Daily Communication & Collaboration

I communicate with my students through multiple methods. Most communication occurs by addressing them as a class and having discussions with them individually. During group discussions, everyone gets the same information whether it is directions for an assignment or the teaching of a concept. Also students get the benefit of sharing in each other’s understanding and learning from misconceptions. Individual conversations are equally as beneficial. Sometimes these happen in an academic context, while at other times they are social chats. These are the ones I love the most. I get to find out a lot about my students. Most of the time this happens during snack or when one student is helping me prepare something or clean something up. I get to learn about my their interests, their family dynamics, class activities they liked, things that challenged them and other things that impact their lives and consequently my teaching. Our newest method of communication is through Google docs. My students have recently learned how to create and share a Google doc and read my comments on their work. This has been very tricky with 2^nd graders. I’ve encountered issues I hadn’t anticipated. For instance, I had one very resourceful, starry-eyed boy figure out he could share his document with a student outside his group to send a love message. All in all, it has been a successful endeavor and I look forward to moving on with Google Classroom. Until recently most of our communication and collaboration in the classroom has occurred synchronously. Our recent delve into docs has allowed for both synchronous and asynchronous communication or collaboration.

I communicate with parents and colleagues in many different ways. Most of my parents have signed up for Remind messages which I use to send out important notices about upcoming dates. Some parents use email while others prefer phone calls. A few parents connect with me in the mornings when they drop off their students. The most regular form of communication my parents get from me is a weekly newsletter, which includes a progress report, upcoming learning, and classroom news. As the newsletter has to be signed and returned parents also use it to send me notes. Occasionally, I use Google Translator to help me with parent communications. My communication with colleagues is even more varied. I use most of the methods used with parents, but I also use Twitter, Google+, Facebook, and this blog. Most often all these communications are asynchronous. I prefer this method for communication and collaboration as I find it most convenient and it leaves a source to come back to when needed.

I will continue to learn and teach my students new methods to communicate. Also, I will work on sharing projects and ideas with colleagues. I often use ideas that were posted in the online communities I am a part of, but I am not very good at sharing what has worked well for me.