This year has been especially difficult for new students. It is hard enough for students to integrate into a new school, but TISA’s new students in 2020 have had to keep up with everything that is going on, like making friends online instead of face-to-face. Not only are there new students, but there are returning students who are having to do important projects without being able to talk in person to people they might need to contact or discuss with. There are also the M1’s who are joining secondary school and have to get used to the different teachers for different subjects instead of the one teacher for all subjects in primary school.
There are also new teachers who have joined the TISA community. These teachers have had to teach students in a new school online. Many teachers are scattered all around the world in multiple different time zones. Teachers have been very dedicated and some have even been waking up in the middle of the night to teach!
We asked two teachers, Ms. Caskie and Mr. Villinski, how they’re managing teaching online and overseas. These are their responses, in their own words.
Ms. Caskie
As an overseas teacher, teaching online is exciting, nerve-wracking and funny.
It’s exciting because I prepare lessons and hope that they’ll engage my students. The excitement comes when students ask for admission to my room and I wonder how they’ll react to the activities.
It’s nerve-wracking because I must set my alarm every night and make sure I go to bed early. I cannot sleep past my alarm as that would be totally embarrassing. I am four hours behind Baku, so the 10:20 a.m. start can be a bit of a fright on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. However, I am lucky compared to my North American colleagues.
And it’s funny because teaching is always funny; my students and colleagues are amazing as they are usually prepared for a giggle and a bit of silliness – silliness and giggling are important.
Mr. Villinski
This is a typical day for me (except the dreaded Wednesday, when I have to get up at 23:30), all times local to me in America:
01:00 – Wake up with the help of 2 alarms and smart lights controlled by Alexa.
01:05 – The back up alarm also goes off – just in case!
01:10 – Navigate the dark house to get the first of many cups of coffee. Don’t wake up the dog or family.
01:15 – Check (again!) to ensure I am making the right time-zone conversion to Bake time so I don’t miss my classes.
01:20 – Use the next hour to send ManageBac messages, refine the day’s lesson plans, catch up on emails.
02:20 – First class of the day (except Wednesdays…then it’s at 00:20).
05:30 – The school day ends!! Now for after-school meetings with students, asynchronous learners and colleagues.
06:30 – Oh – there’s the sunrise!
07:30 – Now, I need to work grading, comments, making videos, researching online labs, emails, and lesson plans.
???? – probably have a nap in here somewhere
17:00 – Bedtime! Close the blinds, put on my sleep mask, start up the white noise machine and hope everyone is quiet.
My colleagues have similar days but with different time-zone offsets and mine is not the worst! I’ve come to believe that two important benefits of online learning are increased technical literacy for students and teachers, and, personally, making detailed daily lesson plans to share each day with students. There are obvious challenges as well; we can’t recreate the richness of learning in the classroom, the spontaneity, or soft skills.
We teachers miss our students, and can’t wait to be back in the classroom together. Until then, we must all work together to get the most out of the current approach, to focus on developing the skills we need at each grade level, and be kind to one another by supporting our peers, friends and families. Now, I’m going to grab another cup of coffee!
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