What I’ve learned about “Distance Learning”

Schools are closed, now what?

It was to my absolute horror when the ministry of education announced that schools were to be shut down until further notice. My anxieties were even further exacerbated when we were told to continue to teach… online. At my school, distance (or remote, or online, or virtual or whatever they’re calling it these days) learning took place mainly for homework and assignments, and I am confident and tech-savvy enough to navigate through the SIS grading and Google systems. However, this — a full-bore transition to pandemic-geared remote learning — is unchartered territory and, as the last few weeks have proven, actually super exhausting.

Here’s a short ride on what the first couple of weeks of the school wide shutdown looked like:

You’re panicking. There are at least a gazillion free and paid teaching resources online and you’re supposed to take a look at all of them, now. Yes, now. Pack all your COVID19 worries away in a box, build a makeshift office somewhere at home (preferably somewhere with access to decent lighting) and get cracking.

It takes you hours to go through them, and when you finally find a strategy or tool that you think will help, you stumble upon another one, and another one, and end up thinking what you have planned isn’t good enough. So you scratch the previous plan you thought was ingenious and stare at the 50 new tabs on your browser as your mind spirals down the hog-ridden rabbit hole of comparing yourself to other educators around the world who have somehow found the light at the end of the tunnel.

Before you know it, you’re in your first Zoom meeting with your kids, and one of them shows off a painting she worked on over the weekend — a modern take on Hakusai’s “Great Wave off Kanagawa”. Another shows the class her latest DIY project — a bleach-dyed tracksuit — and it’s actually super cool. Mohammed reports live from the passenger seat of his driver’s car, “on the way to the chalet miss!”, and Ali finally finds the unmute button on his Zoom app. You never thought you’d say this, but you genuinely miss them all, and — just for a moment — all your worries about online teaching seem so far away now. 

Worldwide, schools are cancelling standardized tests, and announcing that remote learning will take place until the end of the year. Let that sink in. Standardized testing is cancelled. I can finally teach my students without worrying if it’s enough to get them to pass the final test at the end of the year. Temporarily, I am free of the pressures of standardized testing. Could this be an opportunity to return to the teacher I truly am at heart?

Before this pandemic-driven shift in mindset and practice, cramming students everyday with lessons and quizzes was the norm. In retrospect, I felt like I was killing students’ love of learning and my love of teaching. I was exhausted, worn down, and overwhelmed.

Today, I am still exhausted and overwhelmed, but I find comfort knowing that, temporarily, we are free of the pressures of testing. We’ve always said put student relationships and socio-emotional needs first. But somewhere along the way, we were under so much pressure to cram things into the school day to prepare for the quizzes and tests, we lost sight of that.

Now, we can finally be flexible. The new normal is based on what’s actually best for our students. There is no worry of doing things “right”, because there is no “right” way or path. We are creating the path as we go. We get to be pioneers in online education and carve out our own directions. There is nothing and no one to compare ourselves to and we don’t know how things end… (yet). Maybe all those fancy high-tech resources I stayed up until 3 o’clock in the morning scrolling through are not the way to go. Maybe a simpler, low-tech, less elaborate solution might be exactly what students need right now. Now’s the time for me to do what every great teacher does:

1. Try something with the kids.
2. Observe how they respond.
3. Take it from there.

This pandemic is a devastating blemish on their childhoods. It’s springtime, and this global lockdown coincides with the two finest months to go outside and enjoy the weather before the months of hell, (yes May, June, July, and August - I’m looking at you) and they can't go outside and do the things they love. They've been robbed of seeing their friends, playing football during recess, passing their crush in the hallway, a proper graduation ceremony - the list goes on. Their worlds have shifted.

So I guess my advice to any teachers reading would be this:
If you do decide to do something and it totally confuses the kids, do what you always do: pivot. Explain it a different way. Offer clarification, provide a bit more scaffolding, or more opportunities to practice. This is what a great teacher does.

In the classroom, it might have taken 30 minutes to deliver instructions to the class due to everyday interruptions, intercom messages, kids getting up for tissue, or behavior issues. Now, I can record a lesson that’s only 15 minutes and kids can watch it when they can during the week.

Here’s a chance for us to prioritize every child in their entirety — in their art, their crafts, their hobbies, and their boredom — and the same applies for teachers. Yes, this is a difficult time for all of us, but on the bright side, we finally have the time to read, play, create, and rest.