Guest blog by Robert Barnett, co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer of the Modern Classrooms Project
Is there anything more annoying for a teacher than missing school?
It seems like a funny question: taking a day off school can be a nice break for students and teachers alike. But when teachers miss school, they need to create sub plans, which take time to write and are often challenging to implement effectively. Teachers frequently tell me that it’s easier to go to school sick than it is to deal with writing sub plans and helping their classes get back on track.
When students miss school, it falls on teachers to help them catch up on top of teaching their regular lessons. That’s a heavy lift. Telling students to get notes from a classmate might seem like a quick fix, but it rarely leads to real understanding. If it did, we wouldn’t need schools or teachers. The truth is, most teachers simply don’t have the time or bandwidth to reteach everything a student missed.
Of course, both teachers and students will inevitably need to miss school at times. That’s life. So teachers need a convenient way to create easy-to-implement sub plans, while students need a convenient way to catch up on content they may have missed. That way, teachers won’t need to spend a lot of time creating substitute plans or worrying that students won’t be productive while the teacher is gone. And, students who miss class can easily catch up on what they missed, without requiring extra time or attention from the teacher.
I’ve spent years trying to help teachers and students better navigate absences and have helped develop an instructional approach, called the Modern Classroom instructional model, that makes it easier for both teachers and students when they miss class. I strongly believe in this approach and have used it myself. However, I also recognize that implementing it takes time and effort, and may not be suitable for every teacher.
That’s why I’ve spent the past year building a free, AI-powered tool that can help any teacher create a comprehensive, easy-to-implement substitute plan in minutes and can help any student create a self-directed lesson to catch up on content they have missed. That tool is called Insta~Lesson.
When a teacher creates an Insta~Lesson, they receive a complete, student-ready lesson, which includes a high-quality instructional video, space for students to take notes and apply their learning, an Exit Ticket, and more. Teachers also receive detailed guidance on how to implement the lesson effectively. Here’s a 45-second demo showing exactly how it works.
I’ve now seen teachers around the world, across all grade levels and subject areas, use Insta~Lesson to create sub and catch-up plans for their students, and I’ve worked closely with these teachers to make sure that it is both easy to use and implement in real classroom settings. For instance, you can explore recent Insta~Lessons on erosion, poetry, scatter plots(pictured below), and the American Revolution.
Lesson Overview and Teaching Notes
Warm Up Activities
Extension Activities
Exit Activities
I would love for you to try it out! After all, it’s free.
And I hope that the next time you or one of your students needs to miss class, you’ll breathe a sigh of relief. Teaching is hard enough already – and Insta~Lesson is here for you.
Robert Barnett is the co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer of the Modern Classrooms Project and the author of Meet Every Learner’s Needs. He built Insta~Lesson in his free time to support teachers and students around the world.
One response
This is AMAZING! Thank you Robert and Catlin for sharing insta-lesson! It also found a useful video related to the topic I entered. Simply brilliant. I’m Rachel, fellow blogger from Greece. Author of the TEFL Zone https://teflzoneracheltsateri.wordpress.com