Put it into practice

So far in this module/activity we’ve focussed on engaging and motivating your students, and selecting or creating student-centred approaches to achieve this aim. All of this has been framed by the considerations of the impact moving to online teaching can have on educators.

Now it’s time to apply what we have covered to your context. We’re going to ask you how it went later, but for now, it’s time to go teach!

We are all supporting you from a distance and you can always come back here to ask your peers for advice or share how you’re getting on.

We’ll leave you with some advice from our contributors:

Hannah Tyreman, Chartered College of Teaching: “Trust what you know. It’s easy to be fooled into thinking that learning online is dissimilar to the learning we’re all much more familiar with. It isn’t. The principles of what makes for effective learning exist in the online learning world too; it just takes a slightly adapted form.”

Rebecca Ferguson, OU: “Don’t focus all your attention on presenting course content. Think about the different types of activity that will help your learners to understand and engage with that content. For example, you might ask them to find and assess information that is related to the topic, or to discuss aspects of it, or to respond to it by producing a slideshow, or create a mind map to represent it.”

Remember to set times to get away from your screens, drink a cup of tea, coffee, maté, whatever you prefer, and recharge before heading back out online.