Remote teaching during a pandemic. Part 2: Getting started on Teams.

This is the second in a series of blogposts looking at remote teaching during a pandemic. Click here to read my previous blogpost.

​At our school each class has its own group set up on Teams, so for example the only people who have access to my 8ESP3 team are the students in that class and my colleague who also teaches this group.

Whilst exploring the tools available on Teams I noticed you can add links to the tabs at the top. I’ve added the specific links for Memrise and Seneca, so that students can simply go on and click the tab, then sign in to be added to the correct groups on those sites.

I also changed the class avatar for each of my groups to make it easier to find the class I’m looking for. Simply click on the avatar and choose one of the many images already there, or click upload to add your own. I made my own using Canva.

I blogged during lockdown one about virtual classrooms, so you can read more about that and find a free template by clicking here, but essentially it’s everything my students need hyperlinked on one PowerPoint slide. I did this to make things a bit more student friendly and because I wanted them to have everything in one place. The one below is actually one I made when the schools were “open” (the schools have always been open) before the current lockdown, so it needs updating, but it has links to any websites we use, as well as links to any important folders and documents on Teams.

A lot of us are already doing all of the above anyway, but I thought I'd share just in case someone is struggling to get to grips with Teams. Hopefully it's helped someone somewhere! Feel free to ask me any questions and I'll do my best to answer them.
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Dannielle