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Learning from home with English Stars – top tips for teachers

English Stars 29/4/20

The COVID-19 pandemic has meant that teachers are constantly having to adapt to a changing learning environment. Fortunately, English Stars is jam-packed with handy features that are suitable for online teaching. Try our top tips for using English Stars to support your students learning from home.

Make sure students have their login details. You can find this information on the My Classroom page once your English Stars classroom has been set up by your school’s Class Builder Administrator.

Tip 1: Use the Preparation and Planning resources

Each English Stars year level has a suggested yearly plan, which you may be following already. If you’re new to English Stars, you may like to identify units of work which align with what you already have planned for the year. Go to the Preparation and Planning page and use the yearly plan and curriculum match documents to help you select the appropriate units and modules for the coming term.

We recommend that you teach the modules within each unit in sequence. Modules are often cumulative leading to written assessment such as persuasive essays or information reports, so it’s important that students are introduced to each concept in the correct order to build on prior knowledge.

Tip 2: Unlock the activities

For each set of activities in English Stars, you can use the ‘locking tool’ to control what’s available for your students. Activities are always locked by default. To unlock an activity for your class, click the padlock icon next to each module’s title in the program home page, or above the activity set on each module’s home page.

Tip 3: Direct students straight to an activity using the URL

Navigation in English Stars is intuitive, but you may want to copy the URL of a particular activity to share it with your class. The URL will take students directly to the resource or activity, and will prompt them to log in if they haven’t already.

Tip 4: Let parents know they won’t need to help with marking

Many activities are automatically marked to give students instant verification of answers so they don’t compound their errors, and to save you time so you can focus on other aspects of teaching. Parents may expect they will have to help with the marking, but you can let them know that English Stars’ automatic marking means they’re off the hook!

Tip 5: Know the four module types

Take a moment to understand the different module types so that you can assign the right activity to your class at the right time.

Comprehension modules include a comprehension stimulus, such as an excerpt from a popular book, a video or a persuasive essay exemplar. These modules also include three sets of activities, which allow students to respond at either a Literal, Inferential or Applied level. Encourage parents and students to print the comprehension stimulus so they can read through it together before students complete the online questions independently.

Content modules generally cover a specific grammar concept. Activities are usually automatically marked and streamed, so students can progress through the activities with instant feedback as they go. While they can work independently at any time, keep a watchful eye on the Activity Tracker to identify any students who might need you to intervene.

Task modules require students to write to a text type that has already been taught, so they are great for independent work.

Assessment modules are either an automatically marked test or an assessment task with an interactive rubric. Make sure parents understand that they can’t help out in assessment tasks like they might with day-to-day learning.

Tip 6: Refresh your knowledge on how the built-in differentiation works

If you are new to English Stars you may not realise that there is built-in differentiation. Most English Stars modules include two core activities and an extension activity. All students begin on the first core activity. Students who answer all questions correctly are fast-tracked to extension. Students who have answered questions incorrectly in the first core activity are prompted to have a second attempt at those questions before moving on to the second core activity for consolidation. So all you need to do is unlock the first activity and the rest of it happens automatically while you watch.

Tip 7: Track and review students’ work

Use the Activity Tracker to track student progress through activities in real time as you live stream a lesson. This means you can quickly identify whether students understood the concept taught in the lesson. If you’re asking students to complete tasks at their own pace, use the Activity Tracker to review their performance at a later date.

Use the Assessment Tracker to view and hide assessment results from students. This is helpful when you don’t want some students to see their results before the whole class has had a chance to complete the task, or if you simply want to release results at a later date.

Use the Student and Class portfolios to see valuable data that’s conveniently collated into graphs and tables. Go to the My Classroom page to view assessment results, activity progress and comprehension results at an individual student level, or at a whole-class level. Results for automatically marked tasks are populated as the activities are completed. Here, you can find the instances where you do need to allocate marks.

Tip 8: Provide feedback

Use these English Stars features to give timely feedback to students learning from home.

Leave digital comments for open-ended activities and assessment to provide specific feedback on students’ everyday work, as well as extensive feedback on assessment pieces.

Give Teacher Awards to provide extra encouragement and help student engagement. Students will automatically earn points and awards through the English Stars’ reward system Solar Flair, but getting an unexpected award from you can provide a much-needed boost.

Use the Return/Reset Function to return a student’s work to them, or reset an activity entirely if you’d like a student to start again from scratch. Perhaps you’d like them to improve the work they have submitted, or maybe a student just submitted their work by mistake before it was complete.

Tip 9: Encourage students and parents to use the teaching resources

Many English Stars modules include slideshows and videos. Prompt students to view these during your live-streamed lessons or, where a teaching lesson may not be possible, guide students (or parents) to use the resources for self-paced learning before beginning an activity.

Tip 10: Use the printable worksheets

Every activity is available online or as a printable worksheet. Use the online activities to get the benefit of automatic marking and collation of results in portfolios. Use the printable version if you want them to practise handwriting, or if a device is not available to them. Communicate with parents and students ahead of time so they know which worksheets to print before the lesson.

Tip 11: Use the built-in Help

If you or your students are ever unclear about something, select ‘Help’ at the top of every English Stars page. This handy pop-up contains videos and tips specifically related to the page you’re working on.

Psst! If you like English Stars, you may like to explore our other digital resources. Log in and add a free trial of Sound Waves Online and Think Mentals Digital Classroom to your account and start using these resources in your classroom now!

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