science

Greenville County teachers are finding creative virtual ways to engage students – Greenville Journal


When Gov. Henry McMaster ordered the closure of all South Carolina K-12 public schools on March 15, Greenville County Schools scrambled to help its teachers plan for the initial two weeks of using the eLearning platform for internet-based classes.

“It was a Friday afternoon after school when we received an email saying we may be closed about 10 days or so,” said Blythe Academy fourth grade teacher Shasta Kelly Looper. “I was sitting in my living room, and I felt like I needed to start doing something.”

Looper used that weekend to make sure that her students had access to resources such as Discovery Education for videos and Scholastic Online for free magazine articles.

In addition to the work done by the individual teachers to ensure that digital tools were in place, the school district had the teachers come in on March 16 to map out what eLearning looked like for each grade level and subject.

“Many of us were concerned and confused because we didn’t know what this was supposed to look like,” Ralph Chandler Middle School science department chair Kaitlin Wilbanks said. “We’ve been using technology inside the classrooms for a couple of years now, but it’s completely different when you aren’t there in person to help lead your students through it.”

Planning went quickly. “We basically had to create two weeks’ worth of lessons in two days — lessons that were engaging and informative but could also be completed at home with minimal difficulty,” said Wilbanks. “We had to meet as a school, as grade-levels and as content-teachers constantly. It’s still amazing to me how basically every teacher in Greenville County retooled their entire approach to teaching in such a short period of time.”

Greenville County Schools virtual learning
Greenville County Schools teacher Kaitlin Wilbanks. Photo provided

With more time out of the physical classroom, teachers are working to find creative ways to engage the students. Looper has had her students perform scavenger hunts around their own homes and show the items they find on camera during their Google Meets sessions. Blythe Academy K-5 Spanish immersion teacher Beatriz Powell has taken to reading a daily bedtime story aloud as well as making video messages to make sure that her students know she is there for them during this uncertain time.

To further enhance the digital experience, Wilbanks has had her seventh-grade students take a virtual field trip to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, watch a live frog dissection and ask questions about the trip from their Chromebooks.

While the digital world has helped the teachers engage their students and keep them learning, the teachers are concerned about the emotional toll of current events on their students.

“I think the biggest challenge that students and teachers are facing — really all of us — is just the mental and emotional toll of isolation,” said Wade Hampton High School math teacher Meredith Smith. “I worry about my students who don’t have as much home support and really rely on their network of friends and adults at school to help them cope with the stresses of teenage life. I am especially sad for my senior students who are missing out on so many rites of passage for their senior year. Teenagers are such social beings by nature, and I know they are struggling with not being able to interact with their friends in person.”



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