Building relationships with students online

Photo by Emma Matthews Digital Content Production

So it is official that I will be teaching my 6th graders online, at least, for the first 6 weeks of school. Of course, the first thing that came to my mind was “How will I ever get to know 60 students if I never get to actually meet and be around them in person?!” and then “How will they get to know each other?!” It has always been my top priority to build relationships with kids as I feel that is the number one way to begin to effectively teach them anything. So my challenge to myself is to do just that - build relationships. Online. With 60 pre-teens who know way more about technology than I do.
As Humanities teachers, I feel that we have an advantage, in some ways. In other ways, definitely not. We can assign tasks that allow us to get to know our students while having them practice writing and reading skills. Below are some ideas that I hope will give me a place to start with getting to know my students. Feel free to borrow these ideas, tweak them to make them your own if need be and share with me about how they go. I would love to hear and see what others end up doing!

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