School: Sidney Sawyer Elementary School
Text: Connecting with Students Online: Strategies for Remote Teaching and Learning by Jennifer Serravallo
Study Group Leader: Abbi Eichhorn
Study Group Members: Erica Hernandez (5th grade), Niamh Burke (8th Grade SS), Maggie Steber (K-2 Special Education), Jennie Vazquez (6th Grade ELA)
Goal: Our group’s goal was to learn about the best practices for Remote Instruction and ways to incorporate SEL into our instruction.
At Sawyer, Our Study Group read Connecting with Students Online: Strategies for Remote Teaching and Learning by Jennifer Serravallo. Our focus was on best practices for remote learning and SEL for our students. Overall, we found the book to be reassuring although a bit obvious in some of the strategies. So, we created a list for a first year teacher to use to get started and have a successful year. We would rate this book about a 7/10 and consider it valuable but specific for remote teaching.
We learned how to manage our time effectively for remote learning and instruction and how to modify for virtual learning needs. We also learned the value of purposeful SEL instruction. We took this opportunity to learn different virtual platforms to increase student engagement. We intend to share our document with our school on our school newsletter and in email to the grade level chairs. We wanted to create a document that would be able to be used as a resource for next year and easy enough to understand for younger teachers.
