And so it begins….
Day One. Today was the real Day One. The first day of distance learning for my three kids. More accurately, the first day of distance learning for all of us since the burden on parents is tremendous. The end of my daily life as I have known it.
Inspired. The day got off to an amazing start as I woke up at 7am to find my kids sitting around the kitchen table: my fourth grader giving an American history lesson to the Kindergarten twins about the Declaration of Independence and why we separated from England. He was serious about turning our house into school. His brother and sister were sitting in rapt attention – one was already fully dressed and ready for the home school day to begin. While I was explaining the plan for the day, after noting that piano practicing would count as Music, my school ready son dashed to the piano in the back room and began running through his pieces. Not to be outdone, his older brother headed back to the piano and completed his practicing with a perfect version of Pachelbel’s Cannon in D. The beauty of motivated kids.
Requiring Parents to Be Teachers. From the very beginning when the idea of closing schools was discussed there seemed to be little consideration for how the full burden of caring for their children’s care and education was going to be handled by working parents who barely manage to keep up with their children’s homework assignments. These are not parents who planned on homeschooling their children – these are the parents who rely on our public (or private) schools to have experienced teachers educate our children. These are not parents trained in the pedagogy of teaching. When they announced last week that schools would be closed, I had visions of cooking together for Science class, Social Studies lessons about other cultures using dolls from international travel, and exploring the hundreds of childrens books in the house for Reading. Instead, it took hours to try to piece together the various requirements and lesson plans for each of the kids that the homeroom and specials (Art, Music, PE) teachers prepared. And there was figuring out Google Classroom, Meets, Zern, and other websites with logon and password instructions. But for me, the problem was that I’m the type of parent that does not like to give my child educational materials without first reviewing them myself. I’m a parent who has been a (university) teacher and trainer much of my life but I still find this experience overwhelming. I can only imagine how impossible it must be for parents who have no background in education, have more limited computer skills than I do, have less time, and/or for whom English is not their native language.
All Homes Are Not Equal. If good public schools can be the great equalizer, distance learning is the great divider. The problem is not just who has access to a computer – that was the question asked on The Last Day – but whether the access is adequate to meet the new learning needs of all the school-age children in the household. A working computer. Of reasonable processing speed. With reliable internet service. With new enough software to access the programs selected by the teachers to use. And, depending on the age, reading level, and maturity of the children, an adult to provide supervision and guidance throughout the time the child is online. Multiply all that times the number of children in the home.
Becoming a Systems Operator. I consider myself of average competency when it comes to computers. I’m not afraid of them having spent much of my life with my fingers glued to a computer keyboard and mouse. But, that is not the same thing as being a technology instructor for not one, but two kindergarteners – and at the same time. That was the chaotic scene this morning as I tried to get both twins on Google Meets with their respective teachers at the designated 10-11am timeslot while their older brother was holed up doing the same in his room. What works each day when everyone is at school with a full complement of teachers, assistant teachers, support staff, technicians, cooks, and cleaning staff does not work in a busy home environment with all of those jobs assigned to a single over-stretched parent. I can handle (with care) my laptop – but it only takes minutes in the unsupervised hands of my younger kids before disaster strikes. I know I’m not the only parent of a Kindergartener who usually gets by with sharing their own laptop but is now spooked by the prospect of a broken computer in these times when everything is being done online.
Overwhelmed. After a full weekend of togetherness, a school week used to provide five daily blocks of time of 6-8 or more hours a day – when our children are learning, socializing, exercising, fed and being entertained – and when we can work and manage our households.This new kind of learning is effectively an extra full-time job or more depending on how many kids you have. As a mother of three, it means figuring out and explaining the detailed curriculum for the Kindergarten classrooms, supervising a fourth grader with more challenging work assignments, and providing each child with some individualized “mama time” attention and keeping everyone on schedule. Although financially challenging, the fact that I’m mostly on a work hiatus is lucky for me. I can spend the time to try to figure everything out and be present for my children . . . and squeeze out some extra time to help others in little ways I can.
Worked Like a Charm. Sometimes the things you try work out better than you imagined. One was a reminder that with all the Google Meets, the kids’ teachers would be seeing our house when the computer cameras were on so they should keep their rooms and workspaces tidy. For the first time in forever, all beds were made and clutter was kept to a minimum in every room where they were working. A second success was to have learning buddies. Using a team approach helped stave off loneliness and promoted teaching and mentoring skills. My older son set up a second workstation in his room and started teaching each twin one by one some of the skills he had mastered over the past five years at the same elementary school. This was extra special because the kids are otherwise not allowed in his room … and it helped with sibling bonding too!