Lakota language immersion means that our students are completely immersed in the Lakota language while at school. They learn math, social studies, science, reading, and writing all in Lakota.

Nearpod allows Lakota immersion educators the freedom to develop lessons in the language through entertaining activities for all our students. Nearpod also provides a variety of lessons that educators can save and translate into the Lakota language. Students of all ages access our Nearpod lessons almost every day of the week. Each Lakota language immersion educator has created hundreds of Nearpod lessons over a few years, and we continue to make more every day.

The importance of teaching Lakota language

The history of education and Indigenous peoples must be understood to fully grasp the importance of teaching the Lakota language and teaching Lakota language immersion. Indigenous peoples’ first introduction to the education system was boarding schools built in the late 1800s. Colonel Richard H. Pratt stated the mission of these schools and infamously said, “Kill the Indian, save the man.” Such a short and straightforward statement molded the foundation of the education system society continues to use to this day. Indigenous knowledge systems and languages were silenced due to the education system working to industrialize and assimilate Indigenous peoples.

The effects of that era, which ended in the ’80s, are still prominent in tribal communities. There are only a few thousand fluent Lakota language speakers today. This is a small number compared to over 40,000 Lakota enrolled tribal members. Reimagining the education system through language revitalization has proven successful for all students and educators involved. The Lakota language immersion curriculum is entirely a culture-based education implementing culturally sustaining pedagogy. Through this program, we are working towards guiding this young generation and the ones to follow to be fluent in the Lakota language and knowledgeable of cultural teachings.

How Nearpod helped us jumpstart the curriculum

We, the Lakota immersion educators of Red Cloud Indian School, discovered Nearpod around the summer of 2020, the pandemic’s beginning. The only Lakota immersion curriculum we had developed up to that point was not accessible online. At first, educators were told that this would only last some weeks, so we printed out as much work as possible for students to take home. Since it was so early on in the pandemic, society did not yet know how COVID-19 was transmitted, so continuing to pass out workbooks and activities for families to pick up was not an option. We began searching for online-friendly lessons that could be created and manipulated to use Lakota language words with the goal of developing a virtual curriculum solely in the language. Educators could access interactive sites in English, but finding sites that would allow Lakota language immersion educators to manipulate and create lessons proved to be more difficult.

When discovering Nearpod, our school held meetings online for educators to learn more and help each other become familiar with developing lessons on the platform. At the time of March 2020, I was teaching kindergarten, so my biggest concern was keeping my students engaged while successfully teaching them new concepts. I would share videos I made of myself discussing our worksheets and teaching the curriculum. Eventually, the school required that all teachers host video meetings with their students every day. We were slowly improving as a school and adjusting to online learning. However, teaching the Lakota language and teaching within the language remained a huge obstacle for parents as many did not know the language. A radical change quickly became necessary for students to continue learning and staying in the immersion program.

We decided to develop our curriculum from scratch for better accessibility. My colleagues and I have since developed lessons for kindergarten through fifth grade in all subjects, including language arts, math, social studies, and science. We also developed Nearpod lessons for teaching Lakota language oral proficiency for grades K-4.

Red Cloud Indian School remained virtual for most of the school year of 2021-2022. All educators were required to teach during regular school hours, developing multiple interactive lessons five days a week.

As young as five years old, students learned how to access and navigate Nearpod through school tablets safely distributed before school. Nearpod provides a variety of activities, which helped maintain their focus and curiosity. All the activities are child-friendly, so telling them to press “the big blue button” to submit their work was quickly learned.

Interactive slides, videos, and formative assessment activities

Lakota language immersion educators could introduce a new topic through interactive videos and slides and check for understanding using interactive activities. Nearpod serves as formative assessments, sometimes asynchronous lessons, and teacher-led lessons for our students. Here’s how we formatted our lessons:

• We use interactive slides as an introduction by adding essential information.
• Then, throughout the lesson, we use various interactive activities to keep students engaged and learning. Example: Matching Pairs
• To wrap up, we use Nearpod’s formative assessment tools to check for understanding. Example: Quiz or a Time to Climb activity

One activity, in particular, we were grateful for was Draw It. It serves as an open-ended question activity but allows students to write their responses. For example, in the Draw It instructions section, the educator will provide a question about the lesson, and the students will write the answers. Kindergarten students often use the Draw It activity to trace letters and words and then attempt to write the letters and words independently.

Our younger K-2 students, who still needed to practice and learn to write physically, were able to do so through the use of this activity.

Sharing and organizing lessons with colleagues

The students quickly grew to enjoy Nearpod and the various activities it provides. We educators at Red Cloud Indian School also favor it because we can easily share lessons and edit whatever is shared. Before Nearpod, all the work we created was often lost in our files. It was challenging to remember sharing or finding any curriculum we individually created.

With Nearpod, we can share editable links or share entire folders of our lessons using the library, something we all do weekly. It has been great to share editable links to our lessons. We all teach different grades, so we can use similar content and adapt activities to fit appropriate grade levels. We all enjoy it so much that even after our school transitioned to hybrid and eventually entirely in-person, we continue to use Nearpod in everyday lessons.

Modifying lessons for different grade levels and hybrid learning

Finding resources that adhere to younger grades’ needs is difficult. Still, Nearpod provides a variety of activities that can be adapted for all ages. For K-2 specifically, our educators use the Draw It activity every day to increase writing and drawing skills. Drag & Drop, Matching Pairs, Fill in the Blanks, and Time to Climb all serves as a tool to increase Lakota language fluency and master core curriculum skills and knowledge. Lakota language immersion teaches to South Dakota’s content core standards, so the students are learning skills as every other K-2 student is learning but in the Lakota language. In addition, we focus on Lakota teachings and culture throughout the school year. Grades 2-5 also use Nearpod every day and use the activities just mentioned and utilize Open-Ended Questions, Quiz, Poll, and Collaborate Board.

Teaching Lakota Language adult-level courses

My colleagues and I also teach adult Lakota language classes throughout the school year. In 2020 we chose to make the hybrid courses entirely virtual. The students from various states were not receiving the same materials and attention as those previously in person. This transition was well-received due to many of our students being located throughout the country. Also, our classes have grown now that all materials and lessons are accessible online. It allowed everyone to learn from their homes and do so in interactive ways.

Teaching Lakota language to adults is vastly different from task teaching elementary. Still, we chose to use Nearpod, and the feedback from the adults has been very positive. The lessons in Nearpod are just as engaging for adults as they are for younger students. Nearpod has various lesson launch modes, such as Live, Student-Paced, and Front of Class. Student-Paced mode allows students to go back and review lessons in case they missed class. There are currently four levels of adult Lakota language classes being taught virtually, which are all free. All materials and lessons are provided and are sent to students daily due to the self-paced option Nearpod provides.

My colleagues and I began teaching adults because it became clear as we taught elementary that we would need more Lakota language immersion teachers as our program progressed. We also recognized that while our efforts toward reclaiming and revitalizing the Lakota language through our youth were working, we also wanted to achieve the same goal with older generations.

Our adult Lakota language classes have students as young as 16 and in the age range of the ’60s. Teaching immersion is very different from teaching adults because we are teaching in the language for our immersion program, but for our adult classes, we are teaching them the language. Teaching Lakota language to adults has become a fun and exciting experience, and they thoroughly enjoy all Nearpod activities, particularly Time to Climb.

This activity has served as a release of stress after an entire class of studying and learning. The students see it as a friendly competition, and it serves as a good assessment for us educators to see how well they have retained what was taught in class. Students have expressed their joy in learning the language virtually and are continuously excited to see their own progress every year.

We use every activity offered within Nearpod lessons every week for our adult language classes. We specifically use Fill in the Blanks, Matching Pairs, and Drag and Drop for vocabulary lessons. We use Open-Ended Questions, Draw It, Quiz, and Poll for assessments and activities regarding sentence structures and writing fluency. We also use the interactive slides every class to introduce new concepts and vocabulary. It also serves as instructions for “talking time,” when they are required to speak with each other in Lakota based on a prompt we have provided.

The impact of teaching Lakota Language

Students in our K-5 immersion program and our adult Lakota language classes continue to master their skills. Our K-5 students test at and above the national average in standardized testing, and our students in adult Lakota language classes have significantly improved since we decided to use Nearpod. Students in the highest level of adult Lakota language classes are at different levels of fluency now, and thanks to the self-paced option, students can review and study outside of class hours. Nearpod has been an incredible resource in teaching Lakota people of all ages and reclaiming and revitalizing our Lakota language.

Teaching Lakota language to various ages is challenging, but we are grateful to have found a tool to do so in a fun way effectively. Nearpod has been so valuable throughout the pandemic and virtual education. Educators and administrators worldwide were faced with an obstacle no one had ever experienced before. It was and continues to be a difficult time for many these past few years. Still, our students are resilient, and finding resources such as this has helped our students remain academically challenged and encouraged them to master educational standards. Our students continue to enjoy this platform to this day. We will continue to include Nearpod in our lessons as our Lakota language immersion, and adult Lakota language curriculum grows.

Interested in reading more about this topic? Check out this blog post: Experiential Learning for ELL Newcomers

Elyssa Sierra Concha

Sierra is the Project Coordinator of the Lakota Language Literacy Project K-8 at Red Cloud Indian School. She graduated from Black Hills State University in 2018 with a B.S in English and graduated from Arizona State University in 2021 with a M.A. in Indigenous Education. She taught kindergarten Lakota language immersion for two years and first grade Lakota language immersion for one year.

The post My Nearpod Experience: Teaching Lakota Language appeared first on Nearpod Blog.

My pen pal program for kids was a way for me to incorporate project-based learning and multidisciplinary studies across several classrooms. I also used some traditional methods while also integrating 21st-century learning and technology.

Pen pals for kids: What was the purpose?

Some generations may recall the days when we received personal letters in the mail. Some students may even remember a special friend who they messaged back and forth with like a pen pal across miles. Most K-12 students were born into a world full of technology. They have the capability to text and type to others internationally in an instant. With our world being heavily influenced by technology, typing, and instant messages, handwriting could easily be swapped out and seem like less of a priority in many occurrences. My pen pal program was inspired by creating opportunities, emphasizing connections, and extending beyond the walls of the classroom using both technology and handwriting. International teachers have a unique opportunity to reach out to their home-based connections for a pen pal international experience.

Safe pen pal programs: How did Nearpod help?

Through project-based learning, international pen pal programs allow students to discover and connect with other students and their experiences from the comfort of their classroom. Learners can read and write about the perspectives of students around the world. You can create safe pen pal programs by hosting the lesson through your Nearpod account and/or by having students use their own student accounts.

With Nearpod, you can oversee and guide what students are doing in real-time, so you can always ensure digital citizenship skills are being practiced in a safe environment. Schools usually have different levels of cyber safety for students, especially to support the new norm of flexing between distance learning, hybrid, and in-person learning. The “new normal” of distance learning and more technology may be daunting to some, but Nearpod is one resource that addresses the needs of teachers across the globe. The foundations for a safe pen pals program for kids should be flexible and safe. Nearpod ensures teachers can alter their lessons at any time while protecting students’ privacy and cyber safety.

Merging standards-aligned content with rigorous instructional strategies for students might seem complex at times with the constant changes in the teaching industry. In my pen pal program for kids, young digital global citizens were asking and answering questions while demonstrating their understanding across subjects. We sometimes wrote out the questions in notebooks, and submitted them on a Draw-It or Collaborate Board. Then, I shared the submitted questions with the students so they could see their peers’ responses. This prompted students to edit and revise their written responses.

Nearpod has premade standards-aligned social studies lessons and activities exploring geography and cultural norms that are useful to share with students for international pen pals. It’s beneficial for visual learners to gain perspective on what the location looks like for places around the world as we encourage them to be global citizens. Providing the context around cultural norms and geography help students to compare and contrast the life of their international pen pals with their own and strengthen real-life connection opportunities to their lessons.

Here are examples of how Nearpod features support the lessons:

• Visual Support: VR Field Trips and a hefty library of interactive videos where kids can safely search for where their pen pal international peers are located and gain visual context to prompt ideas for writing. 
• Learning Different Languages: Matching Pairs also helped to support vocabulary for ESL words that the students found challenging with the letters received by their pen pals.

How were students assessed using Nearpod features?

Teachers can check for understanding and guide the learners through the units with Nearpod activities as formative assessments that can provide informal and formal data in reports to track learning with students. Summative assessments can be considered as well as sharing out and reviewing student responses to Open-Ended questions, Collaborate Boards, and Time to Climb activities. Take a peek at what some of the students added in their share to our wrap-up Collaborate Board:

As students are engaged with the content and features, educators can use Nearpod to acknowledge progress and note opportunities to reflect throughout the writing process as students brainstorm, draft, edit, revise and publish their letters. Nearpod can be used throughout or in specific parts of your classroom experiences.

How Draw It can support your pen pal program:

1. Use the Draw It activity to have students interact with their pen pal’s writing to analyze their vocabulary and grammar. 
2. Add an image of the handwritten note or letter as the Draw It background to model and highlight specific parts of the letter, such as vocabulary words and spelling. 
3. Have students follow along on their own devices and highlight modeling on their own screens.

Nearpod features and tips to keep in mind:

• Google Safe Search: Host safe pen pal programs for students by using the Google Safe Search ability on Nearpod’s Draw It activity. Students can search images and add them to their activity with this functionality. 
• Reuse past resources: Have a trusted resource you’d like to use? Convert existing Google slides, PDFs, PowerPoints, and more into a Nearpod slide.
• Gamification: It’s also fun to create Time to Climb questions based on some of the fun and informational responses shared from pen pals. 
• Wrap-Up: For an online celebration, use Collaborate Board for the pen pals to share program highlights. Students miles away can post in the same Collaborate Board in real-time to reflect on the program. This exercise helps build community amongst students and their pen pal classmates.

Building a community with fellow teachers: How to find pen pals

Participating in Nearpod’s community offers opportunities to collaborate with amazing educators around the world and allowed me to collaborate and enhance this pen pal program for kids. Connecting with other educators in the Nearpod community allowed me to expand the possibilities for their pen pal activities using Nearpod content and features.

Thanks to Nearpod’s Camp Engage professional development sessions, I was able to connect with a fellow Nearpod PioNear who teaches the same grade level. Attending Camp Engage is a great way to hear from and collaborate with teachers who are interested in using Nearpod content and activities in exciting new ways. These teachers were happy to join the program as well and agreed to receive the handwritten notes from my students and have their students respond.

I shared my unit plan ideas and suggestions on how we could use technology and Nearpod to support the learning objectives- hence, my pen pal program for kids came to life! Through handwriting, technology, and Nearpod, a creative synergy was made. The pen pal program was a success!

Meaningful learning experiences for students

Some experiences impact students for years to come. Along with the memories of being thrust online with recent world events, my pen pal for kids program allowed students to use their pencils and notebooks along with their computer screens. The smiles the students had when they completed their writing, sent their letters, and saw their pen pals for kids program buddies is a memory they may have for years to come! It was endearing to hear the administrators of the schools reminisce about these creative writing opportunities.

Not only was their joy and charisma in the speaking and listening efforts for the students, but the reading and writing challenges for the students came along with an additional reward that they used then and can carry with them. Nearpod was an excellent choice to create lessons while providing the flexibility to support instructional strategies.

Teaching writing and grammar to our students using project-based learning ideas like a pen pal program provides an interactive, engaging, and inspiring experience for students that we will always cherish. Striving to fulfill unit requirements and keeping students engaged can be achieved through a pen pal model program for kids. So get those pencils and notebooks back out and plug in your school devices. Use Nearpod for activities and features that support your grade level objectives by creating a pen pal program for kids!

Interested in reading more about this topic? Check out this blog post: 5 Student voice tips for teachers to encourage passive learners

Shavonne Morgan

Tech-savvy international educator, Nearpod PioNear, and lover of literacy encouraged by sharing ideas and strategy for the profession that teaches all other professions.

The post My Nearpod Experience: Pen pals for kids appeared first on Nearpod Blog.