Independent Learning with Kira
With the robust video resources and AI tools available on the Kira platform, some teachers may prefer that their students have an asynchronous, independent study experience in their coursework. In this model, students will work through the course at their own pace, watching videos completely or predominantly on their own. The teacher, rather than leading lessons, acts as a facilitator of independent learning. The teacher may wish to use different assignment, access, and progression features to stop students from progressing too far or to ensure they complete steps sequentially.
Recommendations for Independent Learning
While the Kira platform has many methods of support for students, we know that many students on the Kira platform are still at an age where they are developing their executive functioning and self-regulation skills. To ensure that students can stay focused and engaged on their independent classwork, we recommend considering the following:
Utilize timelines and learning plans to keep students on track.
Students may have different goals for what to finish in a day or week, but can have classroom goals like ‘Finish Unit 1 by October 2nd’
You can determine due dates and when work becomes available when assigning materials.
Content locking can still assist in an independent model
Keep students “more together” by setting locks that open as deadlines are met, or set locks for individual students
Utilize sponge activities, or have Kira make and assign personalized work from the Student Atlas to keep fast workers busy
Pulse check with the grade book, Student/Class Atlas, and one-on-one student conferencing
Set a conferencing schedule and stick to it - aim to talk to each student at least once a week.
Check the Student/Class Atlas regularly to determine student and class mastery levels
Independent Learning Example Instruction
Ongoing Structures
Based on the above recommendations, it's suggested that an independent study classroom to have several structures that will be ongoing for the school term.
Class deadlines and/or student learning plans: Set on a routine cadence for when they begin, end, and have any checkpoints or milestones
Teacher conferencing schedule
Whole class touch points: allow times to build community at the start and end of class
Example Flow of Day
Students complete a content-agnostic 'do now' activity with the whole class, then log in to Kira
Think reflection, logic puzzle, or something else that will use their computational thinking skills
You can use the Homepage Chat to create an unplugged, offline warm-up to present to your students!
Students begin working in the course, using class deadlines or a learning plan to set the pace
Teacher moves through the conference schedule, spending ~5 minutes per student.
Time to check in with progress, answer questions, suggest remediation/review/extension using the Student Atlas and its Recommended Actions chat.
Reference learning plan to ensure student is on pace; discuss next steps if pacing is off
Ensure students are prepared for their share during lesson close
Lesson Close: class regroups and students who were conferenced with share something they are struggling with and something they’ve found success with.
Promote class discussion with sharers describing strategies that allowed them to be successful and soliciting help for sticking points.
A Note for Fast Workers
Even with an independent study, you may have students who finish well ahead of their learning plan deadlines and get bored not being able to move on, or feel like they're far ahead and don't need to work. Normalizing sponge activities - or supplementary activities students complete to soak up extra time when they finish - can help with classroom engagement and management.
Typing skills - your school or district may have a preferred platform for this, but many free ones exist. You can even use Action Tiles to make learn-to-type activities on Kira!
Consider making a batch of activities for an entire Unit; you can label them as mild, medium, spicy, or by the skills they should know to attempt them.
Weekly Error Assessment - ask students to submit their favorite error (flawed code) or write a coding challenge. At the end of the week, work 1-2 of these into an end-of-week error assessment task.