On July 15, 2020, Sean Michael Morris, Senior Instructor of Learning, Design, and Technology in the School of Education and Human Development at the University of Colorado at Denver, facilitated a talk at Colgate University entitled, Teaching through the Screen: Classroom Community after COVID-19. An abstract of the session, a video recording of the talk, and additional resources are available below:
Session Abstract
The precipitate shift to remote instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic came with no reliable best practices. Finding themselves suddenly distant, learners and teachers had few choices outside of improvisation. The natural synergy of being together in a room abruptly became an unnatural shift to turning mics and cameras on and off in the framework of a video conference. Those who never supposed to teach online—or in some hybrid of online and face-to-face—discovered that teaching to a screen can be a lonely, and sometimes unmoored endeavor. But community in classrooms that occupy multiple spaces is possible, and even rewarding. To develop and sustain that community, however, we must move away from the all too common one-size-fits-all approach of online learning. We must consider a critical digital pedagogy, one that integrates digital literacies with equitable practices to create meaningful learning on both sides of the screen.
Session Recording
Teaching Through the Screen: Classroom Community after COVID-19 (Colgate login required).
Suggested Readings
- Fostering Care and Community at a Distance – Sean Michael Morris
- Critical Digital Pedagogy: a Definition – Jesse Stommel
- An Affinity for Asynchronous Learning – Maha Bali and Bard Meier
- Love Letters and Pen Pals: Community through Correspondence – Sean Michael Morris
- Selections from What is Digital Pedagogy? – Hybrid Pedagogy (various authors)
