Teaching During Pandemic Times

Remote learning and teaching

Online teaching and online learning

E-teaching and e-learning

Distance learning

            There are many ways to say how teachers have been working since the pandemic hit the planet; here I have listed just a few. That kind of makes sense because we're facilitators and remote teaching and learning facilitates through technology; live or recorded. The remote classroom does not provide the warmth and the security that the traditional classroom does, though. Online you cannot really tell whether the student is paying attention and absorbing all the information being exposed to. That question mark stamped on their faces cannot be seen.

The learning environment that the teachers and students are in are not the same which makes it hard to control. For instance, the noises in the house; the noises that come from the outside; the inappropriate or uncomfortable furniture or even other distractions, like cooking, cleaning, video games and Netflix.

Many students and teachers are locked down with other family members, who also have to work and study from home and sometimes there aren´t enough rooms in the homes available for these family members to be separated from each other during this work or study period. Sometimes you see small children coming into the room to see what is going on on the computer screen. There are other times when you here someone hollering. Not to mention, the pets that like to jump all over the place and take part in the online classes.

Although many people are in their homes, the city is wide awake, and the exterior noises come in. There is no way to control that. Construction work is full blast. The cars racing by. The police cars, fire trucks and ambulances soaring by with their sirens on. These noises we cannot control. A possibility here would be headphones or earphones; however, there have been studies that shows that these tools can ignite vertigo in some people who use them for a long period of time. One thing is good though, no planes are flying around, at least that sound has been removed.

Back pain caused by inappropriate seating or too much seating is something that loads of people have been complaining about. In addition to this, headaches and joint issues. In the traditional classroom, the teacher walks around much more than at home. The students do too due to the fact that they need to move from one classroom to the other. Now at home, that does not happen as often.

Despite the fact that many tools are available to mimic the traditional classroom face-to-face instruction cannot take place, which makes learning and teaching a bit harder for some people. On the other hand, students are less illiterate than teachers; the student´s level of competence and understanding in the case of information technology is sometimes greater than the teachers. Nonetheless, the teacher should not be afraid to ask for help and in most part of the times the student is glad to do so. In this teacher-student scenario, everyone is a teacher, and everyone is a student.

 E-learning from a student's point of view is that it is a self-paced learning situation. The student is able to take his/her own time to do the activities suggested different from the traditional classroom situation where the teacher is always controlling the time for students to get tasks done and not everyone is able to do those tasks under those circumstances or within that time limit. However, since the teacher is dealing with the class of 25 students, it sometimes becomes very difficult to allow each student to work at their own pace.

As soon as the pandemic was announced and teachers were told they would be teaching from their homes online, there was some sort of panic. Each institution decided to use a platform for the teachers to work on. In my case, we were given a two-day workshop on how to use the platform that we are using. Just like students it was tiring and I could see that too much online activity does wear you out which was a good experience because then I was able to kind of measure how much I would ask my  students to do during their 45-minute class so as not to overload them.

 How to use a virtual classroom online based platform is something that we are not taught at the University. Some teachers prefer to record their classes while others live. I, myself, prefer to do it live. From the experience that I'm acquiring, teaching English online is more fun live. However, there are so many good professionals out there who have already posted tutorials on specific topics grammar, writing, reading and listening related that I really do not need to record anything.

What I have tried to do is write out a plan where the students work on their own some of the times and other times online and basically online is just to touch base to see what questions they had based on what they had been doing; listen to a song and talk about it; read a short story and then talk about it; or just have a question and answer conversation class. Of course, there are times when I need to explain grammar because they could not understand it well.

In the beginning, I must confess that I was very afraid and the butterflies in the stomach did not let me sleep the night before my first online class and at the end of an eight-period class day, my body told me that I would have to make some changes. Sitting in front of the computer for such a long time wasn't healthy and the body screamed it out at me through excruciating  pain, so I put myself in the shoes of the learner and also thought about the fact that his or her being in front of the computer all day would also cause the same pain that I was feeling even though they're much younger. Therefore, I   have worked out a plan where I’m online all the time; however, not live. The students do not have to be either. But they can have it on in case they have a question. I also use other techniques like Netflix where the student can watch a movie or a show from a comfortable sofa for bed and then at the end they have to work on it either in writing or in speaking. I have also used techniques where they have to use their coursebook  so that they don't have to be online. I must confess that now I have gotten used to the idea of teaching from home; however, I surely miss being in the classroom with my students. Although sometimes they might drive me crazy, it does make a difference. Being a teacher for over 35 years, I can state that e-learning is much more tiring than working in the classroom when it comes to planning and the corrections and everything else that goes into teaching.

At the end of the day we are to be proud of ourselves for hanging in there and doing the best we can to occupy our minds and learn with the situation we are in; we as in teachers and students. One teaching and learning from the other. 

Remember: this too shall pass.

Written: May 28, 2020

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