Monday, May 4, 2020

Distance Learning update

You guys? I think we've got this shit figured out. It's a huge team effort, but we finished out last week missing one half of one Khan Academy assignment and short a few minutes in a math facts app. That's a HUGE improvement from where we were. And it also is making me appreciate both the teachers and just how much work this is for the kids. Especially Averson. I'm not here, but when I'm putting her schedule together it conceivably amounts to a little over an hour, but it's the most complex out of all of the kids.

Every Sunday evening, I log into each kid's Google Classroom and hope and pray that their teacher has uploaded assignments. Averson's teachers use Shutterfly (WHY?!), but on the positive side, they're always loaded early and the week is complete. Syd's teacher posts the "week at a glance" with general assignments and zoom topics, but hers is updated daily. Luckily Syd is our most conscientious student so she's good about checking every morning. Eli has a couple classes that I can sketch out, so I mostly focus on Monday for him and then update again on Monday evening. I know it's kind of enabling him and a little helicopter-y, but we needed to know what to be tracking. It was a lot for him to organize himself and MANY things were falling through the cracks. Each kid has a daily schedule, with the corresponding Zoom log in details, and Eli has a breakdown by class as well. 

I also go through and print out all of Averson's worksheets. After a couple weeks of fighting with some of Averson's apps, we finally asked the teachers if we could just print the pages and send pictures. That's made a big difference in her attention and completion. All of her worksheets get put on a clipboard and she works on them at her own pace. Then she just has to take the test on-line. It still feels like she has a lot, but at least it's in a format that makes more sense to her. 

We're on to week 2 (and I'm procrastinating updating my schedules by blogging.) I'm hoping we get into the swing of it, and I'm REALLY hoping we're not distance learning next year (though we will if COVID-19 still feels scary regardless of what the state does.) Word on the street now is that it's going to be a hybrid. Every time I say that my eye twitches a bit more. 

1 comment:

  1. Our grades each send weekly girds, which is so helpful for me, and I make a google doc for each kid everyday and print it out. We also print all of Dorothy and Coop's stuff and take pics-- way more developmentally appropriate anyway. Your plan is a good one!

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