Mixed feelings 👥

These days I've been making progress on the online courses I took on: Online Teaching and Business English which are very rewarding. Moreover, I have met new colleagues via online given the fact that the institution I work for has been implementing virtual training sessions regularly among all of the teachers who are work from home, including myself. Interestingly enough, I should thank this isolation situation for keeping me at home because if it wasn't for it, I wouldn't had had the chance to get to know them. I learned many useful techniques when it comes to teaching online that I certainly will apply in my actual classes. 👥

The most significant learning that I had last week is that out there, we can use many virtual tools to enhance our student's skills and the best of all is that some of them are for free. For instance, I discovered a tool that is a virtual game to measure the students' previous knowledge that is the same dynamic as the Cien Mexicanos Dijeron game. A very popular trivia game in Mexican culture, among others. 😀

On the other hand, the biggest challenge I've had to face lately is to move on from one stage of the lesson to the other in a completely virtual environment. I became aware that moving from the warm-up to the next stage in a face-to-face class is very different from doing it in an online one. Firstly, teachers may find themselves way more limited in terms of space of movement to arrange the chairs in order to make a round table for discussion, for example. Instead, He needs to use wisely the tools that the platform offers to try to simulate a physical environment as much as possible. In this case, he should use the breakout rooms functions, unfortunately, not all of the platforms offer it. Consequently, he will need to figure it out. 💥

Secondly, a process as simple as spoken interaction could turn out overwhelming for both teachers and students if the teacher doesn't catch the students' attention properly. Mainly if the teacher is working with young learners such as teens or kids, the situation becomes even more challenging. 

Finally, the technical issues might take place and to my mind, these challenges are the most frustrating of them all because it's something completely out of your control. For instance, I was wrapping up my today's class when the platform crashed down out of the blue, I had a steady internet connection and my computer was okay, but the platform's server was so saturated that it took me out of my class just because! Nonetheless, what really matters here is how good at improvisation are you as a teacher and how you manage these issues trying to have the minor affection to the class as possible.

The moral of today is: Do not rely fully on technology! The can fail just as a human can. 🐙