By Zachary Smith
It is safe to say that the start of this school year is going to be unlike any other. As a teacher, one of my favorite parts of teaching is celebrating student success. I am in a district that is including virtual learning as part of our return to school plan for the fall semester. As a teacher, I found myself pondering the issue of how will my student celebrations happen if my classroom setting is virtual? Therefore, I researched and created a list of ways that we can fulfill our desire to celebrate students… virtually!
Praise for Individual Students
1. Verbal Praise
We all know the importance of verbal praise for students. This is probably the easiest (in terms of time and planning) way to celebrate student success in our virtual or hybrid classrooms. These moments of praise can be in the form of a pep talk, a quick compliment, or a shout out.
2. Send a Note
A quick virtual note to a student is a great way to celebrate a student’s success for a student who prefers to not receive praise in such a public manner as a verbal phrase. You can email the student, send a text through a program such as Remind, or send it through your online learning platform.
3. Contact Parent / Family
Remember that parents and families love getting compliments about their children/family members. A quick phone call home is a very positive way to celebrate student success.
4. Class Incentives for Individual Prizes
I use Classroom Dojo for classroom management. On the first day of class, we set expectations as a class. Then students create their avatar and share why they chose certain features so we can get to know them. Then, each week, students can turn their positive points into raffle tickets for small prizes or $5 gift cards to some local businesses. I will mail the gift cards or prizes to the winners.
5. Peer Recognition Activity
It is hard to get students to interact sometimes online. So I like this idea a lot. Plus, sometimes the most powerful form of recognition is when it comes from a person’s peers. You can have them participate in a “strength” circle. If in-person, students pass the envelope around the room and write a compliment or a strength of the student whose name is on the envelope. This can be done virtually by making a Google slide show. Have the title of each slide be a student’s name, then students will type compliments for that student on his or her slide. This is an activity to do AFTER a positive climate and classroom routine has been built within that classroom environment. This is something that probably will have to wait until at least October to be done within a classroom (virtually or in-person).
6. Displaying and Sharing Student Work
It is important to model student work and let students share their work. Doing a gallery walk in a classroom is something that can be done socially distanced. This can be done virtually, too, in many creative ways.
7. Social Media Shout Outs!
If you have a class Twitter handle, Facebook page, or Tik-Tok account, use it to shout out awesome student achievements! Make sure to be doing this on the class page or your teacher account and not your personal account… and exclude student names from the examples for privacy reasons.
8. Award Show
After a large project or a unit, create an award show and give students rewards for their achievements. For example, “Best thesis statement” if it’s an essay that they wrote; “No misplaced modifiers”, etc. This way, you can find success within their writing, something that they do consistently very well, or something that they have greatly improved on.
9. Create an Instagram Channel
This channel can be of “student wonderfulness.” You can devote a channel to one class, where their work can be celebrated and discussed. On that channel, create personalized hashtags so they can share on their own social media accounts if they’d like to. Then to draw more attention to the channel, you can share some “secret” learning tips, some extra prep questions for a test or quiz, or post some extra credit work that students can interact with.
10. Student Experts
While you’re doing a subject or topic in your class, have students be the experts if they are excelling in a specific area. They can lead the breakout room on that topic. For example, in a language class, if we are working on editing our papers and I have three students who had no subject/verb agreement errors, they will be the leaders of each breakout room so then I can bounce around between rooms and interact with each group in a smaller group setting. This again is something that will have to be done once students are independently able to manage classroom expectations.
11. Snail Mail
Who doesn’t love to receive mail? Postcards are not too expensive, and sending a postcard for a happy birthday or a “way to go” is a fun way to brighten a student’s day.
12. Virtual Badges
Create a virtual badge system that students can collect and share on their learning profile. In the beginning of the year, students can create a learning profile. Then, you can create a badge system for the students. For example, in a math class they could earn a badge for 100 math problems solved, 250 math problems solved, etc. In Language Arts it could be for numbers of vocabulary words learned, words read, reading levels passed, etc. As students earn a badge, you send it to them and they can display it on their virtual profile!
13. Show and Share
Did someone level up on Lexia or finish the next chapter of their independent reading book? Show and Share is a great way to celebrate this student achievement. At the end of the week, create time for students to share out their accomplishments that they are proud of! They deserve some self-recognition!
Zachary Smith is a language arts and ELL teacher for Des Moines Public Schools and can be contacted at zasmith001@gmail.com or on Twitter @zas85.
