Hi everyone,
I hope you are all fit, healthy and as happy as can be in light of the present circumstances. The whole world is going through such a tough time at the moment and we really are being tested. I must admit, I am really impressed with how people are dealing with these testing times. The PE community is going above and beyond to support each other! You only need to log on to Twitter or Facebook to see so many teaching resources and ideas. If you haven’t already please follow me on twitter @Rach061992, I share all good resources and guidance that I make or find as sharing is caring!
In this blog I want to give everyone a round of applause for plodding on during this uncertain and concerning time. EVERYONE, no matter where they live, whatever their job, is being tested, every day. As long as we are doing our best to look after each other, we all deserve a pat on the back!
Teaching online is a long and tough journey, at times you feel overwhelmed and isolated. Please make sure you are keeping in touch with your family, friends and work collogues so you can support each other.
Since February, my life, both professional and personal, has been a rollercoaster. I am now back in China where I had to complete quarantine, only seeing my husband with no family and friends for an extended period of time. My time was filled with home exercise, reading, cooking and getting around to all those little tasks I never usually have time for. To begin with it was quite nice, but, yes……. I got bored!
One major positive was that I completed some awesome Professional Development!
Watching numerous webinars, mainly hosted by Jarrod at ConnectedPE. It was great to have the time to reflect on how I could put the ideas presented into practice. I know for sure that once I return to school, my teaching practice will have improved and my students will benefit more, due to this PD.
Some exciting news was that after years of listening to others’ ideas and researching different theories in teaching and learning, I was able to host two webinars. One with Achper, “Teaching Purposeful PE on-line in an uncertain environment”, the other with ConnectedPE “Teaching Online: The Positive Lessons Learned”. I am super thankful to these two organisations for offering me the platform to share my journey with online teaching.
During both webinars, I talked about my online teaching journey so far, the mistakes I have made (this is how we learn!), the progressions I made and the positives I can see. It feels weird writing the word ‘positive’ at this time BUT, in terms of teaching, I think there many lessons we can learn from teaching online, (see the image below for a few ideas). You may even have ideas about how you can use ideas in place for online teaching in your lessons once students return. If you can, YOU ARE AWESOME!
I guess my main messages from this blog are to keep going, keep caring, keep sharing and keep learning.
