Throughout the lock-in period, the press relayed the testimonies of teachers confronted with a totally new situation: the complete switch to distance learning. The excerpts from interviews with teachers collected by Uzbek & Rica, France Culture, Zdnet and Alternatives Economiques paint a contrasting picture (technical hazards, lack of digital skills of teachers and students) but also draw some tracks to invent the school of the future.
Difficult first steps for distance learning
On March 20, 4 days after the start of the pedagogical continuity, Usbek & Rica draws a first picture of this new experience of distance learning.In spite of the anticipation, the announcement of the closing of the schools was experienced as a shock by many teachers, who only had the day of Friday to organize the continuation with their students. On the morning of Monday the 16th, the majority of the teachers discovered the tools of the CNED.
Florence, mathematics teacher in Isère: " Many colleagues are not computer literate. So with those who know how, we made a tutorial on a common Google Drive for the others. This is where we are now...".Jessica, a French, Latin and Greek teacher at a secondary school in the Gers, "In the region, the ENT does not work at all," she explains. So she adapts: on a padlet (an online collaboration tool, ed. note), she gives homework to her class: "I exchange by SMS with the delegate, who relays all the information on the Snapchat group of the class. Then, they send me their work by email. She deployed this system alone in one of her schools, against the advice of the digital managers, while waiting for the directives of the rectorate on the conformity of these tools.Lorène, a school teacher in a disadvantaged area of Chambéry. In charge of a class of 26 students in CE2 and CM1, she feels abandoned. In her class, 75% of the children have allophone parents, and about 50% of them do not have a computer or a tablet. "We're going to fall behind. I'm only doing review because if I bring up new concepts, I'm leaving three students behind ... If we had more time, we could have at least given them paper materials. I can't even give them textbooks because we only have one for every two students due to budget constraints. So I preferred not to give anything to anyone so that everyone would be on the same page.Paul, a mathematics teacher in a secondary school in the 18th arrondissement of Paris. He had the agreement of his management to develop Discord servers. "It's not too bad. I started to prepare two servers for two classes. It takes a lot of time to set them up, but eventually we'll be able to have a room for students to ask questions. If it works, I'll offer it to the rest of the school. Other teachers prefer WhatsApp, in particular to overcome the technical problems of Pronote.Sophie, a French teacher in a secondary school in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté: After two days spent trying to connect - in vain - to the CNED tools, she finally managed to organize a "virtual class" with her 4th grade students, a kind of videoconference replacing the face-to-face class. Out of 25 students, 17 showed up: "That's a lot more than I thought. I was really happy to see them because they had a lot of questions and I think the system is fun.Référence :
"It's a different way of working.
Mika, SVT teacher in a secondary school in Moselle: "the live hours in front of the students represent the most complicated part to transpose into telework (...) On the other hand, we can give work that relies more heavily on digital resources and give the students time to complete them. It's another way of working, we change the rhythm, we give access to other tools... In addition to the ENT, I use a shared bulletin board (middlespot) so that students who don't have access to the ENT can still do the work. The students have the possibility to send me individually their copy of the activity to do. For that I use the quizinière site, which is a tool set up by the Canopé network. And in order to keep the individual contact and to make collective sessions in audio, I created a Discord ".Référence :
Not all are equal when it comes to digital technology
Nicolas, an elementary school teacher in charge of a first grade class in a Parisian suburb: "It' s an opportunity to reflect on one's own practice, to innovate, to establish new links with families, to redefine the parent/teacher partnership for the benefit of children's learning. But the digital divide is felt by some families. I had to go and mail documents to some mailboxes. The lack of a printer is a concern. Especially when it comes to limiting exposure to screens as much as possible. In the absence of ENT for elementary school, Nicolas prefers "the most widespread and democratic tools, i.e. exchanges by e-mail, WhatsApp and especially phone calls ... The profusion of educational resources, very unequal, suggested by the National Education or by the entourage, social networks, can be invasive . .. Technology has certain advantages, but within the school itself, I am hermetic to the virtual which replaces the physical in verbal exchanges, writing, manipulation, social links ... The screens are omnipresent, the school must protect itself from it as much as possible ".Référence :
"Keeping in touch with students is sometimes difficult."
Alexis, a teacher in a working-class neighborhood: " In my practice as a teacher, I noticed that I had to quickly give the students appointments so that they could know what time they would meet us. I chose to give them an appointment during the French hours that were noted in their timetable, so that it would be legible both for their parents and for them. (...) Then, I also think that the fact of having landmarks like class times, of having fixed appointments, is reassuring and it orders their day, by reminding them of the time when it was still ordinary, and by showing them that, despite everything, there are things that do not change, that the college is still a fixed landmark for them. (...) For many students, if they no longer have these virtual classroom moments, they are cut off from all contact with their peers. (...) The students among themselves will have a greater tendency to keep in touch, because they will send each other messages, photos of classes, etc., and in fact they ensure the pedagogical continuity that we are not able to assume in its entirety. I rely a lot on some of the students, I try to keep track of them, but keeping in touch with them is sometimes difficult.Référence :
"Students don't know how to make the connection between their specific computer skills and school."
Alexis, a teacher in a working-class neighborhood: " Switching to distance learning eliminates factors that used to help me teach my classes, such as the fact that I used to put on a show in my classroom and move around a lot between tables. I can no longer rely on these habits, I am forced to focus on the activity itself. Except that I have never tried these activities before, I am discovering some of them and developing others. For example, it could be a live internet search (...) So, they'll use the tools I've given them before, go on Wikidia, Wikipedia, etc., that kind of thing we don't do in class.The students' mastery of computer tools is a private matter, which means that they know how to use them for their own purposes, to communicate with each other, to edit, etc. I was actually very surprised to see how well some of them knew how to edit their short films! On the other hand, this mastery, within the framework of school knowledge, is a bit neglected. The students don't know how to make the link between their particular computer skills and school, and it's up to us to help them understand that a skill developed in life can be put to use in school work.Référence :
"We are not equipped for this way of working".
Delphine, a teacher in Paris with a double level CM1/CM2: "The main difficulty was to plan work and correction sessions without the students' feedback. On this occasion, I realized how much I was nourished by these exchanges with them. Normally, I launch a reflection to which they will respond in a certain way, then I suggest this type of tool, this type of way of speaking, I go to see this student, address him in a certain way and another in another way, we work in small groups... Pedagogy is a living subject, that is to say that it is fed by all these exchanges, by the interactions between students, and it is this that is lacking at the moment... What makes the workload even more important is that we have to conceptualize but also manipulate the computer tool, with the help of a computer that is not a professional computer, with an internet connection that is a bit fragile in my case, that is to say that we are not equipped for this way of working. We are trained, we learn to make PowerPoint, to insert diagrams, it may seem silly but it takes time. At the beginning, the message that was sent to us - almost an instruction - was not to tackle new concepts. We had to reinforce what we had already learned (...) On the other hand, tackling a new concept requires exchanges in the class (...) But all this collective research work, we can no longer do it. I still try to make them think about the right method to use, or one of the methods, from a distance. I try to be cunning, to make videos, explanations with diagrams so that it speaks to each one, but we reach the limit of the exercise sometimes ".Référence :
"Everyone does a little bit of what they want to do.
Mohamed, a math teacher in a general and technological high school: "It's true that at the beginning it was a bit complicated to set up and manage all that. He has to put every piece of information he gives to students about their work on the drive, an online document storage service, or on Pronote, an online software that the school uses to manage the students' school life and communicate with them. As for the exercises, the teachers use different tools. Either MCQs sent on Pronote, or exercises on a drive. Each one does a little bit as he wants. Mohamed Amazigh creates a form provided by Google in the form of a questionnaire or activities with diagrams and figures that he has to draw. "This method is really something new. I never used it, it was like a test and yet it worked well with the students .... There are things that cannot be explained in writing. We do it with the technological means at our disposal ... As soon as we start in the morning when we wake up, it doesn't stop until the evening. I stay in front of my computer screen from morning to night (...) all this support work serves to keep the students as focused as possible and to make them aware of the importance of continuing to study.Référence :
"Distance learning courses require a lot of preparation"
Malika, a maths teacher in a general and technological high school: "the confinement increased my workload enormously since I had to type the correction of the exercises, which, in maths, can be time-consuming... and I know that I still have tools to master" . Malika Farhane has also changed her teaching practice. She asks the students to copy the course she put on the drive into their notebooks so that they can try to integrate it. She also prepared worksheets and asked students to turn in their work on the drive. She then offers virtual class time (on the CNED platform) to correct them. And it is during these virtual class hours in half-groups that she tries to remedy the various difficulties encountered by the students. "Just like in class, they can ask me questions.Référence :
"The virtual classroom application has worked pretty well."
Pierre, math teacher in a general and technological high school: "We have more things to prepare. Now I start making videos to correct the exercises", commenting on the power point slides that appear on the screen: "It's relatively easy to do... However, what's missing is the interactivity, seeing the students' reaction, because seeing a face is quite revealing of what's going on... Overall, I think the virtual classroom application has worked well. We can do a lot of things with it, we can even share files" by projecting a lesson that the students can see live, as if they were in class. " With fifteen students, we manage very well, even if only a few take the microphone, three or four, the rest is by chat", i.e. in writing. To facilitate communication, some classes have also created a WhatsApp group, for example to tell students: "in 10 minutes there is a virtual class". "Some teachers, especially the teachers of the second year class, have agreed to lighten the overall workload of the students a little, because they realized that some students had difficulty organizing themselves.Eloïse, a teacher in a secondary school in Toulouse, sums up her experience for Médiapart: " For the past month, I think I've used about 15 different applications with my students: the Cned's virtual class, Pronote, WhatsApp, Discord, YouTube or Pearltrees... It's a happy mess, but we've been able to keep in touch with certain students.Référence :
Sources
- 1. Uzbek & Rica: During lockdown, I don't see the harm in doing a Snapchat class
- 2. ZDNet's #IWorkHome: teachers face the digital divide
- 3. ZDNet's #IWorkHome: teachers face the digital divide
- 4. France culture: How to keep in touch with students?
- 5. France culture: How to keep in touch with students?
- 6. France Culture: Pedagogical continuity put to the test of time
- 7. Alternatives Economiques : Teachers overwhelmed with work during short-time working
- 8. Alternatives Economiques : Teachers overwhelmed with work during short-time working
- 9. Alternatives Economiques : Teachers overwhelmed with work during short-time working
