My first job in education in 1997 was in distance learning. taught hundreds of kids each year German via TV, phone, and web. We had to think about learning rather than teaching, anticipating how each of our students would respond to our input, prompt, task. #COVID19WL #langchat

There was no zoom, flipgrid, google classroom back then, so our focus was on PROCESSING language. How would students be able to engage with language in such a way that was enjoyable and memorable? #COVID19WL #langchat

We also spend hours, no days, preparing for a single one hour class. Thinking about graphics and images. Thinking about the sequence of activities. Thinking about the connection among lessons. This time was a luxury that #COVID19WL doesn& #39;t provide. #langchat

The favorite part for our students was the weekly small group (2-8 students) speaking lessons we had that allowed us to build and maintain relationships, opportunities for assessment and most importantly provide instant feedback. #COVID19WL #langchat

we were considered pioneers in distance learning and at the time we didn& #39;t realize how lucky we were to dream and build. we didn& #39;t have the #covid19wl pressures of today. teachers today are asked to design, produce, and deliver in days what took us weeks. #langchat