Blending Methods Part 4: Designing Interactive Webinars

Awhile back, I posted about a PD opportunity that helped me to reimagine what engaging webinars might look like. After testing these strategies out in our Coaching program, I was ready to give it a go for the Methods course. Throughout the semester, there were many times when I wanted to meet with students to discuss important themes arising from their work. Given the constraints of the blended syllabus, this wasn't always possible as sometimes we wouldn't meet face-to-face for multiple weeks. Enter the webinar. To address this need, I planned interactive webinar activities around the following three topics.

1. Approaches to Writing Revision

Traditional Activity: The writing process is one of my favorite areas to explore, especially when we get out the colored pencils for revising writing. For this topic, we use samples of writing we are currently working on and apply a variety of strategies to look closely at our writing. Then we consider how to structure those activities for the K-12 classroom.
Webinar Activity: This is one lesson design that stayed pretty much the same when moving to the online space. I would overview a strategy, students would test it out on their own writing, and then we would use the chat feature to discuss their wonderings and noticings. The strategies included:

• Freewriting about Writing
• Visualizing Revision through Color-Coding
• Outlining Key Ideas

Reflection on Experience: Since I didn't change much of the traditional lesson, it's no surprise that the experience was not enhanced. In fact, the face-to-face setting was far superior for implementing these activities. I would definitely keep this activity offline in the future.

2. Assessing Digital Compositions

Traditional Activity: To better understand the complexities of assessing digital writing, we typically engage in a collaborative process of analyzing a mentor text together. Later, students apply this experience to analyzing their final Digital Salon projects with a partner.
Webinar Activity: This process looked fairly similar online with two important changes that greatly improved the experience:

• I organized the activity to utilize a variety of mentor texts assigned to small groups. This was easier to facilitate online as everyone could view/listen to the projects without distractions from the physical space. It also provided the chance for students to review the other group texts at a later time.
• Then, we applied multiple frameworks to analyze/assess the texts using a collaborative Google Doc. As individuals added contributions to their group table in real time, I could also scan across the groups to leave comments and identify common themes emerging. I was able to pull these out for a follow-up discussion that elicited especially thoughtful insights into the differences between using checklist/rubrics and applying more of a mindset/attribute approach to evaluating the projects and process.

Excerpt from Protocol 1 using Rubric Categories for Analysis

Excerpt from Protocol 2 using Mindsets/Attributes for Analysis

Reflection on Experience: This was by the far the best facilitation and discussion of this topic! I also think I could integrate this process into a face-to-face setting, but it worked well for the online space.

3. Reflections on Discussion

Traditional Activity: Perhaps we held an impromptu discussion in the past, but I never supported students to reflect upon and apply their feedback on leading discussion in such an explicit way. I'm most proud of this design and see a lot of potential for adapting further in the future.
Webinar Activity: This was designed in response to the questions and concerns arising out of the Leading Discussion Workshop. The blended format allowed me to use class time from the previous week to annotate and analyze all of my students' videos--and yes, this took close to forever. But it was worth it. For this activity, students reviewed my notes and followed a reflective prompt to identify strengths and opportunities for continuing to grow their ability to lead classroom discussions. We shared these findings in a collaborative space where, again, we could benefit from the individual insights as a group.

Excerpt from Note-taking Protocol

Reflection on Experience: As with the above example, I think this activity could be adapted for a face-to-face setting. However, I believe it was the nature of the blended context and online webinar that pushed me to develop these opportunities for greater application and reflection on the methods and practices students were exploring. I also am not sure I would have had the time to provide the extent of feedback necessary in a traditional setting, as I was able to use students' space-based workshop times to dig deeper into their assignments.