One of the biggest challenges schools face during distance learning is tracking attendance. Often, it’s no longer possible to see who’s actually in the “classroom.” While there’s no universal solution, schools have multiple options when it comes to taking attendance in Sycamore School.
Classroom Activity Assessment
There are many benefits when it comes to Sycamore classrooms. One of those benefits being, teachers have the ability to track classroom activity. Within each classroom, there are Visitor Logs. These logs give a detailed description as to who entered the classroom and when. Teachers would be able to track the date and time each student accessed their classroom. With attendance playing such an important role to the academic process, Visitor Logs are a simple and structured method for teachers to evaluate class attendance.
Participation in Whiteboard Discussions
Whiteboard Discussions can also track students to Visitor Logs, but they take it one step further. Teachers can create a Whiteboard Discussion for every day of the week. When a student writes a comment, the system performs a limited timestamp, but the teacher can easily tell when the student made the comment. Each student that participates in the daily discussion would be marked present, while those students that did not participate would be marked absent.
Instead of just posting the discussion topic with the date, teachers can ask a question of the day with each accompanying post. It could include, “Who is your favorite U.S. President and why?” What book are you reading right now?” “What’s the best thing you learned this school year and why?” These questions are simple, but they encourage students to actively participate in a discussion, and hopefully help the teacher learn more about them along the way.
Record of Last Logins
Teachers also have the means of viewing last student logins. There will be a timestamp within every classroom under Administration | Students detailing each student’s last successful login. This provides teachers an accurate record of students who are actively logging into Sycamore, and those who aren’t. At the end of the school day, teachers could utilize this section of the classroom to mark students present/absent based on their logins for that particular day.
We know that many administrators also like to keep track of student attendance within their school. They are able to access a Student Login Information report of school-wide student logins. This helps ensure students are actively logging into Sycamore during this distance learning period. Administrators also have the ability to view mobile activity with that report, showing when students are logging into the app as opposed to the desktop.
Tracking virtual attendance is an inevitable challenge, but it doesn’t have to be an impossibility! It is our goal and responsibility to provide schools with solutions, but more importantly, we look forward to teachers returning to the classroom as soon as possible to take attendance with young, vibrant and eager students looking on!
To learn more about the tools and resources Sycamore School provides to assist schools in the distance learning process, make sure to schedule a demo and start your free trial today.
