Welcome > Introductions

Hi, room for an old jerk here?

<< < (3/8) > >>

RokofAges75:
That does sound challenging trying to plan four different curriculums at once!  Co-teaching can be fun, but I would miss being in charge of my own classroom too.

Thankfully, I'm only responsible for the teaching the in-person kids live.  The kids who are at home have independent assignments I post through Google Classroom, and I just have to check in on them and answer questions if needed, but no live instruction on those days.  That makes it much more manageable.  We're not moving through the curriculum as quickly as if I had them all every day, but I already see a huge improvement in their typing and technology skills, math facts, and other things that I hope will help them down the road.  There are also no behavior problems with a group of 13 students compared to the usual 26.  I could definitely get used to that!

nicksgal:
It's nice because we have different strengths, but then there's the added challenge of also complimenting their classroom teachers while having zero interaction with most of them. And other things like teaching phonics while wearing a mask, that was my favorite last semester.

That's good that you're not live for both every day! First because it feels like two different curriculums to offer both at the same time (I felt like last semester was the hardest I've worked since student teaching when I was doing that plus working 40hrs/week to pay my bills) and second because the kids dialing in to live instruction for other kids is not equitable learning for them. Not to mention, I imagine that would be exhausting for you and self care is so important especially in times like these. Does your district offer a virtual only option or is everyone doing the hybrid model?

I feel like there will be a big asterisk on this year for a lot of things, education included. I wonder if more districts will look at looping or more split age classrooms next year because of this. Right? They're better at zoom meetings than I am! And we thought the Gen Z in college now would be technology experts. One of the kids in my class challenged me to a type off and I thought, I can win this. Which I did, but I only type 67 words a minute? (Though that feels faster than writing typing, but I think that's because your not thinking of the words while you type.) Right? We went down to twelve when the schools Irene back up and it was amazing, time to really give each kid substantial personal attention. Now we're back up again and there's behavior incidents again. So frustrating.

RokofAges75:
Oh yeah, I can't imagine teaching phonics through a mask!  And trying to stay with their classroom teachers without being able to plan with them has to be tough too.

We do offer a virtual-only option, and thankfully, there are other teachers who are responsible for those students so none of us have to try to balance both virtual-only and hybrid.  The tough thing is that they give the virtual-only families the opportunity to come back to hybrid learning after every trimester, so I just got four new students this past week.  Also dealing with kids being quarantined for two weeks at a time is tough.  I've only had one case of actual COVID in my class (he's fine and back at school now, thankfully), but several other kids have had to quarantine due to being exposed or having symptoms but choosing not to get tested.  It's tough trying to keep them caught up.  Like you said, the equity is an issue - nothing I can post on Google Classroom for them to do at home by themselves can totally replace the experience of being in the classroom for a live lesson. 

I think flexibility is going to be key moving forward.  For the next few years, we'll all have to adjust our expectations about what the kids should come into a grade knowing and meet them where they are... which we should be doing already anyway.

nicksgal:
The hardest part of it is my Kinders because all of their teachers are focusing on different things for whole group instruction. I have one still on letter sounds, three on blends, one on "faking it until you make it" reading and writing (I'm teaching them blends because they keep replacing most of them with /v/), and one that has been taught 40 sight words but is still confused about certain blend sounds. It's crazy. I think the hardest for me is that one of them was in my Pre-K class last year and they were just starting to get so many phonics concepts where they would have been ahead and all this just caused such a backslide. I hate that I couldn't do more for them.

I'm glad they have dedicated teachers, but that's crazy that they can pop back into hybrid after each trimester! I hope they're more on par across the board with instruction at the same headed level in the same school. But the classroom community aspect must be tough. I'm glad that you've only had one case and that they're healthy. Did your whole class have to quarantine then or no? Our governor is trying to pass some guidelines that in a classroom you would only have to quarantine if you individually were working x number of feet (I can't remember exact numbers) of the kid for x amount of time and I just don't know how that will work. I get that it's to keep more classrooms open, I don't think anyone is arguing against in person learning being better for kids, but I just feel like it's an outbreak waiting to happen. I wonder if it would be better for the quarantining kids to pop into the full virtual option during those weeks? But then I think about the stress of a new schedule when they're online half the time already and think probably not...

The name of this game is absolutely flexibility and creativity. I'm excited to see what curriculum and assessment innovations may come out of it. And I'm hoping the differentiatio n will be that much better access the board.

nicksgal:
Also, poor Mare and Rose. They've been inundated with shop talk here. Delightful shop talk, but shop talk none the less.

If you both want to skip it, I asked about general life updates and writing updates.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page