Day 2: Planning for Remote Learning and Assessment

I have no idea if my insights are worthwhile to anyone but me--most of this seems common sense but in case I can be of any help to anyone else, I'll continue to share my thoughts as things evolve. I expect to share my background soon (as soon as things slow down.....????) but at the moment, next steps seem more immediate. But briefly, I should note for anyone who doesn't know me personally, I am the director/principal of a small middle-high school that serves grades 7-12. I draw on 30+ years as an educator in a wide variety of settings from outdoor and international travel to higher ed to consulting with a bunch of schools where I got to steal a lot of great ideas.

I keep thinking about those big number calculations on how much traffic or smoking costs the country in lost productivity. We should count up the cost of all the school administrators writing largely similar correspondence to families about how we're planning for remote learning and developing plans for food distribution and our teachers are the best in the world, etc. None of us probably have that much else to do, but if it helps save any administrators any time, I'll share some of my correspondence to parents you are free to copy or draw from.

With that said, let me share the thinking on remote learning plans I outlined in our recent weekly newsletter:

Important Information about Plans for this Week and Beyond

We had an incredibly productive day with teachers yesterday and we are genuinely excited about the plans we developed. With all humility that we’ll have to see how things go and there will be inevitable bumps and adaptations, we believe we have a thoughtful, reasonable, and engaging program designed that addresses academic learning and also attempts to support “the whole child”.

We will be sending much more communication soon, but let me lay out a few points here:

• Students at all grades have work for some classes due this week. Parents and students, please be aware that all students should check their Compass e-mail daily, and even more importantly, check daily in Google Classroom for current assignments in all of their classes. We appreciate that this is a strange time of transition, and continuing the flow of existing work will enable us all to move forward together most effectively. 
• Our official remote learning program starts next Monday. Advisors will be sending communication to students and parents by 5:00 Friday with an overview of plans.
• While the overall plan will be fine tuned for different grade levels, the basic outline is that student work will be organized around five required areas: Science, Humanities, Math, Spanish and “Remote Learning Enrichment Opportunities.” The enrichment activities are a buffet of options that we hope accommodate the different situations, interests, and needs of each student. We know some of you may be completely busy caretaking for younger siblings and there is a category for “counting” that towards schoolwork. For others looking for what to do, there are many options from music to movement to mindfulness to learning new things. We’re trying to support students to continue their academic learning while also attending to other aspects that make our lives interesting. 
• Teachers, particularly through advisors, will be figuring out other ways to help students “get together,” to check in, and to continue to support their social-emotional needs.
• Teachers will all have designated “office hours” where they will be available for electronic contact during the week. 
• We are committed to ensuring kids will get an email by noon on weekdays for any work due the next day. For the most part, students will be getting week long plans but students asked for a set time daily to check email so noon is that time.
• Likewise, Our counselor is making herself available to students and parents for counseling support. Our special education staff (and all teachers) are available for individual support. Contact them through email if you have immediate needs. 

Some foundational agreements our staff agreed on included:

* Try to keep as close to what we already did and know--At least as a starting point, use technology platforms already in place (largely the google suite).

* Synchronous learning may be really hard to arrange. We are planning for mostly asynchronous learning with advisors planning to try to arrange more regular synchronous advisory gatherings to check-in and make connections.

* As our school always emphasizes, learning is more than just academics. We want to continue to support kids to engage in other things that make life worth living--nature, physical activity, art, music, play, mindfulness, physical and mental health, handicrafts, learning things you want to pursue....

* We can't replicate or address every single element of our program. We simplified into 5 areas we expect kids to attend to: academics in the 4 core subject areas plus a buffet of options that include health, arts, PE, service, etc.

* Expectations need to be flexible enough to accommodate kids who may have very little available time because they are caring for younger siblings as well as kids who are desperately bored or ambitious and want to go well beyond what we require. So both in the academic work and the buffet of options, we have a minimal level of expectations with extension opportunities to go much further.

* Lastly, we know whatever we plan is going to be imperfect and we can adapt over time. Like tech companies that release software and then iterate to improve performance, we need to not wait until we think we have everything "perfect." We will aim for good enough for now and be open to adapting and improving as we learn together. (A nice perspective on "good enough" schools comes from Wendy Mogel's Blessing of a Skinned Knee.

On report cards and feedback: Coincidentally enough, our mid-semester progress reports were about to be sent home just when we were closing school. It feels like it might be challenging for parents to keep perspective on report cards that reflect on learning from "regular school" that now seems eons ago while at the same time thinking about remote learning ahead. Processing this at home in the current environment may be may be especially difficult for parents of kids who may not be getting the best grades. To frame this for parents, I wrote the following letter to accompany these progress reports that are going home this week:

Dear Parents,

Enclosed is the mid-semester progress report for your child. These were shared with students in early March, which now seems ages ago. 

I encourage you to try to process these with appropriate balance as you are cloistered with your family and we move into this new, uncertain remote learning experience. Progress reports are intended as a check-in at mid-semester to celebrate successes and to identify areas for improvement. We always invite parents to connect with teachers and advisors for conferencing about your child’s progress and to use these as a conversation starter with your child.

Under current circumstances, this is trickier, especially if the progress report conveys some negative results. The progress report is reporting on a different learning environment than we will be now undertaking, so some of the feedback may be not applicable (such as problems coming to class on time or how a child talks with peers in class:). Of course some of the feedback is still quite applicable (such as the need to keep on top of assignments and ask for help when needed). 

Maybe more significantly, we all want your child to approach this new learning environment with positive energy and to find successes. For those who may have been falling short in the first half of this semester, this is a chance for a fresh start. So focusing too much on shortcomings in the report may not inspire confidence or optimism. Likewise, I think especially as we may be in close quarters at home, we benefit in our families from focusing on positive feedback, compliments, and expressions of gratitude. 

I recommend as you process these progress reports, particularly if your child’s performance wasn’t as wonderful as you may have wanted, to take a step back and use this to find areas of (relative) strength and to identify some specific feedback that could help your child be more successful with remote learning, while avoiding extrapolating too much from how your child was doing in “regular school” to how they may do with this new remote learning environment. This really is new terrain for all of us and some students who did less well in regular school may shine now. Likewise, some who thrive normally may find this remote learning environment more challenging. 

Like everything in our current lives, I encourage you to have patience with yourself and those close to you, to approach with optimism the opportunities at hand, and to look for positives wherever possible. 

Thank you for your understanding.

Nuff for now. Be patient and be kind.