Many of Kepler’s courses are kicking the academic year off with orientation this week. Others will orientate when the academic year officially begins next week.
Either way, I want to take a moment and welcome our incoming student body as well as families of Kepler students. We’re honored that you would choose Kepler teachers for your educational needs. In this short post, I want to share Five pointers for getting our academic year off to a good start.
The abundance of late registrations and transfers each year dramatically increases our team’s workload for a couple of weeks, just when classes are starting. We’re okay with that as we desire to help everyone we can. But we can improve our workflow by being patient with one another and by being prepared.
Check your spam folder if you’re still waiting on registration confirmation.
Review the class syllabus ahead of time.
Order books and materials early (or as soon as possible).
Print your course schedules and Kepler calendar and post them in a visible place.
Reach out directly to your instructor for course details and canvas login; follow up with the registrar if necessary (registrar@kepler.education).
Schedule a fifteen-minute class login "dress rehearsal" at your earliest convenience. Make sure your student’s laptop is in working order. Is the battery in good condition? Is there a plugin near by? Wifi connection working? Do they need headsets? Find and log into the Zoom Classroom. Test the camera and the microphone. Make sure you have a designated and quiet space for your student to take his or her course.
Kepler uses the “flipped classroom” approach, sometimes called the Oxford or University model. That means students read, watch pre-recorded lectures, and complete written work asynchronously throughout the week; then they meet with the instructor online for their ninety-minute Socratic seminar or recitation. The design has served as an excellent model for a millennia, but the likelihood of failure is predictable when students and families view the live meeting as the beginning of the week's work rather than its conclusion. Set your child up for success by beginning with the end in mind.
Students must use both webcam and microphone (as instructed by the teacher) during class. Even though Kepler is an online course, students must also remember this is a live course. We cannot duplicate the embodied experience a brick and mortar school provides but we can expect an incarnational experience for students. To this point, the student’s face is a large part of what makes the classroom conversation human.
Additionally, just as we would expect in the embodied classroom, students are expected to be clear, polite, interesting, and to the point in live online classrooms.
Finally, in a Socratic discussion, students should expect to disagree with their classmates and their teacher—whose office it is to play provocateur. In such cases they are expected to argue forcefully, rationally, and respectfully, avoiding the ad hominem in all cases. Kepler courses are a civic curriculum in miniature. Students who can dismantle an argument without wounding the person making the argument are succeeding at rational public discourse.
In classical Christian education, the parent is the primary agent in the child’s education. The teacher is not, however, a casual transmitter of content but a model of the paideia life. At Kepler we like to say we are teachers of students rather than teachers of curriculum. Thus, teachers are not the students’ buddy, but an authority in loco parentis who inspires respect by their mastery of the subject and their ability to capture a student's imagination. Teaching so understood is a deeply moral and spiritual vocation.
So, when a difficulty arises, write the teacher before you write anyone else, and write in the assumption of goodwill. Be sure to get both sides of a story before automatically believing slanted news. Kepler teachers promise to do the same with parents. Nearly every problem can be resolved with clear and early communication. If it can’t be resolved at that level, the Dean of Academics is next in the chain of problem solvers.
I hope these five tips will be a help to you and your family as you enter another wonderful year of student formation.
If you still need to register for courses, be sure to secure your child’s seat before the clock runs out. Late registration closes on Monday, August 17th!
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