The universal GP Training website for everyone, not just Bradford.   Created in 2002 by Dr Ramesh Mehay

Remote Online Teaching

like on Zoom, MS Teams, Blackboard etc

macbook pro displaying group of people

CODE OF CONDUCT - ground rules for attendees at remote digital educational sessions

All trainees - please read through these tabs

Developed by Dr. Ramesh Mehay, Aug 2021

 

Top Tips for Teaching Remotely

Remember to

  • Prepare – check all the equipment works IN ADVANCE.  Good WIFI is essential.   Make sure all your documents are open on your computer.  Don’t waste time opening tonnes of folders.  Learners will switch off!   Consider sending some pre-session material: a pdf handout, a youtube video etc.  
  • Select an uncluttered room to engage in the session.  DON’T use your bedroom!  Use something professional.   Make sure there are not too many personal effects otherwise others will be interested in your room rather than your teaching session.  
  • Have an opening session.  Where you provide time to let latecomers join.  Not everyone is a time focused.   Allow people to chat and talk.  In fact, get a chat going to settle them all in – open the chat box.   Have a chitter chatter.   Don’t just keep them all in a waiting room until everyone is there.  Let people in like you would do in a physical room.  Greet and make them feel welcomed.  Show genuine desire to be there.
  • Set your Aims and Objectives (or Intended Learning Outcomes) – have a slide or document summarising these.  Come back to these often to help your learners see where the session is at.
  • Don’t use new fancy tools for the sake of it.  Simple is often best.   You can make things interactive with simple things.     Use tools ONLY if they have a purpose.
  • Have regular breaks.   Breaks are important to get people to recharge and refresh.   Stay hydrated throughout the session – it is surprising how much you can forget.   Pace yourself through the session.   Remember to engage break out activities which gives the facilitator a bit of a break.  You don’t want to feel exhausted after your session.
  •  Look after the Online Learning Environment.   Look after everyone’s feelings – note the quiet ones.   Engage them with paternal kindness.   Temper heated discussions.   Create a safe place.  Make it fun.
  • Make an ending section.  Don’t just abruptly say “hope that was useful, bye…”
  • Close on Time.   Control open ended ruminating meaningless discussions.   Finish on time (or earlier).  Don’t use more time to teach than you need.  If you have 3 hours but your session really only needs 2, then use 2!

This is a great little video summarising it all:

https://eu-lti.bbcollab.com/recording/7bd21ba7016440648873df0ae7fb89c7

 

BlackBoard Collaborate

An intro to Blackboard Collaborate

https://eu-lti.bbcollab.com/recording/364e22c8cfc34746b31e4fdc407c4cc8

A short film about how to run a teaching session on Blackboard Collaborate:

https://eu-lti.bbcollab.com/recording/4a87b97ad1564642af88e8676809169c

A link to the Blackboard help page for more detailed advice about the functions in the Blackboard room e.g. breakout rooms:

https://help.blackboard.com/Collaborate/Ultra/Moderator/Moderate_Sessions

Basic Zoom

Top Tips for using Zoom

Other Tech Tools for teaching

My favourite tools are

  • Google forms to create real time polls and questionnaires is quite simply amazing.   Look at this YouTube tutorial.  
  • Mentimeter  – polls, quizzes, word clouds.  Free if just using the odd one or two polls here and there.   Tip – don’t create a number of polls or quizzes together.  Separate them out – because Mentimeter allows you to create lots of “one-poll” items for free.  
  • Padlet – beautiful boards 
  • Kahoot – online tool that gamifies quizzes 
  • Nearpod – a hub for all the learning materials that teachers may want to include in a teaching session for learners to access.
  • Random Name Picker – when no learners volunteer to do or say something, this fun little number might help.  Beware, you don’t want learners to feel apprehensive or anxious as it can inhibit learning.  So, use it for opinions and things rather than recall of factual knowledge.
  • HeyHi’s online whiteboard – a great whiteboard accessible on android and apple devices.  Get learners to add to the board.  Collaborate.

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How IT ALL STARTED
WHAT WE'RE ABOUT
WHO ARE WE FOR?

Bradford VTS was created by Dr. Ramesh Mehay, a Programme Director for Bradford GP Training Scheme back in 2001. Over the years, it has seen many permutations.  At the time, there were very few resources for GP trainees and their trainers so Bradford decided to create one FOR EVERYONE. 

So, we see Bradford VTS as  the INDEPENDENT vocational training scheme website providing a wealth of free medical resources for GP trainees, their trainers and TPDs everywhere and anywhere.  We also welcome other health professionals – as we know the site is used by both those qualified and in training – such as Associate Physicians, ANPs, Medical & Nursing Students. 

Our fundamental belief is to openly and freely share knowledge to help learn and develop with each other.  Feel free to use the information – as long as it is not for a commercial purpose.   

We have a wealth of downloadable resources and we also welcome copyright-free educational material from all our users to help build our rich resource (send to bradfordvts@gmail.com).

Our sections on (medical) COMMUNICATION SKILLS and (medical) TEACHING & LEARNING are perhaps the best and most comprehensive on the world wide web (see white-on-black menu header section on the homepage).

4th February 2024 

WHAT's HAPPENING?

Here are some updates planned over the next 6 months

  1. Updating the SCA exam pages with cases and videos.
  2. Clinical Specialty areas all being updated with current guidance and easy to understand diagrams and flow charts.
  3. Videos being created for some of the pages for those of you who prefer to watch than read.
  4. We’ve got some bradfordvts helpers to contribute and develop their own pages or areas of interest.  If you would like to be a bradfordvts helper, email me rameshmehay@googlemail.com
  5. We provide all of this for free. But it costs us money to run.  If you could kindly donate something, that would be great.  We do all of this for you.   Please hit the button below. xxx