Setting up your child’s environment to support distance learning
“What children learn does not follow as an automatic result from what is taught, rather, it is in large part due to the children’s own doing, as a consequence of their activities and our resources. ”
In the Reggio Emilia approach, the environment is considered to be the child’s third’s teacher (the first being the parent and the second the classroom teacher).
With 71% of children doing remote learning this fall, it’s vitally important that we provide children with the support they need to thrive in this new hybrid environment of home and online classes.`
At Modulo, I run digital learning pods for students ages 3-17. Some meet twice a week for 1 1/2 hours and others meet 3 hours a day, 5 days a week. We’ve found that with the help of certain tools and a good setup, we’ve been able to create classes that the kids love, where they’re able to engage meaningfully with each other and the teacher and stay physically active, even while online.
When I first started teaching pods, our classes were deafeningly noisy, kids often got restless and disappeared from view. It was not a good experience for anyone involved. Like many teachers, I lamented the loss of the physical classroom. I despised the idea that we were forcing young children to sit in front of screens.
Fortunately, I have of group of parents in our pods who work in tech and who were really committed to making this work well for their students. They encouraged me to explore hardware and software options to make the learning environment better for the kids. After all, what choice did we really have? We decided to do everything we could to make this work not just well, but wonderfully for our children.
Goals
It was our goal to create an environment that would help kids
Stay engaged, learning and playing
Hear clearly without background noise
Participate freely in class discussion (not mute them)
Move freely without disappearing (move about the room, do jumping jacks, dance)
I’m happy to say that one month in, after a lot of trial and error and trying different devices, kids love their online digital pods. Every student is actively involved in class discussions. They dance around their rooms, do art, write, read and play.
I attribute much of this to the hardware and software we chose to support their learning.
Recommendations
Here’s what we recommend for parents and teachers seeking to create enriching learning environments for children doing remote learning.:
If possible, put your child in a space where they can close the door. Background noise from parents and siblings is one of the biggest causes of distracting noise in the class. (Parents talking to their child while they are on zoom is the only thing everyone in the class hears.)
A large circular yoga mat and a pillow. We recommend not putting your child at a desk, but on the floor for maximum comfort and freedom of movement. As adults, we learn to sit at desks, but perching or sitting is much better for our bodies. Position the lens of the camera of your child’s computer, chromebook or tablet so your child can be seen standing up or lying down on the circular mat. You can gently encourage your child to stay in the circle, but it’s fine for them to move off it if you get a wide lens. They can reference it as a center point. A great use case for the circular yoga mat as a focal point is the popular kids youtube channel, Cosmic Kids Yoga.
A lapdesk tray for writing and drawing. This works well when children are sitting or lying on the floor.
Zoom for classes. We tried out a bunch of different conferencing platforms and zoom is far superior for seeing and hearing kids clearly. If there’s any way you can encourage your teacher to use it, it will go a long way in reducing noise and making everyone feel seen and heard.
Meta Portal. After testing many different devices, nothing we’ve found allows children to move around freely, be seen and be heard quite like the Meta Portal. It even picks up a whisper, so it’s especially great for younger kids who haven’t learned to enunciate and project. Kids are not glued to a screen, but can do jumping jacks, dance and the camera follows them. Our one con is that you can’t download apps and screen share the way you can on an iPad or even a mac. Therefore, we often suggest parents log into our zoom twice. The second device can be an iPad.
An ipad pro can be used in tandem with the Meta Portal or a Macbook air. Just don’t connect to audio when zoom asks if you want to connect the device to audio (muting it will not work) It’s the only iPad where kids images don’t disappear when they screen share.
Blue light blocking glasses. While there is not solid evidence that blue light blocking glasses actually work to reduce eye strain (and this topic is a bit controversial), Dr. Samuel Pierce, president of the American Optometric Association, recommends wearing them if you use digital devices several hours a day. I do find they help reduce my eyestrain (though this might be psychological) and they also look cool:). Buy a pair for your child’s teacher and you will win the parent of the year award!
Markers and paper. Drawing or doodling during class will help children stay engaged while they’re learning. I recommend purchasing an unlimited supply. If your child’s teacher is concerned that your child isn’t concentrating, here’s a great piece to send them about how doodling helps concentration!
Choose some great apps and youtube videos to supplement your child’s learning. Independent study can be a wonderful way to support or enrich your child’s learning. Here are some of our favorite apps and youtube channels.
We are so privileged to be able to purchase tools to help create a wonderful environment for our children to learn. However, we’re keenly aware that 20% of US students don’t even have a computer, much less any of the other great equipment I’ve recommended above.
If you are in a position to give, we strongly recommend donating to givecomputers.org, a national campaign we launched in collaboration with PC’s for People to help get computers to students across the United States.
Likewise, If you know a company that may have extra computers to recycle, please send them our way.
We’d love to hear about any other great ideas you have to share about setting up your child’s environment for learning. We’ll add the best ones to our growing list!
