One of the goals I've had since before our kids were born was to travel together as a family when they hit a certain sweet spot (able to handle intercontinental air travel; not yet adolescents). Now that we are in the window period, I've had to reconsider how to accomplish the same goals without leaving home.
On the up side, sheltering in place gives us a great deal of time together to spend as a family.
On the down side, sheltering in place gives us a great deal of time together to spend as a family. You can have too much of a good thing.
My imperfections are magnified under the current circumstances:
- My patience is less than what it should be. My fuse can be short and I am quicker to anger.
- I can be resentful of intrusions on what used to be my personal time.
- A sense of apprehension about inadvertently becoming a liability to my family, bringing illness to them, hangs over everything.
Despite these shortcomings, my family needs me more than ever - to teach.
The kids, whose teachers are struggling to adapt to the realities of remote education, find themselves attending online courses 3-6 hours per week, leaving them bored and restless for the balance of that time. So we supplement their school work over their objections, they resist, and we grow frustrated. We're physicians, and while our profession can at times incorporate an element of teaching, this is not our innate strength.
We often act and feel in a contradictory manner that reflects our ambivalence. We want them to become internally driven, yet we push from without when that does not happen.
My wife and I are proud products of public education who paid a premium to live in an area with highly regarded public schools, yet we have never felt more frustrated at how poorly those public schools are responding to this epidemic. Private schools in the area have risen to the occasion by creating 6 hour per day curricula for their students - understandably, since dropping a large sum for online instruction is hard to justify unless you are receiving premium service.
The public schools, in contrast, have displayed wide variability. On one end of the spectrum, standout teachers are recording supplemental video lectures, taking attendance, giving quizzes, providing office hours and continuing classwork at the same pace as before. On the other end, more than one teacher has repeatedly been a no show for 20 kids gathered for a scheduled zoom class.
I realize that mastery of online teaching is an entirely different beast than most teachers have trained for, but with two months to adapt, outright absenteeism cannot be attributed entirely to a dearth of online skills. A few teachers do not have class on Mondays or Fridays, creating three day weekends where non previously existed.
Adding insult to injury, the principal has written parents to inform them that they should expect students to be learning at 1/3 to 1/2 the pace of the material they'd been learning previously. Perhaps I'm missing something, but I'd be embarrassed to publicly announce that children entrusted to my care would be intentionally taught less material, at a slower rate than their peers.
My mom spent her career teaching in public schools. I started out as a public school champion. But perhaps some variant of Gasem's home schooling plan might be in our future.
What I'd attributed to the schools all along might very well have been a function of the students. Get enough driven students from advantaged backgrounds with parents who are involved in their kids' education collected in a single district, and the schools will shine.
The experience has left me feeling mugged by reality (with apologies to Irving Kristol, who coined the phrase with a very different meaning).
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Lowest common denominator. In an adequately funded public district you can have gifted and talented, AP courses for the high caliber students, accommodations for those with disabilities and special needs, and everything in between. In the current environment districts revert to the LCD. My wife is a public school teacher in a well regarded district who would agree with your observations and assessment. Condensed curriculum, P/F grading, variable effort from the teachers and students doing something they really aren’t train to do is the new normal. She did have some interesting observations. Some of her less stellar ADD classroom students are doing much better online, probably due to working on their own time and pace with fewer distractions. Some star students are putting in minimal effort, probably need grades and competition to fuel their efforts. It will be interesting to see how things unfold this fall.
Author
GasFIRE,
Fascinating that your wife has a similar perspective – makes me feel less alone in this problem. I’ll be curious if those ADD kids, who no longer have to sit still in an environment designed to imitate the industrial revolution, will continue to blossom or even decide on a hybrid approach to future school. Similarly, I’m curious if the stars you’d have bet on to ruin the curve under normal circumstances can maintain interest when competition is no longer as palpable. The changing dynamics might just create more curious and self-driven students, which could be a silver lining.
We are considering different options for next year, and if it turns out to be safe to attend, a hybrid approach of partial independent study (assuming we can identify quality online education opportunities). What if the kids took independent study the first half of each day at home, then went to school for lunch and the second half of the day? Social opportunities preserved, while intellectual stimulation can be tailored to individual ability and chosen based on high quality teaching. School would hopefully be incentivized to be flexible because keeping our kids enrolled helps the district to retain funding.
Flight of ideas going on in my head about what next year might look like…
Thanks for weighing in,
CD
My daughter’s private school certainly did create an online curriculum but to be honest it is not challenging her as if she had gone on campus. She now could pretty much complete everything required starting at 1030a or so and finishing by 3. I do try to assign her additional stuff to do to keep her a bit more challenged because I told her that starting 10th grade next year will be a shock to the system (hopefully back on campus) if she sort of gets used to this lackadaisical setup now
Author
Xray,
The private schools locally have been doing a very solid job with the transition, in part because they now have to justify the extra cost since their public school peers are using Khan Academy gratis. My daughter’s friends at least get decent structure and attention, which keeps them from falling behind. My daughter – not so much. Some classes consist of a 5 minute roll call followed by directions to, “Watch the video and take the quiz.” No critical thinking, no discussion, no lesson plan. I get that this is not anyone’s ideal, but I genuinely expected more from the teachers this many weeks into the process.
So we become both parents and part-time home school teachers (sigh).
I’m similarly concerned that the idea of reducing the pace ad quantity of material will simply result in every child left behind.
Like your anxiety over your daughter, what happens when these kids return to school and it’s no longer a Tim Ferriss 4 hours work week?
My kid’s home school curriculum was both extremely challenging and resulted in 32 hours of college credit at an affiliated university institution. My kid did 4 years, but she was able to include a year abroad and advanced work in her major. She entered grad school on a handshake since her undergrad was well known to her graduate department. You are only a prisoner to mediocrity if you choose to be. Covid isn’t going away for 2 years at least.
Author
Two quarters of credit is impressive. Did not realize there was a year abroad included in her undergrad school curriculum, likely thanks to the advanced credits helping her opt out of general ed requirements – that’s quite a perk.
I only went to school to see my friends. The main purpose of the teacher was to let me know which part of the textbook we were working on.
Alas I have always had zero expectations of the education system. For myself or my children.
I would have thoroughly enjoyed this online learning. Aside from missing my friends….
Your kids will be fine CD.
Author
I suspect you are right about this, Dr. MB, but it’s always a bit scary to realize you are climbing without ropes.
The secret to happiness is low expectations…
Thanks for stopping by, my friend.
CD