OREO Online Learning Guidelines

What is in the name of O.R.E.O?

Governments in different countries in the Asia Pacific have ordered schools to be closed (or to have extended holidays, depending on how you look at it) due to the coronavirus outbreak. Schools quickly have to put their online learning plans together to support students and families. If teachers have not integrated technology as part of their teaching routine, this can be challenging. In my previous experience and observation, students, teachers, and parents all hated online learning as it generated more work for all stakeholders. 

The Thai government has not ordered schools to be closed yet, but many international schools in town seem to anticipate school closures soon. Learning from our previous experience to better support teachers, students, and families, our Secondary School Academic Team (SSAT) recognizes the importance of providing online teaching and learning guidance and recommends tools that teachers and students are already familiar with. This is probably not the best time to introduce and experiment with new web-based tools or apps.

I want to make the guidance as simple as possible for everyone, so I came up with the acronym, OREO, exactly as the cookies that kids love to eat. They are standing for: 

Objectives

Online learning should never be the case that teachers give students a lot of busy work to do. Identifying clear learning objectives and learning outcomes can assure the quality of online learning. Just like what we will do in the classroom, students need to be prompted and encouraged to clarify and understand the learning outcomes before engaging with their learning.   

Responsibility

To ensure an effective and productive online learning experience, responsibility is shared by all stakeholders. Teachers need to update the learning materials and tasks regularly and communicate clear instructions to be followed. It is helpful for students to create a daily online learning schedule. For younger students, they will benefit from getting guidance from their guardians and practicing their time-management skills. 

Expectations

Asynchronous learning is provided and students are expected to participate and engage with online learning. They are expected to complete tasks and assignments with their highest level of effort. By the same token, teachers are also expected to provide their ‘office hours’ and let students know when they are available online to answer questions or clarify instructions. It is highly recommended that teachers set up a system, such as using Padlet or Flipgrid, for students to ask questions. We want to avoid answering endless emails from students. Another tip is to set up the task with specified length and requirements so that students can anticipate how long it will take them to complete the task. Instead of saying responding to the prompt orally, we can make it to a 2-minute response.   

Organization

Organizing and sequencing online learning helps keep students on track and allows teachers to collect formative learning evidence. We want to avoid sending students to visit multiple external links, and they feel confused or lost. All learning materials and tasks should be sequenced. I highly recommend using Formative, a web-based tool, to structure and record online learning. After setting up the lesson via the Formative website, teachers can generate a link and post this link on their learning platforms, such as ManageBac or Google Classroom. Last but not least, students and parents are reminded of organizing a dedicated learning space for encouraging productivity.  

Note: a more elaborated OREO information for parents organized by Nadine Bailey (@intlNadine) can be found here. 

OREO online learning tools

To avoid increasing cognitive load, I put together a list of tools that our teachers and students can benefit from. These tools have been used by some of our teachers so that there is a sense of familiarity. This idea of providing a curated list of tools is inspired by @klbeasley. She has created a wonderful list of tools and web-based apps to support her school and a wider community. I am building upon her idea and generating the list that works for my school. I know some of the websites are not accessible in China, e.g. Padlet. There is always an alternative. For example, Trello can do similar things as Padlet offers. Thank you, for my Twitter PLN, for suggesting many ideas and tools. This is a very difficult time and it’s truly a community effort to do our best so that we can continue to make an impact on student learning.   

English poster

Chinese poster