Education Commons, and the Teacher Education and Professional Development Commons

K-12 online learning or virtual schooling has seen substantial growth in the United States over the past two decades. While the practice of virtual schooling has exploded, the availability of research-based best practices to guide teachers working in these environments is lacking. This chapter presents four cases from Michigan Virtual School (MVS) teachers that examine a variety of issues that virtual school teachers face when facilitating K-12 student learning in the online environment, including strategies to provide substantive feedback in English Language Arts, methods for addressing the demonstration of mathematical computations, using Web 2.0 tools to increase interaction in an online environment, and a five-step process for incorporating reading and writing to increase science literacy. Each case follows a similar format, outlining why the problem exists in the virtual school environment, followed by what strategies each MVS teacher uses, and how that strategy is implemented in virtual schooling