But there’s a way to make online meetings more fun, and this is through the help of Zoom virtual backgrounds. Staying in front of the computer for long hours and being in video conferences all day are now the norm. Work, school, and relationships have greatly benefited from this technological advancement. I am usually the only one with a headset.The interconnectedness brought about by the Internet has allowed people to communicate from anywhere at any given moment. They say I sound more clear on the call than anyone else. (Every time we have a zoom staff meeting a colleague will email me afterward to ask about my headset. The set I had was six years old and not super comfortable, so I borrowed my son's gaming headset and then bought my own. The other thing that helps to have for video calls is a headset with a boom mic. Jen in zoom, with her virtual background and good-ish lighting.

Update: The hooks and binder clips worked great. I think I'm going to mount some hooks to make it easier to put up and take down. Right now I'm using some big binder clips to hang it from the shelves behind my desk. I have one like this. (Affiliate link) It works great.

I happened to have one already and I was glad I had thought to bring it home from my classroom. Virtual backgrounds work much better if you have a green screen. The Gear: (Updated in August 2020 because I found some things I like better.) Note that the full image, and what shows up on Zoom are slightly different. There are much more specific directions from Zoom here. It remembers the backgrounds you add, and you can have more than one. One of the options is to add a virtual background. I find it easiest to do this if I launch a meeting and click the arrow next to the camera icon. To add a virtual background on Zoom you will need to go into your settings in the zoom app. That tweet has turned out to be very popular, so here is a little more info. A back in March I posted a picture of my classroom on Twitter and suggested teachers take pictures of their own classrooms to use as a virtual background on Zoom.

Classroom virtual backgrounds for zoom