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If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen the Reel that I posted this Saturday. If you didn’t, you can check it out @teacher.allyson, but it used the tune to “We don’t talk about Bruno, no, no, no” from Encanto, and it mentioned four things that online teachers don’t talk about – but we really probably should. I loved making this reel, and realized that this sort of hush hush mentality isn’t productive for anybody – but especially the newcomers.
I dove in head first – and didn’t know how to swim
When I started teaching online in 2019 I had NO idea what I was getting myself into. I thought that since I had classroom experience, I would have a leg up, but the truth is, it’s a whole ‘nother world out there and formal classroom experience means absolutely nothing. I had to relearn how I delivered my lesson. I had to learn new engagement techniques and strategies. My classroom management needed adjusting – over and over. I had to learn tech requirements and specs that never mattered to me before – and then – and then I had to learn the 4 things mentioned in the Reel: Taxes, the lesson planning process (and I was no stranger to lesson planning), low parent reviews, and loneliness.
Taxes
As a teacher, I was always a w2 employee. I was salaried and taxes were automatically deducted from my paycheck. However, when I became an online teacher, I was also labeled as a “freelancer”. That meant I was no longer a w2 employee, and instead I received a 1099 every year. Now, if you’re not familiar (like I wasn’t), if you receive a 1099, your taxes are not automatically withheld by your employer. I had to make sure I budgeted accordingly, and had the discipline to move our tax percentage into a different location so that it’s always there come tax season.
I am not a tax professional or an accountant, so I cannot give you an end all be all percentage to withhold. These numbers are usually determined on a case-by-case basis with a lot of different factors. The rule of thumb most online teachers follow is to budget 30% for taxes. However, my BEST advice is to talk to a CPA or tax professional to determine the best number for you and your family. I always cringe when I move our percentage over. It was so much easier when I never saw it!
Lesson Planning
Now, let’s talk lesson planning. Depending on where you teach, you may not have to create a lesson from scratch, but it’s worth discussing. As a classroom teacher, there were tons of exceptions that were given to me for the students’ free, not for profit education. However, as an independent contractor, these exceptions turned to restrictions. For example If i wanted to do a book study in the classroom – I could! I didn’t need permission from the author or publisher. But, as an online teacher, those book studies became much more complicated. Since I was earning a profit off my classes, I could no longer make those stories accessible during our lessons. One way around this was to do something like a book discussion – where all my students had to have a copy of the book they purchased at their homes. I couldn’t read from the book during class but I could talk about it. That felt pretty limiting and restricting to me, so that was something I personally decided against. I always wanted to teach the more obscure books that nobody would have!
Book studies are just one example out of many. As you decide what and where you want to teach, you will become more familiar with the rules and restrictions. But, my engaging activities also needed an overhaul. In the classroom, I liked to have my students up and moving to show their understanding. I also enjoyed group work and hands-on activities. Again, these are extremely difficult, or nearly impossible in the online world. Instead, I researched, followed more experienced online teachers, and used some creativity in my classroom to revamp my lessons.
What would you do?
My biggest piece of advice to new teachers trying to make their lesson “online friendly” is to think about what you would do if you were in person – and in a perfect world. For example, in the classroom, I would have papers hung in my classroom with different questions. Every student would have a sticky note, and would walk around the room answering the questions (with names on the back for anonymity!). While I can’t do that in the online world, I can create a Jamboard lesson with a question on each slide. To answer the question, my students would use the sticky-note feature in Jamboard and advance through the slides at their pace. If you’re not familiar with Jamboard, I have a quick tutorial in Episode 5: Online Teaching Tool Swap 3.0 – Turn in person and virtual lessons into the collaborative lesson of your dreams.
The would scenarios are different for everybody dependent upon the lesson, so that’s where your creativity and online resources knowledge comes into consideration. Just like every classroom teacher’s teaching style is different, every online teacher’s teaching style is different as well. What works for me may not work for you, and vice versa. Allow yourself grace to get to know yourself as an online teacher. Kids are resilient and will learn anyways, and most parents are understanding of you learning the ropes.
Low parent reviews
You may notice I said most…so let’s get into the dreaded low parent review. My first online teaching experience was for an ESL (English as a Second Language) company based in China. Within this company, a perfect 5 star rating was the only thing acceptable. The percentage was only based off the last 100 reviews, so you weren’t doomed with one less than perfect review. This expectation created a lot of stress for me as a new teacher. I was trying to get my footing, learn the ropes, and keep parents (and the company) happy.
When I moved to a different platform, there were still parent reviews, but a perfect 5 star average was no longer the expectation. It took a lot of relearning on my part to understand that just because my review average isn’t perfect – it doesn’t mean I’m a bad teacher. It can be hard not to take the negative feedback to heart. Especially when you put all your best efforts into the lesson, the kids, the class, the prep, and everything in between.
Try to think of it like this:
This is how I like to encourage everybody to think of reviews (and how I have to remind myself): when you’re shopping for something on Amazon, I bet most of us will admit we look at reviews. However, do you pass up on buying something just because it doesn’t have a perfect 5 star average? No! Most of us would say anything between 4 and 5 is pretty good, and we might even accept a 3 star review too.
Are you thinking of a bunch of “depends on…” right now? Because I am too. Depends on who makes it. Depends on the most recent reviews. Depends on the price. And so on and so on. Same thing with your online classes! I understand that the dry shampoo I ordered didn’t work for me – but maybe it works great for somebody else (true story!) My teaching style may be great for Sally’s learning style, but not so great for Sam’s personality. Remember this.
How to avoid a low review
One way I’ve found to help combat the low reviews is to be as explicit as possible when describing you, the lesson, your teaching style, and what you plan to do in class. Maybe Bruno’s mom doesn’t like Jamboard. If I mention that Jamboard will be used in my class description – she probably won’t sign up for class. And that’s okay. Your students will find you. I know it may be hard to believe if you’re struggling to find your footing and your students – but they will.
Another way to show parents or possible clients your teaching style is to incorporate it into your intro video. Many platforms will have a space for your intro video. This is a place to introduce you, your teaching, and your style. Many parents have said they don’t worry about reviews as much if there is an intro video from the teacher that they can watch. I’ve used my intro videos to show that we can have fun in class, but still learn. Other teachers introduce themselves and tell about their past, relevant achievements in the subject. There’s so much that goes into an intro video, that it’s a topic for a whole different episode. Remember, simplicity and honesty is best when getting started.
Lesson planning with pre-made lessons
Before we move on, let’s quickly talk about teaching on a platform with premade lessons. While you don’t lesson plan from start to finish, there is still some lesson planning that will happen. For example, I’ve had young learners work hard and take many classes. They advance through the premade lessons quickly, but aren’t necessarily retaining all the content. This is when I decide I need to lesson plan. I always try to spiral any content I know they need extra practice with. So, even if it isn’t practiced in the lesson, I practice it with them.
To practice these skills with them, I rely on short games, props, whiteboards, and modeling. Right now, I’m teaching a couple small groups of 4th and 5th grade students. I am tutoring them on concepts they are working on in class. For the most part, they get the formulas but they don’t understand the concept of why the formula works. This is where I come in. However, the biggest gap I’m noticing in my students is their multiplication facts. They simply don’t know them. So, when multiplying fractions, we’re first having to multiply basic facts before we can even begin to understand the fractions.
To help my students with their facts, while also trying to keep the majority of our lesson time on grade level, I quickly do some flash cards with them as a warm up, we play some multiplication games if we have a few minutes to fill at the end of class, and I’m constantly asking for and giving different strategies for solving each multiplication problem without having the facts memorized.
Advanced Learners
The same holds true for more advanced learners as well. If you’re not teaching somewhere where you have the freedom to change lessons or concepts quickly, you can adjust, or add to the existing lessons to better suit your student.
For example, I know my student, let’s call him Samuel, is interested in outer space, but my content isn’t covering that for a while. It’s covering colors. What I could do is show a picture of each of the planets and ask Samuel to say what color each planet is. Then we could practice the name of the planet together. This way, Samuel gets to talk about what he’s interested in, while also ‘sticking to’ the lesson.
For me, that’s the beauty of being a teacher. I get to understand my students’ likes and dislikes. I get to understand their skills, strengths, and weaknesses. Then, I get to use all this knowledge to cater a lesson specifically to them. This keeps class fresh and fun for both me and Samuel – or any other student.
Loneliness
Teaching at home has a ton of perks. There’s no commute. You get to work as much or as little as you want. You get to stay home with your kids. And, you aren’t exposed to all the different germs and viruses around (which is great for those with immunocompromised family members). However, there’s one fairly large drawback. Loneliness. Depending on your personality, you may be more affected by this than others. Some online teachers report that they feel much more lonely in this job than they have in person positions.
Whenever I had a job in person (inside or out of the classroom) I always looked forward to lunch with my colleagues, building friendships outside of the work walls, and having somewhere to go. When I teach online, it’s just me, by myself, in our home office talking to kids in a different state and sometimes even different country.
How to combat loneliness
One way I’ve found to combat the feelings of loneliness is to join different communities of online teachers. Each platform has a Facebook group filled with other teachers teaching on that platform. If you venture over to instagram, just following the hashtag online teaching, or following the name of your company, will show lots of other teachers doing the same there as well. Inside these spaces is a great spot to build relationships with your coworkers, even if you’re not in the same state!
Have you heard of any of these so-called ‘secrets’ before? Which one were you most surprised about? Which one wasn’t so surprising? If you’re thinking about becoming an online teacher, I hope this helped to give insight. I know these were several things I felt unprepared for. I hope you have a wonderful week, I’ll see you next week! Chat soon!
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