden rule … is regular communication with the students, and a flexible approach to their circumstances.” Similarly, Zara Bending discussed the importance of “connections in the room; you read expressions, gestures, emotions” and saw the role of teachers to “meet our audience where they are (and that includes their headspace).”
Connecting with colleagues is also important, as Nathan Hart reminded us: “My suggestion would be to reach out to your colleagues and find out how they are doing things because that sort of combined knowledge can be really useful.”
Today’s prompt is to practice reflecting in company with students and colleagues.
I’ve been doing my own connecting through reflection by meeting with the Reflection for Learning Circle (an invitation prompted by this blog series): Marina Harvey, Kate Lloyd, Kath McLachlan, Anne-Louise Semple and Greg Walkerden.
Their work includes a YouTube channel of exemplar videos guiding online reflective practice for student learning. There are 32 videos (and counting) available, and they offer ways to practice reflection in company.
The exercises are readily adapted to engage with concepts in various disciplines and offer prompts for students preparing for exams, moments of calm during challenging times, and some novel approaches to connecting with students.
Invite your students to ‘Give your brain a break’ and move away from the computer.
Reflect on learning with ‘five main points’
Ask ‘how mindful am I?’
More detail on the research behind these exercises is available in Reflection for learning: a scholarly practice guide for educators from AdvanceHE.
As we transition out of lockdown, socialise more and return to campus and face-to-face learning, finding opportunities for moments of calm will be important.
Agnes Bosanquet
Catch up on previous posts in this series:
Click on the blue button to access previous posts in the ‘Over a cuppa’ reflection series.
Image created by Fidel Fernando.
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