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!

Favorite Book - Write a paragraph to tell me about your favorite book of all time. Explain why this book is your favorite. Which character in the book do you relate to the most? Tell me about the character and why you relate the most with him or her. For an extra challenge, research to find out how the author came to creating this character. Believe it or not, plenty of authors LOVE to hear from their readers and respond rather quickly to questions. 
How does this help you learn about your student? 
There is so much here! First, the type of book tells you about their interests and most obviously, they are directly telling you about themselves by describing a character that they think describes themselves. Secondly, by offering an extra challenge in the task, you will see which students went a little further when given the opportunity to do so. That says a lot about their intrinsic motivation for learning and will be beneficial when beginning to teach them online. My guess is the students who complete or at least attempt to complete the extra challenge won’t be an issue when it comes to starting work I assign throughout the school year. 

Vision Board - Of course we all know the quote “If you put your mind to it, you can achieve anything!” However, did you know another component of being successful in achieving goals is by actually creating a visual of the goal as if it were already accomplished? Today, you are going to put together a vision for yourself. Find a large piece of paper, poster board, etc and create sections to label for each aspect of your life you would like to focus on. Some examples are: sports, friendships, family, monetary earnings, projects. Begin to think about what you would like to accomplish in each of the areas you choose to focus on. Then, in each section on your vision board, you will create a design, photo or drawing that symbolizes the accomplishment along with a short caption. For example, Monetary Earnings may have a dollar bill taped to the board with a caption I will earn $100 by asking neighbors if I can help with small tasks. A photo of a basketball with a caption, I will make the basketball team when school starts up again. 
Feel free to decorate your Vision Board in a way that draws your attention then find a place in your bedroom that will allow you to see this board each day, multiple times a day. Next, take a photo of the final product and write about each section and your thinking behind the creation of your board. Are any of the visions you’ve created things you’ve thought about before? If so, why do you think you haven’t accomplished them yet? If not, why did you choose this vision? 
How does this help you learn about your student? 
The first thing I thought of when I came up with this idea was: which student boards will look like hours were spent on the design and which will simply be written captions and cut out pictures hastily glued onto the board. When viewing students’ final products here, I will notice which ones are currently taking their goals seriously and which ones are not really into it yet (this could also be assessed if you are able to discuss the boards with each kid, but time may not allow that if you are teaching online). I will also notice which ones are artistically creative and love to go all out whenever given an opportunity to use art. This will also help me to think of projects later in the school year. I remember one year, I had a group that just LOVED to draw. I ended up incorporating drawing into so many different lessons and honored that love by providing more time for it. It’s important to notice these types of things as we get to know our students because we want to make their learning exciting and relevant to them. Tapping into their interests is the best place to start for that. 

Create a Fun Video: Set up a recording where you are being interviewed by someone pretending they are a reporter. You will pretend that you are famous for something you enjoy doing. For example, I enjoy singing and so I would pretend that I am a famous singer being interviewed. The reporter should ask you about what your summer was like and how it was different than your summers in the past. Make sure the interviewer asks you about what you liked and disliked as well as any surprises you experienced as a result of experiencing summer in a pandemic. Your answers can be true or made up as you are playing a character in this video. Feel free to write a script and/or do multiple “takes” before you send me a final version. Finally, write about a day in the life of you (as the made up character) during the pandemic. 
(Teacher Note: I found that Flipgrid is a great place for kids to upload fun videos)
How does this help you learn about your student? 
The first thing that came to mind when I thought about this task was who will be interviewing my student. Is it a friend, a parent, another family member? Of course, I will get to see which students love to perform and who is shy. I will get to see what they like to do for fun. I will get to see their creative writing, how much they write and their writing skills. 

Create a Game Challenge: Your task is to create a game that I (the teacher) and the students will all play together on Zoom with the goal to get to know each other. This may take a bit of research and some inspiration, so you can look online for some games that are already out there, but do not copy anyone’s idea. I will choose 3 top winners and we will play those games as a group!
How does this help you learn about your student? 
So much to learn about kids with this task! I will get to see who is motivated by a competition and who is not shy to share their ideas. I will learn about which students are thoughtful and detail-oriented when tasked with completing something they could ultimately be sharing with the rest of the group. I will also get to see who does end up copying ideas that they found on the internet. Anyone who does that is telling me that they really are not into this assignment. 

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