This week is professional learning for teachers, and in keeping with the times, all of it is remote, and most of it is asynchronous. That was not the case for the session I chose for this morning however. All of us who enrolled gathered via MS Teams from 10 to 11 to learn about the educational tool called Flipgrid.
Essentially a video discussion board, Flipgrid allows kids to record, enhance, and post their video replies to an assignment. In order to teach us about it, the instructors of our course this morning gave us 10 minutes to view a quick how-to and then post an introduction video of ourselves to the group. All we had to say was our names, where and what we teach, and an interesting fact about ourselves.
It was the fact that jammed me up. After three months at home, I couldn't think of anything on the fly that anyone might find the least bit engaging. As the timer ticked down, I swallowed, looked straight at my laptop camera, and hit record. Then I blathered some nonsense about my passport renewal which I had dropped in the mail right before joining the meeting.
My blood roared in my ears because I knew the class was waiting for me to post, and I hit the send button and clicked back to the meeting. Even as the instructors went over some basics, I was suffering remorse, thinking how dumb my video was.
As we moved through the teacher tools, participants were encouraged to post questions in the chat. I waited to see if my one burning question might be answered, but when it seemed we were near to the end of the presentation my fingers flew to the keyboard: Can students edit or delete their videos once they are posted?
"That's a good question," the instructor commented. "I don't know."
But I knew that my students would want to know, and at that moment, I completely understood why. My video was fine, but it felt risky to put it out there only to lose control of it. My anxiety was heightened by the structure of the assignment: if I had had more time, I could have created a recording I was more comfortable with.
To be honest? Flipgrid is a fun tool that I think kids will find engaging, but the biggest lesson of the day was that reminder before we ask our students to go public with their work and ideas, we must create a safe space and give them the time they need to feel good about their contribution.
Essentially a video discussion board, Flipgrid allows kids to record, enhance, and post their video replies to an assignment. In order to teach us about it, the instructors of our course this morning gave us 10 minutes to view a quick how-to and then post an introduction video of ourselves to the group. All we had to say was our names, where and what we teach, and an interesting fact about ourselves.
It was the fact that jammed me up. After three months at home, I couldn't think of anything on the fly that anyone might find the least bit engaging. As the timer ticked down, I swallowed, looked straight at my laptop camera, and hit record. Then I blathered some nonsense about my passport renewal which I had dropped in the mail right before joining the meeting.
My blood roared in my ears because I knew the class was waiting for me to post, and I hit the send button and clicked back to the meeting. Even as the instructors went over some basics, I was suffering remorse, thinking how dumb my video was.
As we moved through the teacher tools, participants were encouraged to post questions in the chat. I waited to see if my one burning question might be answered, but when it seemed we were near to the end of the presentation my fingers flew to the keyboard: Can students edit or delete their videos once they are posted?
"That's a good question," the instructor commented. "I don't know."
But I knew that my students would want to know, and at that moment, I completely understood why. My video was fine, but it felt risky to put it out there only to lose control of it. My anxiety was heightened by the structure of the assignment: if I had had more time, I could have created a recording I was more comfortable with.
To be honest? Flipgrid is a fun tool that I think kids will find engaging, but the biggest lesson of the day was that reminder before we ask our students to go public with their work and ideas, we must create a safe space and give them the time they need to feel good about their contribution.
This is so true, and it’s a powerful and important lesson for us to relive every now and then to remember what we’re asking of our students. I’ve often been guilty of flippantly remaking, “Come on! Don’t worry about; it’s no big deal.” It IS a bit deal.
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