In-Person Classes Will Not Improve the Learning Experience
It is time to reimagine our syllabus and pedagogy
I understand that we want to go back to normal. Who wouldn’t?
We all miss our lives before Covid-19. I miss going back to my office, seeing my students in person, walking by with my creativity bag that characterizes all my lectures, moving around the classroom, and using way too much non-verbal communication. I miss everything about teaching in-person.
But returning to the physical classroom will not give me back my so precious normality. Nothing will, and I need to acknowledge that. We need to understand there is no going back to normal. Period.
Since the beginning of the lockdown, our fundamental concern has been when can we reopen schools. We have felt the urge to go back to in-person teaching because is what we know best.
Because for most of us, shifting to online teaching in such an abrupt way was challenging and even painful.
We were left alone to figure out a way to continue education normally as if nothing happened. We had to learn and adapt quickly to novel teaching approaches, assessment methods, tools, and platforms, many of us had never heard of, left alone use it before. We did our best for our students, but on many…
