Teacher's Handbook
Thank You for joining Skillnook Family.
Teaching anything online presents specific challenges. There is no set rule on how to teach skills online, but whatever is your way, it has to be fun and easy to understand. We believe in a sustainable long-term partnership, where both teachers and students can create, learn and grow. We understand that however easy it may seem, but E-education is no child’s play. It takes tremendous efforts at teacher’s point to organise and conduct a successful class. That is why we want our teachers to focus only on the content and planning of how to make their class a success and we will take care of rest of the things on their behalf. We strongly believe that each instructor must be rewarded for creating amazing content and bringing students to the platform. So before starting your online class just plan out a few things to make your class interactive and engaging. Here is some material which will help you to conduct you online class successfully.
Prepare Your Own Space
To have a successful online teaching career, you need to have a reliable computer and internet connection, and your wifi should be fast enough to maintain a clear connection on video calls. You may also want to invest in a quality microphone and a pair of headphones. It is important for both you and for your students to get the right equipment. You may already have most of these, and you do not need costly options for any of these to be functional:
- Laptop, desktop or tablet.
- Headphones or earbuds -- the biggest impediment to online communications is poor audio quality, so make sure you have a headset or earbuds; this is important to eliminating audio feedback loops, background noises, and other disruptions.
- Microphone -- may already be built into your device, computer, camera or as part of a separate headset.
- Webcam -- may already be built into your device or computer.
- Internet -- this all does require reliable internet service; a wireless hotspot on a high-speed network may also suffice.
- Backdrop -- make sure what students see behind you for any live or recorded video is clean and professional.
Make It a Group Effort
Even an instructor who has taught the same course dozens of times in an on-campus classroom will spend many extra hours figuring out how to teach it online. So, we must try and help each other. Ask for help and guidance from fellow Teachers at Skillnook.
Focus on 'Active' Learning
Instructors often rely on long lectures to fill the time in a traditional class meeting but in online teaching it should be an active learning classroom which should be a blend of teaching and learning. To engage students online, the course should mix spurts of discussions, video clips, and hands-on exercises. You can guide them to your blogs and related course material on Skillnook site. Provide references and detailed instructions. Encourage your students to ask questions at the end of session or they can also submit in the comment section. This allows you to make the class interactive and provide additional information.
'Chunk' the Lessons
Long lectures and videos are boring and probably aren’t the best way to engage students online. So, no long text material or an hour-long video. Present information in in short, pre-recorded videos of 5-10-minute length each. If your video is long, then also break it into multiple short videos. Also design lessons with ample white space breaking up text with photographs and incorporating colour into section titles. You can also prepare PPTs to show during the class and give your students ideas for future.
Keep Group Sizes Manageable
In a traditional classroom or lecture hall, some students never participate in discussions or ask questions, usually because they are either shy or are not engaged. Online that participation is required but can be equally intimidating if students are expected to engage with dozens of classmates.
So, a cap of 20 to 30 students in online classes is manageable and you can involve everyone.
Be Present and Approachable
No matter where teaching and learning take place, the importance of the faculty member being there and being mentally present with the students is the most important thing they can do. That doesn’t mean simply responding to questions that students post online. If possible, have a “social presence” on other platforms to form a personal connect with students.
Create a Great Introduction Video
Most online teaching platforms require you to create an introduction video for your teacher profile. This is what every potential student will see before they sign up to learn with you. So be sure to create the best video you can. You can find tons of excellent teacher intro videos on YouTube to get inspired. Also write a short Bio about yourself on your page.
Parse Your Time
Instructor presence is critical to student success in a virtual class. Online courses can really consume you; I know this from experience. Responding to every discussion board post by every student in an online class may be exhausting. That’s why manage your time in a reasonable way. Don’t be available 24/7. Don’t turn your class into a one-on-one interaction with 30 students. “Picks and chooses” what you want to respond to or what needs to be replied to. You’re there online as much as you are in a regular classroom. But that doesn’t mean you’re in the course 24/7. Pick and choose where you insert your voice.
Set some basic Classroom Rules
Set some rules as soon as your class starts. Classroom rules will allow every student to have fair and equal opportunity to speak and ask questions. There will be less stress on you also because students will not push hard to be heard. It will also relieve additional stress of unwanted noise, chaos and the need to constantly hush the participants. It will allow you to spend more time to listen and encourage every participant and also to conduct the class smoothly. But word your rules in such a way as to grab your students’ attention while maintaining a warm classroom experience which is welcoming and safe.
Keep improvising
Discuss various possibilities involved and how students can present their ideas in different ways. Everything should be as visually stimulating as possible. Visual representation is vital. Lighting should be bright and clear, audio should be tested in advance to ensure it is clear, and the workspace should be clearly visible to the students watching. You may opt to stay off camera for part or all of the session and show a close up of your hands and the work you’re doing, but don’t forget to show your face on occasion. The connection is important to keep students engaged.
Embrace Multi-media Assignments
Students who enrol in virtual courses usually are at least somewhat facile with technology. You can use Power point presentations or videos and share your screen to show them related materials etc as it may help you to explain in a better way.
Beware of Back-to-Back Lessons
Teaching online can be very tiring, and back-to-back lessons can be particularly draining. Try to arrange your schedule in advance, leave time between lessons, take a break and prepare for the lesson beforehand. Look for ways to create fun, engaging lessons. People expect to be bored by e-Learning so you need to show them it doesn’t have to be like that.
Prepare them in advance
Establish how you will actually teach the course. You must decide what you will teach, what you will hold back, how you will present certain concepts, what tools you will use to help students, what will be the format for your sessions. What techniques will be involved in your course. To make sure your lessons are always interesting and informative, make sure that you create a lesson plan and source any materials that you need beforehand. Discuss the supplies needed, the creativity that drives the activity, and the specific styles of art that your students might get into and the fundamentals involved. You can keep some samples handy to demonstrate multiple techniques for future reference and show them what all options they have. Before holding your first class you can record a couple of practice sessions that you can share with friends, family, colleagues for their feedback.
Work to Retain Students Over the Long-Term
Teaching online is like any service business – to keep the money flowing, you need to retain your clients, or continuously find new ones. Spend a little time every day working on getting new clients and serve your regular students powerfully so they stick around.
Fees and Payments
You can publish as many free and paid courses as you like. There is no fee to create and host a course on Skillnook. There is no locking period, and you will have flexible working hours. We only charge you when students make payments for your class. The revenue sharing will be 60:40 between you and skillnook. That means for every Rs.100 payment, you will get Rs.60 and Skillnook will get Rs.40.
Reporting
Instructors can track all incoming sales in their Revenue Report. Some of the information the report includes is the student name, the date of purchase, the revenue channel attribution and total price paid. More information regarding the Revenue Report can be viewed here.