Hey everyone, it's Sheryl from Teaching 2 and 3
Year Olds. I just finished my very first online class for the school year of 2020-2021, and if
you've been following me for a while you know that we will not be starting school at least
until November. I think it's still up in the air. So we're starting the year online. I had a
little bit of online experience last spring, so that really helped. It kind of boosted my
confidence so that when I was planning for this new school year, I had a little bit more
idea of what to expect. So today I met with my students for the first time online, and I thought
I would share a little bit about what we did. Now I have told you all: simple, simple, simple, and I
remembered that as I planned. So I have my laptop, and we use Zoom, and then we put them all in
a waiting room, and then when we're ready to start our meeting we bring them into- into the
meeting. And so I thought I'd show you some of the things I have. I have our class mascot, this
is Barney, and the children haven't met Barney yet because they haven't been in the classroom.
So I was just- I'm sharing how Barney will be here when they come here, and that he
wanted to see what we were doing too. It is so good to see you all on our very
very first meeting! And I'm Miss Sheryl, and Miss Susan is here, and this is... this
is Barney! And Barney loves to go to school! I'm in our classroom today and barney is too!
And then I also had a very simple book. Now I've told you all that I love doing interactive books
when we're in the classroom. Books that get the children to participate. Same thing with online,
I chose a book that had flaps. This book is Toes, Ears, and Nose. And so each book- excuse me, each
page has a flap, and beneath my scarf is a nose, and so I asked them to touch their nose.
And we just went through the whole book, very short, very simple. Toes, ears, and
nose. Can you show me where your nose is? Where's your nose? Can you touch
your nose? Under my hat are two... one... two ears! Can you point to your ears?
Can you wiggle? Can you wiggle your ears? Do you have ears? And my coat protects my back.
Okay reach way behind and touch your back. Touch your back! Another thing we did was we sang
Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star. So we're gonna start off with Twinkle Twinkle Little- do
you know what this is? "I don't know" It's a star! A star, it's not a circle! It's
not a triangle! It's not a square! It is a star! So I have my music that I'm going to
turn on I'm going to get it on here and... here we go! And if you know
the song you can sing with me! Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.. Twinkle Twinkle
Little Star, how I wonder what you.. And I created these little star sticks.
Now last year I had the wooden sticks, but so many of you said we would love to have some
of this too, that I decided to create a printable, and I just published the blog post, so I'll
put the link in the description if you'd like to make your own twinkle sticks. So I just
printed it on card stock and I taped it to the back of- I used an 8 inch craft stick,
but you could use just a regular popsicle stick too. I just like the larger ones because
they're easier for the children to hold, and I got these on Amazon and the link is in that blog
post as well. So right now I'm holding the stick, but eventually I'm going to give them their own
prop box. They're going to come and pick it up and they're going to have their own star, and they
will hold it with me when we sing Twinkle Twinkle. And then the other song we sang was The Wheels
On the Bus. ... something you might know this song, do you know what this is? It's a bus!
Do you know the song The Wheels on the Bus? Do you know that song? And you can make the wheels
go round! Let's try that, can you make it go round and round round and round? I'm gonna make it go
faster! The wheels are going faster! And now slow! I have a song that's going to talk about,
that's going to sing the wheels on the bus. All right, let me get my music
on again, let's try this. The wheels on the bus go round and round... A door! The doors on the bus... uh oh it's
raining outside! Get your windshield wipers up! The wipers on the bus go swish swish...
oh you're gonna love this one! The horn! Beep beep! The horn on the bus goes beep beep...
This is another free printable that I have on the website, I'll put the link to this in
the description. I picked out the ones that were the song that we used, and I just had
the songs, I created a playlist on Spotify for today. I like to have it ready to go. So I
had two songs, the twinkle twinkle little star, and the wheels on the bus, and I will put
the links to the specific songs that we used in this blog description- excuse me, in
this video's description as well in case you'd like to use them. They're the same ones
that I used in the classroom. I love them, there's lots of different versions so whatever
one you choose is fine. And then we just had- um, we had a goodbye song, the same song that we sing
in our classroom during what the end of the day, which some of you asked me what it is and it's
just basically I go to each child and when they're in the classroom I tap on- Barney taps on each of
their heads and it's "goodbye Elsie, goodbye Sam, goodbye Reese, we're glad you came today." And
then you just do that for every child. So I did that in the meeting. That's how we ended it.
My goal is for them to become familiar with me and that way when we do get the green
light to come back in the classroom, they will feel like they know me, and they'll
feel a little bit more like they know some of the things, because we're going to sing these
same songs in the classroom when they come in. We're going to sing the same good
morning song, the same goodbye song, I'm starting it right off now as much as I
can to be as familiar... to be as... very similar to what we would do in the classroom.
So the whole thing lasted about 20 minutes, and the one other tip I wanted to give, I told the
parents when we do the zoom meeting to rename it so that it has the children's name there. And that
helped so much, because I could see the names, because I'm still getting to know them. And I am
so happy that you joined me today! Oh, I almost forgot one thing! Our goodbye song! This is a fun
part. This is new to you so I'm gonna sing it, and I'm gonna say goodbye to each of you.
Ready? I'll start with Miss Susan. Goodbye Miss Susan, goodbye Sam, and goodbye Elsie, we're
glad you came today! And don't forget Barney, we're glad you came today! Okay I hope
we'll see you on Thursday, have a good day! And then um one more thing was that
they brought a favorite stuffed animal. I found this is if nothing else, this
is comforting. We do this at school too ,so they brought their stuffed animal
and I suggested that if they wanted to, they could use this as their snack time. So
several of the children were either- they were sitting at their table and they were eating
while they were participating, and I found that really helps too kind of keeps them a little
bit more focused. So those are the tips that I would give for our first day, first week. We'll
actually probably do it like this for two weeks. The themes that I'm using are very similar to
the themes that I'd be using in the classroom. This week was kind of All About Me, just getting
to know each other. Next week we're going to be- the next two weeks, we're going to be moving- or
maybe a week, I have to look back at my schedule- we're moving into apples, and so it'll be very
similar, but I'll change out some of the songs and the book will be more theme related. And it
went really well! You know that feeling on your very first day, no matter if it's in the classroom
or if it's onlin,e you're always so relieved when you're all finished, you're like yay! We
did it, we survived, and it was great. So those are my tips for my first day of virtual teaching.
I was telling my husband this morning this is my 21st back to school. For 20 years I've had
experience having a regular back to school. 21st year I had to learn something new, but I did
it. You can do it too if you haven't started yet, and I will share more tips on what's working,
what's not. I also am putting everything I'm doing for my virtual teaching is all in one blog
post, it has everything that we've done since I started in the spring. I'll drop that link in
the description as well. Thanks for watching!
