Intro
Distance learning was a common method of learning that was usually relegated to older, university-age students. But the pandemic forced students of all ages to enter virtual classrooms, which they, and their teachers, were often unfamiliar with. While students needed to adjust to this new form of learning, teachers also found themselves having to adapt to this new environment. There were many ways that teachers coped with the demands of distance learning, some of which will be outlined here.
Prepare Course Materials
Preparation is the bedrock of any effective teacher and it applies equally to instructors who had to contend with virtual classes and distance learning during the pandemic. However, the particulars of preparation in the digital realm took on a different look, since making paper copies and handouts no longer applied.
Teachers needed to rely on digital formats like scans, JPEGs, and PDFs to be able to communicate with their students. With the PDF format, teachers could take photos or scans of hard copy materials or screen-captures of online sources and convert them into easily shareable PDF documents.
They could also convert their lesson plans into PDF format to keep for reference and edit them accordingly at later dates to use with other classes. Teachers could also share these documents with other instructors and vice-versa to share ideas and collaborate further on best practices.
Annotating Slides While Explaining the Material
Another advantage of the PDF, which copies in-class methods, is the ability to annotate digital documents in real-time to make lessons more dynamic and captivating. Where teachers would use an overhead projector to project a document to the whole class and make hand-written changes in class, a PDF can achieve that same end using the right tool.
A program like Lumin PDF editor allows users to make annotations or leave comments in real-time so everyone with access to the document can see them. This makes collaboration much easier since users can respond immediately with their ideas and interpretations, which lets them engage with the material rather than passively receiving it.
Grade Assignments and Provide Feedback
While a PDF can be used to present information in a virtual classroom, students can also complete their assignments and submit them in a PDF format. This makes grading and reviewing the work much easier for instructors. Rather than contending with messy handwriting and illegible answers, a PDF’s clarity lets teachers grade, comment, and mark a submitted text with ease.
They can attach comments in the margin to the text or write directly onto the page with a stylus to make more personalized suggestions or remarks. When teachers leave comments or suggestions, students can respond to them in kind and leave their thoughts on what the teacher has written.
Saving Time on Grading Assignments
One way that students and teachers can save time when exchanging documents, whether they are class assignments, written reports, or other materials is by creating a class account on a cloud-based platform like Google Drive, OneDrive, or Dropbox.
Instead of students having to complete their assignments, save them as a PDF, and then send them via email, they can simply save the document to the class drive where anyone can access them. The same applies to teachers who can easily share documents via the drive so that everyone can access them rather than sending each student the document in question.
