Florida Schools Go Virtual

In this day and age, we are required more and more often to be technologically literate. Florida Public Schools need to adapt to that technology or fall behind. We are becoming a mobile society, with the ability to talk to anyone at anytime from anywhere; we can even do a “virtual commute” and have an office at the park, in the coffee shop, or even at a bookstore. While some districts are slow to rise to the task, others have stepped up to the plate.

The Florida Virtual School (FLVS) was founded in 1997, and was the country’s first state-wide Internet-based public high school. In fact, other states wishing to implement this kind of learning opportunity for their students look to FVLS as the model to follow. This is the only one of Florida Schools where funding is tied directly to student performance.

Leaders of the FLVS serving Florida Schools students are committed to deliver high-quality, technology-based education. They hold the following core beliefs about education:

• Every Florida Schools student is unique, so learning should be dynamic, flexible and engaging.

• Studies should be integrated rather than isolated.

• Students, parents, community members, and schools share responsibility for learning.

• Students should have choices in how they learn and how they present what they know.

• Students should be provided guidance with school and career planning.

• Assessments should provide insights not only of student progress but also of instruction and curriculum.

Courses are available to any and all public, private, and home-schooled Florida Schools students. Out-of-state and international students may attend the virtual school by paying tuition. FLVS is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.

FLVS employs 380 full-time and 180 adjunct Florida Schools teachers who reside throughout Florida and some who live beyond the state’s borders. All FLVS teachers possess a valid Florida Schools teaching certificate and are certified specifically in the subject they teach.

All of this information is definitely impressive. It is easy to imagine what kinds of students would benefit from this type of Florida Schools education. Those Florida Schools students who are home-schooled, have various psychological challenges, social disorders, or other disabilities may find success by attending Florida Schools online. Are there drawback? Of course, nothing is perfect and snowy white. Never meeting face-to-face with one’s instructor can hinder the learning process. So much is communicated through body language, and the student would miss out on this valuable information by only studying online. The obvious lack of social interaction with one’s peers also exists; students who attend more traditional Florida Schools have a variety of opportunities to experience activities with other kids their age.

While there are easily recognizable, positive aspects for Florida Schools students who wish to attend a virtual school, it is also important to recognize and consider the drawbacks to never setting foot inside any of the Florida Schools classrooms that exist in the state’s 67 districts.

Who is Florida Virtual School?

Florida Virtual School serves K-12 public, private and homeschool students in the state of Florida and beyond. For more information about our free courses, how to register and who we are visit, www.thisismelearning.com.

Discussing the Pros and Cons of High School Online Learning

Choosing high school online learning for your child’s education is an exciting life-changing decision that is unique to each family. It is wise to sit down as a family and discuss the pros and cons as well as costs and potential challenges you may experience along the way.

For some families, choosing high school distance learning for their students is tough decision. Such a transition is much more involved than simply relocating to a different high school, so it makes sense that families want to heavily weigh their options before diving into virtual learning. As you work to make the best decision for your student, take a look at these pros and cons of completing high school courses online.

Pros

The supporters of virtual learning have numerous positive things to report about this style of education. It is literally access to knowledge, educational freedom, electronic communication, flexibility and creativity all in one learning method. Online learning provides a tool to teach students to become self-directed learners—a skill that will last them a lifetime. In fact, whether it is a virtual elementary school, virtual middle school or virtual high school, students receive training in the digital world and become better prepared to live and work successfully in tune with technology. 

Many virtual schools offer dual enrollment at the high school level allowing students to earn both high school and college credit.  This helps offset the cost of a post-secondary education.  In addition, students have access to resources from all around the world and can benefit from innovative school programs in both their local school districts, statewide virtual schools or part time from private programs in other states—programs that the student couldn’t possible access outside of virtual schooling. With the power of many educational institutions and programs at their fingertips, online learners can discover their unique gifts and talents and then run with them.

Cons

The primary challenges that come with virtual learning include more parental involvement, a disciplined attitude and possibly monetary contributions. While there are public virtual school programs that are free, not everyone has access to such programs. Furthermore, some parents discover through research that they prefer more individualized virtual schooling programs offered by private online schools and are fee based.  The costs associated with these types of programs include not only the tuition associated with the online program but also costs for supplies, tutors, computers and other materials necessary to complete the online courses.

Parents’ primary roles in virtual school programs are that of an advocate, guidance counselor and leader. While the student will have more freedom to choose courses and methods for learning, he or she will likely still need guidance plotting out the best course of study as well as encouragement to work the program and to maximize learning.

The choice to go with high school online learning is unique to each family. It makes sense to sit down as a family and discuss the pros and cons as well as costs and potential challenges you may experience along the way. Research and effective communication can help you make the best decision possible for your child’s education.

What Are The Advantages Of An Online High School Diploma?

Throughout the school year, parents and caregivers everywhere are thinking about and making plans for their children’s education—and there is a lot to think about. Specifically, “what kind of school should my child attend?” With so many options available, from the traditional brick-and-mortar public schools to charter schools to religious schools, students have more educational choices than ever. One option is the increasingly popular and innovative virtual school to get high school diploma online.

Virtual schools started appearing in the late 1990s and are currently available in several states across the country – including California. According to A National Primer on K-12 Online Learning from the North American Council for Online Learning (April 2007), at the end of 2006, 25 states offered state-led online learning programs, and 18 states were home to 147 virtual charter schools serving over 65,000 students.

Yet, despite the steady growth in interest and enrollment, many people don’t understand how virtual schools work or the numerous benefits they provide – to both students and our education system.

Virtual learning enables school districts to deliver a flexible educational option via the Internet and allows educators to address the specific gifts or challenges of the individual student. Virtual students have notable educational support as they learn from home with parents or caregivers while working with teachers over the Web. Online schools typically provide a print-rich curriculum that combines textbooks and hands-on materials along with technology tools.

But what does all that really mean? The benefits of virtual education come in many forms. For the student, “wearing your pjyamas to class” may be one of them, but it’s far from the defining characteristic. Above all, students are offered high-quality, highly accountable, individualized learning. Teachers, parents and students work together to plan the educational path that is right for the student. Does the student require additional work in Algebra? Are they interested in learning Chinese? Do they want to focus on one subject for several days? These are the types of questions and options virtual learning affords. With virtual learning, the actual school work and education are the main focus, while the time and place it gets done is secondary.

As a result, virtual schools attract all types of students, resulting in a diverse and unique student body. A typical online class may include students who are far ahead of their peers in a traditional setting, as well as those who are behind or require additional assistance in certain areas. Or, students who need a rigorous, yet flexible learning schedule to accommodate a sports or acting career. It also brings together students from different towns. Yet these students are learning together, from each other, and sharing on many levels.

While many parents worry about the social implications of having their children enrolled in a virtual school, many of the schools take this into account and make it easy for the kids to interact with their peers. Some online schools provide planned field trips where students can interact with one another in person, and online bulletin boards where young people can talk about the latest Harry Potter movie or meet a new friend with similar interests from another state.

The dedication to your child’s education is also paramount to succeeding in a virtual learning environment. Parents or caregivers directly contribute to and participate in the student’s day-to-day education process while lessons can be delivered when and where it works best for both. For example, Carissa Lim is currently enrolled in a virtual school program and is taught by her mother, Nancy Lim. Carissa is also a gymnast who spends a great deal of time practicing and competing in her sport – a traditional school schedule and environment was challenging and did not support her lifestyle The virtual learning model offers families like the Lims an alternative to public school education with a flexible schedule while still providing an enriched and challenging curriculum.

“My daughter needs an outlet for her athletic passion and personality and she just wasn’t happy in a traditional public school,” said Nancy Lim, a virtual school parent. “Virtual learning allows us to advance in subjects she is interested in and allows her to pursue gymnastics at the same time and she can can get her online high school diploma – I couldn’t ask for a better arrangement.”

Parents of students in virtual schools consistently give high remarks on their children’s education. For families who find that traditional schools are not providing the individualized attention they want, virtual schools continue to provide a highly effective and successful alternative.

For more information, advice and resources visit http://www.gethighschooldiplomaonline.info

Development of the Virtual Classroom and School

A school you can attend anytime of the day or night, Virtual Education will become the next reality. Will

On the advantages of virtual, text-based discussions:

“… In all my years of teaching classes, there are always some students in the class who are very hard to get to speak up. You can ask them a direct question, but basically, unless they are put on the spot, these students will not volunteer their own opinions in class, and I think that there are various reasons why people are reticent and don’t want to do that. Sometimes I think people are shy and don’t want to be put on the spot — all the conversation stops, and everyone turns to look at them. In some cases, students for whom English is not their first language, it really can be an intimidating thing to have to extemporaneously put together English sentences like that in a classroom environment.

In Virtual Classrooms,  that problem of students not participating in class discussions just totally disappeared. And when I thought about it, these reasons, these challenges of speaking up in a regular class went away in this environment. In Second Life, when you want to contribute something to the class discussion, you just go ahead and start typing it in your chat box, and nobody turns to look at you, even if they do notice that your avatar is doing the typing motions, they are not actually looking at you, it’s just your avatar, and your avatar is not doing anything embarrassing. When you are ready to enter your comment into the conversation, you just hit enter. And it doesn’t have that moment where everybody stops and looks at you. Your comment just goes right into the conversation, along with everybody else’s. So i think a lot of the anxiety that goes along with the public-speaking aspect of participating in class discussions, is just removed in this environment.

On the flip side, we didn’t have any trouble with students who dominate the discussion. There’s always been the phenomenon of the student who ends every sentence with a conjunction in order to not stop their comment, and you can do that as much as you like in Second Life, and it doesn’t stop anybody else from participating in the discussions. What’s nice about that is very frequently people who usually speak a lot in class have a lot of very good things to contribute, and it’s hard as a teacher to shut somebody down in order to make space for other students, especially if you do feel that you want to be encouraging of their interest and enthusiasm. And this just takes away that problem as well.

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“The idea that I would actually end up almost preferring to run a class in a virtual environment to a real-based environment, that was a huge surprise.”

It started in 1998 with website Groups.

Students could read stories and write online, and share lessons and activities with other schools and teachers around the world.

This was linked with epals. They created an extensive list of schools and teachers who were interested in connecting first for writing experiences for their students, and today in shared projects and linked forums and websites withepals, with their school and classroom links .

It went ahead with websites in early 2004, using first on-line lessons and online courses and activities. Websites began offering free lesson plans and Activity sheets, and became an online source.

The next step was Moodle, and student tasks on-line with journals, activities and projects.

Sitepals, Virtual heads, and talk-back features started with ALICE

I used my first Alice, who is still on my first English website

From here the start of using the voice developed with podcasts, recordings, and news and the ‘English Voice became the English Voice in Korea, then in China and now simply, “News and Views”

Suddenly the technology was there for the Online Classroom, and the start of the Virtual Classroom and the Virtual School    http://Activeenglishspeaking.com

Lessons are held on two platforms…wiziq and edufire

Lessons take place in a Virtual Classroom which has everything a real classroom has….a teacher, students, a whiteboard, a chatline and the sharing of file, images, and any other teaching tool and teaching aide. Classes can even be run by two teachers in a team situation.

Advantages:

You select your class, time and teacher and study when you wish. The lesson is also available for revision and replay, which is a feature the real classroom does not have.

Lessons can be one-to- one, or group. A teacher can take 100 or more students in one session. In China, the large classes often meant that students at the back do not get the same attention. Here all students get the same attention, and lessons can be replayed if needed as many times as the student wishes. The lesson becomes a students possession like a textbook.

The Lesson format is the same as a normal Classroom. The text is replaced by a Power Point. The lesson is read by the teacher with the students following the words like a Presentation. After the lesson, there is interactive activities using the whiteboard and student voice through a webcam and microphone. Students who are reticent, can practise the lesson in a replay, and listen to their own voices.

Student and Teacher tools…a computer with a microphone and a webcam.

Cost of the lessons…bulk lessons from $2.00 a lesson, and private lessons around $20-$30 a session. No insurance, no travelling, no being late for class, ( simply replay the lesson later and catch up on the part you have missed) and no building or maintenance costs, tasks, or issues. You simply enrol and take part in the lesson…at your leisure.

You can now learn anything online….free and paid lessons.

I am teaching English, but I will also be teaching Social Skills, Creative Writing and later, Art and Computer Technology, extending to a full School Day of as many hours as the student wishes to take.

You are invited to view the Free Public lesson and see how the Virtual Classroom works for yourself. The first lesson is on January 5th 2009 at 9.30pm Korean time (+8hours)

Will Virtual Education take over Real Schools?

With so many social problems and people resorting to Home Schooling their children, Virtual Education could well become the next generation.

With so much increased mobility and change of home and schools, here is one permanent security. You keep the same school and teacher, wherever you live and work, and when you travel, your school comes with you.

There is no bullying, no negative influences and no teacher student dissent. You stay where you enjoy and want to learn, and you learn at your own pace and own level o ability. You attend because you want to, and you are free to repeat lessons and replay the sessions you enjoy.

You can request the courses and lessons you wish to learn, at any level or stage, and you can move from class to class at your own leisure and pleasure. Learning becomes what you choose to do, and is Student Directed.

Welcome to the New World of Virtual Education. It is here to stay,  and can only get better. You and the Teacher is Reality in a Virtual Classroom and World.

Marguerite Carstairs 2009

Activeenglishspeaking.com

Copyright © 2008 Ladymaggic