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Covid and School This Fall (1 Viewer)

Online school started today, apparently there are already countywide technology issues with getting into Zoom calls, etc.  My kids are at my ex-wife's place so I don't know how they've been managing so far.

 
My son's online school has been disastrous for some families so far -- today is the first day. They've done a shoddy job of communicating schedules to kids ... lots of kids are supposed to get on Zoom calls but don't know who their teachers are, the Zoom information, nothing.

Oh, and the school hosts a website that's supposed to be the one-stop-shop for the middle-school kids' Zoom class links. How's that working? The school-assigned laptops block that site  :doh:  I saw that last night and was able to look at the links on my work computer and email them to my son. But still ... that's a giant whiff. And the school was hoping they could just tell everyone to just "Go to the Virtual Hallway to link to your child's classes!" Ehhh ... gotta get it working first.

I did a lot of researching over the weekend to at least make sure he had links to his classes (I found 4 of his 5 Zoom links, one is a longshot "maybe" that would conflict with a printed schedule if it pans out). But if any parents/guardians weren't able to do the detective work I did ... they are pretty lost today.

 
My son's online school has been disastrous for some families so far -- today is the first day. They've done a shoddy job of communicating schedules to kids ... lots of kids are supposed to get on Zoom calls but don't know who their teachers are, the Zoom information, nothing.

Oh, and the school hosts a website that's supposed to be the one-stop-shop for the middle-school kids' Zoom class links. How's that working? The school-assigned laptops block that site  :doh:  I saw that last night and was able to look at the links on my work computer and email them to my son. But still ... that's a giant whiff. And the school was hoping they could just tell everyone to just "Go to the Virtual Hallway to link to your child's classes!" Ehhh ... gotta get it working first.

I did a lot of researching over the weekend to at least make sure he had links to his classes (I found 4 of his 5 Zoom links, one is a longshot "maybe" that would conflict with a printed schedule if it pans out). But if any parents/guardians weren't able to do the detective work I did ... they are pretty lost today.
Sadly enough, this is us (though no blocking going on here).  Just the sheer amount of super sleuthing parents had to do.  The school is all over social media, but they didn't post all the things to all the different sites, so it was like an easter egg hunt to find information.  

 
Sadly enough, this is us (though no blocking going on here).  Just the sheer amount of super sleuthing parents had to do.  The school is all over social media, but they didn't post all the things to all the different sites, so it was like an easter egg hunt to find information.  
Ditto.  It's been this way for years, and every single time I get one of those parent feedback forms, I answer the same way, that parents need a single web page for each child with pertinent information.  Still hasn't happened.  Instead, they blast out 15 e-mails a day, mostly repeats, with info on all 9 schools intermingled.  I end up spending 30+ minutes a day just to cull out the crap that doesn't apply to my kids, then another hour or more a week to find the additional info that they didn't send.  Remote learning has then exacerbated this problem.

 
Ditto.  It's been this way for years, and every single time I get one of those parent feedback forms, I answer the same way, that parents need a single web page for each child with pertinent information.  Still hasn't happened.  Instead, they blast out 15 e-mails a day, mostly repeats, with info on all 9 schools intermingled.  I end up spending 30+ minutes a day just to cull out the crap that doesn't apply to my kids, then another hour or more a week to find the additional info that they didn't send.  Remote learning has then exacerbated this problem.
:lol:

We only deal with 2 schools - but all the schools in the district use the same system to send out mass e-mails, so they all come from the same email address, and there is usually no indication about the school or the student involved in the email.

 
Sadly enough, this is us (though no blocking going on here).  Just the sheer amount of super sleuthing parents had to do.  The school is all over social media, but they didn't post all the things to all the different sites, so it was like an easter egg hunt to find information.  
I think any and all official school business for all districts everywhere, public and private, should be forbidden from using Facebook or other popular social media as a source for official info. For one -- no, everyone is not on Facebook. For two, people shouldn't have to join a social media site like just to receive fundamental, necessary school information. People avoid those sites for very good reasons.

If you, as a school administrator, have to disseminate official information online, do it with a purpose-built website for your school. No piggy-backing social media.

 
Doug B said:
I think any and all official school business for all districts everywhere, public and private, should be forbidden from using Facebook or other popular social media as a source for official info. For one -- no, everyone is not on Facebook. For two, people shouldn't have to join a social media site like just to receive fundamental, necessary school information. People avoid those sites for very good reasons.

If you, as a school administrator, have to disseminate official information online, do it with a purpose-built website for your school. No piggy-backing social media.
As part of the myriad of polls we took this summer, one of the questions that came up was how do you want to get official announcement - facebook was definitely one of the options, there might have been one for twitter also.

I don't know the results - but I suspect more than a few people wanted facebook announcements.

I do think that in today's world, schools should be thinking about how best to reach their stakeholders, and it might extend beyond a school/district website.  (It also should not be hard to develop a delivery system that posts the exact same information on multiple outlets.)

 
Doug B said:
I think any and all official school business for all districts everywhere, public and private, should be forbidden from using Facebook or other popular social media as a source for official info. For one -- no, everyone is not on Facebook. For two, people shouldn't have to join a social media site like just to receive fundamental, necessary school information. People avoid those sites for very good reasons.

If you, as a school administrator, have to disseminate official information online, do it with a purpose-built website for your school. No piggy-backing social media.
Preach it brother....the most bizarre part of this whole thing is our school has a REALLY GOOD web page that they could EASILY manage all this stuff through.  It was really baffling to see them take this approach when they had that resource at their disposal.

 
I would personally choose facebook since i check it daily but i can see why a few folks would be against the idea.  It shouldn't be too hard to just copy what you're adding to one source and add it to another but I also realize there's a lot of factors in play here.  

 
Finally got our schedules for our 4th and 8th graders, here in NYC public school. 

Of course their cohorts are different, so they are never both in school (different schools) at the same time. Going to be great for my wife who will now be essentially stuck at home.

Kids will be live in school 5-8 days per month. No clue at all how remote works, either for blended or full remote.

This is going to be a giant mess, with 1 million kids going back to school in less than two weeks.

Plus...nobody has said how high school admissions will work- at all. Chancellor has said repeatedly that they're trying to sort the back to school thing first and will get to admissions later. This is the same guy who wants to submarine the standard, screened admissions process for high performing schools (typically assessed by grades, tests, attendance, essays) and make everything a lottery. He's going to back door the crap out of this and leave all the high performing kids...and there are lots...####ed.

 
Whoa.

Just got word start of school has been pushed back 2 weeks.

Hopefully they have some of those answers by then.

 
:lol:

We only deal with 2 schools - but all the schools in the district use the same system to send out mass e-mails, so they all come from the same email address, and there is usually no indication about the school or the student involved in the email.
Reminds me of last school year when we went virtual, got a couple of automated calls saying "your student did not check in to..."  Wife asking all three kids if they missed anything, having to call the school to ask which kid they were talking about.  I think both times it turned out no one had actually missed anything.   :wall:

 
Reminds me of last school year when we went virtual, got a couple of automated calls saying "your student did not check in to..."  Wife asking all three kids if they missed anything, having to call the school to ask which kid they were talking about.  I think both times it turned out no one had actually missed anything.   :wall:
This just reminded me of a glitch we had a week ago Friday (the first Friday back in our district).

We got the call that our kid was marked absent. Actually got it for both the high school and middle school. Key thing - kid's name not mentioned in the message, just said your student, they usually have the name automated in the message for those with multiple kids.

Buzz started growing as tons of people got the call. Parents talking about yelling at their kids, etc. Turns out, system glitch, anyone that was marked present at all their classes got a call. If they were marked absent, they didn't get a call.

One of our friends said they hollered at their middle schooler since they got a call, felt bad after the fact since they swore up and down that they were at all their classes. They did not get a call for their high schooler.  🤔

 
Kid started yesterday remotely.  Reports are it went smooth, no glitches for any of the classes.  Not a lot of teaching, more just intos and making sure everyone was there.

District also looking to move to the hybrid in a couple weeks with OC off the list, provided it stays that way.  I believe there will be 2-3 blocks of kids, 2 hours on campus a day.  Curious how this will work, getting kids to and from school in time for their blocks then back home for online classes.  We'll see 

 
My boys are once a day at school and 4 days home. It’s week 3 and it’s gotten better although one teacher’s still having issues with online quizzes. The first week was a #### show. Luckily my youngest is in middle school so no college type grades to worry about. He’s got two Cs and three As. He’s in a sophomore math class an 8th graded and his teacher is awful. She’s so strict and I still don’t get half the things he’s gotten wrong. She’s given out so many assignments that it is hard to keep track off. Two and a half weeks and there are over 70, just counted, records on her Canvas page in at least a half dozen sections. You have to do a daily quiz with 4 questions. 1 wrong, C, 2 wrong and you fail. I’m going to spend time reviewing them because I’ve seen multiple where the answer is identical and he got it wrong. It’s ridiculous and she doesn’t seem to care, just sent out an email about losing points for anything late now that it’s week 3. 11 days in with 7 things per day and you are going to get stricter. They aren’t learning anything from the teacher. It’s assignments and then Q&As. Barely any time going over concepts. I told him just get at least a B since it shows up on his HS transcript even if it’s not counted.

It’s tough on parents to make sure kids are being responsible but when you answer stuff correctly but it’s marked wrong online when it would be correct in person, that’s really frustrating. 

 
Here in Virginia W&M, JMU, and VT started already.  UVA started but only online and freshmen are supposed to arrive this Friday.  JMU already decided to send kids back home.  All schools have like 150-400 confirmed cases already, including UVA.  you have to assume more have it.  I mean, apartment or dorm it's gonna spread just like flu, cold, mono and other close proximity infections.

So here's my serious question...

Why not keep them at college?   From what I can tell nobody has died.  There don't even seem to be any hospital stays reported.  So about 2% of students are known to have it, and it's no big deal.  Perhaps the safest place for these kids is around each other? 

ETA :  I've had friends die from it.  Others infected, including some teens.  I've seen what it can do.  But these kids seems to be fine if they are essentially isolated from spreading it to and from older people.

My opinion is they go and stay, or they don't even go at all.  What's the point of sending infected 17-22 years olds back into the community.

 
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Here in Virginia W&M, JMU, and VT started already.  UVA started but only online and freshmen are supposed to arrive this Friday.  JMU already decided to send kids back home.  All schools have like 150-400 confirmed cases already, including UVA.  you have to assume more have it.  I mean, apartment or dorm it's gonna spread just like flu, cold, mono and other close proximity infections.

So here's my serious question...

Why not keep them at college?   From what I can tell nobody has died.  There don't even seem to be any hospital stays reported.  So about 2% of students are known to have it, and it's no big deal.  Perhaps the safest place for these kids is around each other? 

ETA :  I've had friends die from it.  Others infected, including some teens.  I've seen what it can do.  But these kids seems to be fine if they are essentially isolated from spreading it to and from older people.

My opinion is they go and stay, or they don't even go at all.  What's the point of sending infected 17-22 years olds back into the community.
Close proximity = greater spread.  Greater spread means more people will suffer more severe consequences.

 
Kid started yesterday remotely.  Reports are it went smooth, no glitches for any of the classes.  Not a lot of teaching, more just intos and making sure everyone was there.

District also looking to move to the hybrid in a couple weeks with OC off the list, provided it stays that way.  I believe there will be 2-3 blocks of kids, 2 hours on campus a day.  Curious how this will work, getting kids to and from school in time for their blocks then back home for online classes.  We'll see 
So I must have jinxed it since the tech had some issues yesterday.  One teacher in particular kept freezing or getting logged out.  Seems this will be a week of testing and getting to know you stuff.

Also, CA changed the system for rating counties, so OC is back on the list sort of, but all it really means is the move to hybrid is pushed back a week or two. 

Yesterday's email:

"Governor Gavin Newsom and state health officials have instituted a new color-coded, four-tiered system for monitoring the spread of COVID-19 based on rates of new cases and the percentage of positive tests in counties. The tiers are designated by colors: Purple, Red, Orange and Yellow.  In order to slow the spread of COVID-19, each tier carries restrictions on activities in a county. This new monitoring system went into effect Monday, August 31. 

While the COVID-19 data in Orange County continues to move in the right direction, Orange County has initially been placed in the State’s Purple tier, the equivalent to being on the State Monitoring List under the previous tracking system. In order to move to the less restrictive Red tier, Orange County’s COVID-19 numbers must meet the lower tier’s thresholds for 14 days. Even though Orange County’s COVID-19 numbers continue to improve and already meet the Red tier requirements, the state and the Orange County Health Care Agency (OCHCA) have indicated that Orange County is expected to transition to the Red tier on Tuesday, September 8 and we must remain there for 14 days before schools will be allowed to reopen for modified in-person instruction on Tuesday, September 22.

Middle Schools will reopen in an AM/PM Hybrid Schedule on Tuesday, September 22"

 
So I must have jinxed it since the tech had some issues yesterday.  One teacher in particular kept freezing or getting logged out.  Seems this will be a week of testing and getting to know you stuff.

Also, CA changed the system for rating counties, so OC is back on the list sort of, but all it really means is the move to hybrid is pushed back a week or two. 

Yesterday's email:

"Governor Gavin Newsom and state health officials have instituted a new color-coded, four-tiered system for monitoring the spread of COVID-19 based on rates of new cases and the percentage of positive tests in counties. The tiers are designated by colors: Purple, Red, Orange and Yellow.  In order to slow the spread of COVID-19, each tier carries restrictions on activities in a county. This new monitoring system went into effect Monday, August 31. 

While the COVID-19 data in Orange County continues to move in the right direction, Orange County has initially been placed in the State’s Purple tier, the equivalent to being on the State Monitoring List under the previous tracking system. In order to move to the less restrictive Red tier, Orange County’s COVID-19 numbers must meet the lower tier’s thresholds for 14 days. Even though Orange County’s COVID-19 numbers continue to improve and already meet the Red tier requirements, the state and the Orange County Health Care Agency (OCHCA) have indicated that Orange County is expected to transition to the Red tier on Tuesday, September 8 and we must remain there for 14 days before schools will be allowed to reopen for modified in-person instruction on Tuesday, September 22.

Middle Schools will reopen in an AM/PM Hybrid Schedule on Tuesday, September 22"
Our Superintendent (Orange Unified) sent a similar message earlier today, however was non-committal on returning on September 22nd, just said that was the earliest possible date if all numbers continued on the downward path, but school boards would still need to vote on what makes the most sense regarding return to in person. They've already said elementary schools would be the first to go back as that is the easiest to implement. Middle and High school are a lot more complicated because of having different students in different classes with a mix of students coming back vs. staying online. Essentially they would quite likely have to rework a large number of kids schedules so that the in person classes did not exceed social distancing guidelines, but also had enough students in each class to warrant having a classroom used.

 
Our Superintendent (Orange Unified) sent a similar message earlier today, however was non-committal on returning on September 22nd, just said that was the earliest possible date if all numbers continued on the downward path, but school boards would still need to vote on what makes the most sense regarding return to in person. They've already said elementary schools would be the first to go back as that is the easiest to implement. Middle and High school are a lot more complicated because of having different students in different classes with a mix of students coming back vs. staying online. Essentially they would quite likely have to rework a large number of kids schedules so that the in person classes did not exceed social distancing guidelines, but also had enough students in each class to warrant having a classroom used.
Los Al had their waiver approved so elementary schools can go back to in-person.  I think its hybrid model, but not sure since I don't have a kid that young.  Seems our district is pushing to go back the first avail day so if they qualify for the 22nd, they will be back then.  I would rather see them go a month or two of online before making the change.  Just when they get into the online routine and things are smooth, they are going to change.  Plus if the OC status changes.... 

 
Los Al had their waiver approved so elementary schools can go back to in-person.  I think its hybrid model, but not sure since I don't have a kid that young.  Seems our district is pushing to go back the first avail day so if they qualify for the 22nd, they will be back then.  I would rather see them go a month or two of online before making the change.  Just when they get into the online routine and things are smooth, they are going to change.  Plus if the OC status changes.... 
And based on what we have seen in other areas of the country (and in other countries), more than likely quite a few of the schools that open will need to close down shortly after re-opening because there will be outbreaks. 

 
And based on what we have seen in other areas of the country (and in other countries), more than likely quite a few of the schools that open will need to close down shortly after re-opening because there will be outbreaks. 
True, I am just hoping with the mask mandate and the protocols they've put in place this won't happen.  

 
two days in with my 4th grader and it's clear the school district did little to no planning.

we're remote learning for now. so far her teacher has sent two 5 minute videos in the morning. that's it. there hasn't been any other direction or instruction. 

two videos saying "hi! have a great day!"

we've heard from parents in other districts that their kids are doing full time zoom school right out of the gate. 

 
two days in with my 4th grader and it's clear the school district did little to no planning.

we're remote learning for now. so far her teacher has sent two 5 minute videos in the morning. that's it. there hasn't been any other direction or instruction. 

...

we've heard from parents in other districts that their kids are doing full time zoom school right out of the gate. 
With my son's middle school ... they've had technical issues knock out entire Zoom class periods each of the last two days. I do wish they'd at least submit supplemental and simple busywork that the kids can work on when the Zoom classes are down.

Just guessing ... but I'm getting the feeling that a lot of districts took the robustness of online meetings for granted. That Zoom or whatever would "just work" and that technical issues were the least of their worries, way behind content creation and presentation skills. Ergo, no dress rehearsals during the summer. Then again ... maybe the first week of school kind of IS the dress rehearsal :shrug:  

 
And based on what we have seen in other areas of the country (and in other countries), more than likely quite a few of the schools that open will need to close down shortly after re-opening because there will be outbreaks. 
Over a month of in person school, and not one school (or class) has shutdown in our district.  Distancing when able and the use of masks is all it really takes.  I couldn't imagine my kids getting anything useful out of distance learning or a hybrid schedule. 

 
Over a month of in person school, and not one school (or class) has shutdown in our district.  Distancing when able and the use of masks is all it really takes.  I couldn't imagine my kids getting anything useful out of distance learning or a hybrid schedule. 
Where are you?  Cleveland?

 
Day 6 of "hybrid" plan today.  At least 50% of district parents have opted for full remote rather than hybrid model.  So far, the first five days have included:

Day 1 - Received e-mail the night before that they weren't ready, school cancelled for day 1.

Day 2 - Live streaming not ready, remote learners were sent an e-mail the night before or morning of (depending on grade) with "asynchronous activities to complete".  Those activities, for all grades, consisted of 1) circle the appropriate emoticon face representing how the student feels, and 2) a five-minute slide presentation reviewing why circular columns are stronger than square or triangular columns.  Parent at one of the elementary schools sent her children to school, although one of the two children had recently tested positive.  To date, school district has not acknowledged this or informed parents.

Day 3 - Live streaming not ready, remote learners were sent an e-mail the morning of with more async activities.  For fifth-graders, those activities consisted of watching a 20-minute knockoff of Mister Rogers, more suitable for 3-year olds.  Note, school-distributed Chromebooks unable to login, although personal devices can login.

Day 4 - Live streaming is live!  Whoops, school-distributed Chromebooks still unable to login, but personal devices can access live stream.

Day 5 - Live streaming live, and Chromebooks able to login.  Live streaming was used for approximately 80 minutes, instead of the full 6.5 hour school day.  The rest of the time, remote learners were instructed to read on their own.  Received an e-mail from school that one child was marked absent.  Replied to the school that child was attending via the live streaming, asked what child was supposed to do in order to ensure that attendance was recorded properly.  Received reply from person in charge of attendance that record was corrected for that day, but she is unsure how child is supposed to properly record attendance.

It's reasonably clear that no planning or testing was done over the past 5+ months.  Teachers are trying their best, but they haven't received the tools needed from the district or administrators.

 
And so it begins...

Started in person (only about 10% elected to do online) about 3 weeks ago.

We have 3 year old twins that started K3 and love it. Over the weekend, their teacher tested positive so K3 is in quarantine for 2 weeks.  While I work from home.  Ugh.

8th grader says nothing has happened in her class but the 11th grader (different campus) said 1/2 the freshman class got sent home - the K3 teacher mentioned above has a freshman daughter and she now is positive.  

Only a matter of time before my kids all bring it home.  Yay.

 
Doug B said:
With my son's middle school ... they've had technical issues knock out entire Zoom class periods each of the last two days. I do wish they'd at least submit supplemental and simple busywork that the kids can work on when the Zoom classes are down.

Just guessing ... but I'm getting the feeling that a lot of districts took the robustness of online meetings for granted. That Zoom or whatever would "just work" and that technical issues were the least of their worries, way behind content creation and presentation skills. Ergo, no dress rehearsals during the summer. Then again ... maybe the first week of school kind of IS the dress rehearsal :shrug:  
based on what we've heard on the grapevine, the teachers are just as upset about how school prep was handled as the parents are.

our district sent out surveys and polls about 3 weeks ago with various questions regarding how we'd like to see school handled.  then a week after that sent a follow-up with the finalized plan, that included "full remote" or "full in person"... which were 2 of the 5 options presented.

we didn't have any information regarding teachers, schedule, etc. until Thursday last week for my youngest.  

my oldest starts on Tuesday next week & all we have for her is a Chromebook and a link to a website where she's supposed to login and all of her classes will be available.  which classes those are, or who will be teaching them (if anyone??) has not been made clear to us yet.

 
I would expect any distance learning fist week of school to be pretty light on content. Even when I took online masters classes, the first week was always getting familiar with procedures, getting to know each other and making sure everyone was logging in and ready. We are going live next week and I feel pretty ready but I am sure many of the General Ed teachers who don’t have a tech background are going to be a disaster. 

 
That said, we seem better prepared than most of what I see here. Tech is no issue, going live won’t be an issue. My worries are just teachers not designing high quality online instruction, not understanding learning management systems, making basic tech mistakes in presenting, be really boring with presentations and struggling to manage the kids “live”.

 
We didn't have any information regarding teachers, schedule, etc. until Thursday last week for my youngest.  

My oldest starts on Tuesday next week & all we have for her is a Chromebook and a link to a website where she's supposed to login and all of her classes will be available.  which classes those are, or who will be teaching them (if anyone??) has not been made clear to us yet.
If this is a school-assigned Chromebook, double-check in advance that that "link to a website" can be opened and is not blocked on that Chromebook. Based on my own experience and Rich Conway's account a few posts up ... school-assigned laptops are probably locked down super-tight, and even school-approved (or even school-created!) websites may be blocked.

To be slightly more technical: I think virtually the entire Internet is blacklisted on my son's school-assigned Chromebook ... just a handful of school-approved educational sites, a stripped-down version of Google Search, etc. are whitelisted. I think his school just never got around to whitelisting new sites they built hurriedly during mid-August or so.

 
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That said, we seem better prepared than most of what I see here. Tech is no issue, going live won’t be an issue.
No concerns with "no one knows why" Internet outages? That's how my son's school is couching it: "You know ... the Internet just goes down sometimes."

Admittedly ... it would probably take cash and time to make the school's web access more robust.

 
Rich Conway said:
Day 3 - Live streaming not ready, remote learners were sent an e-mail the morning of with more async activities.  For fifth-graders, those activities consisted of watching a 20-minute knockoff of Mister Rogers, more suitable for 3-year olds. 
You wouldn't want to do it every single day in place of instruction ... but there are tons of educational videos online that are well worth the time to view. Appropriate for all age groups, all subject matter. My son's 7th grade science teacher last school year sent us a site with a lot of self-directed exercises centered around videos on different science topics. One I can recall that was really cool was sort of an abridged version of "Earth Without People" -- my son was into that one and wrote a nice essay about his response to the concepts presented.

 
If this is a school-assigned Chromebook, double-check in advance that that "link to a website" can be opened and is not blocked on that Chromebook. Based on my own experience and Rich Conway's account a few posts up ... school-assigned laptops are probably locked down super-tight, and even school-approved (or even school-created!) websites may be blocked.

To be slightly more technical: I think virtually the entire Internet is blacklisted on my son's school-assigned Chromebook ... just a handful of school-approved educational sites, a stripped-down version of Google Search, etc. are whitelisted. I think his school just never got around to whitelisting new sites they built hurriedly during mid-August or so.
hadn't thought of that, to be honest, but you're right.  she had a Chromebook last year and it was only able to access the school's intranet. 

guess we'll test this new website out and see if it actually works

 
Rich Conway said:
Day 3 - Live streaming not ready, remote learners were sent an e-mail the morning of with more async activities.  For fifth-graders, those activities consisted of watching a 20-minute knockoff of Mister Rogers, more suitable for 3-year olds. 
You wouldn't want to do it every single day in place of instruction ... but there are tons of educational videos online that are well worth the time to view. Appropriate for all age groups, all subject matter. My son's 7th grade science teacher last school year sent us a site with a lot of self-directed exercises centered around videos on different science topics. One I can recall that was really cool was sort of an abridged version of "Earth Without People" -- my son was into that one and wrote a nice essay about his response to the concepts presented.
I'm not opposed to a video now and then.  Perhaps I should have clarified, "those activities consisted, in their entirety for the day, of watching a 20-minute video..."

 
No concerns with "no one knows why" Internet outages? That's how my son's school is couching it: "You know ... the Internet just goes down sometimes."

Admittedly ... it would probably take cash and time to make the school's web access more robust.
Certainly could be an issue. That’s out of our control. I don’t recall us having internet issues the last few years outside of a few minutes here or there. Ofcourse a power outage or something will stop things dead in its tracks but we have increased our bandwidth by 10x and have done in district PD with every teacher in the building all on the same video call at once without issue. 

 
I'm not opposed to a video now and then.  Perhaps I should have clarified, "those activities consisted, in their entirety for the day, of watching a 20-minute video..."
No, I understand -- I was thinking your problem was more the age-appropriateness than the fact that a video was assigned.

I mean ... was I the only kid that loved it when teachers whipped out the old-school slide projector? * BEEP! * between each slide, queued up to a little Radio Shack cassette player? The teachers pet was usually the one who got to drive the projector and advance the slides. Ah, good times, good times.

One of my teachers had gotten a set of educational slides -- completely serious science-class material -- about various paranormal interests. I remember seeing, in class, filmstrips about Bigfoot sightings, the Loch Ness monster, the Yeti, various UFO encounters, déjà vu, etc. Apparently, that stuff was taken a lot more seriously in the 1970s than they are today. 9-year-old me was completely fascinated.

Moral of the story: Videos are great! Just make sure they're vetted and aimed at the right audience  :)  

 
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That said, we seem better prepared than most of what I see here. Tech is no issue, going live won’t be an issue. My worries are just teachers not designing high quality online instruction, not understanding learning management systems, making basic tech mistakes in presenting, be really boring with presentations and struggling to manage the kids “live”.
It is unfortunate that there is such a wide disparity in how prepared schools are - as I noted above, even in our school district we can see the differences in schools.

Our younger daughter is getting a great education - albeit remotely.

Our older daughter is getting some stuff to do.

 
gobrowns33 said:
Over a month of in person school, and not one school (or class) has shutdown in our district.  Distancing when able and the use of masks is all it really takes.  I couldn't imagine my kids getting anything useful out of distance learning or a hybrid schedule. 
That's definitely encouraging. I'd like to think that we could accomplish the same here.

I guess like some of the other posters, we are fortunate that thus far all of our schools and the kids teachers have made very good efforts at maximizing the remote learning. All are engaged in Zoom or Google classroom meetings throughout the day, are getting to engage with their teachers and classmates and so far have been adjusting fine to the more rigorous online model compared to the Spring (which admittedly they did fine with).

 
It's amazing how NYC's administration and teachers union has handcuffed public schools ability to plan this out usefully.

Just finished our 8th graders middle school meeting. So many things still uncertain that could/should have been figured out a long time ago. So now we are pushed back two weeks so they can finally get off their collective asses and prepare. 

8th grade floppinho is doing blended- 5 days in person every 3 weeks. The school will attemp to live stream/teach the in-class day to the remote kids, so they'll all get the same exact teachers, lessons and days. Small school, so fingers crossed that it works. 

Right now they're not even allowed to leave their desks in order to maintain 6'. No outside, no nothing. We'll see how that works.

 
My 9-year old's PE teacher wants them to follow along with a youtube exercise video. Of course, with her being being signed into chrome with her google child account, google won't let her use youtube and the video isn't available in Youtube Kids.

I really don't want her to have access to youtube because I know exactly what she'll be doing all day instead of paying attention to online classes.

Sucks but, at least until my patience runs out, I'm logging onto the laptop with my account when she needs to do the youtube video then logging out when she's done.

 
It's amazing how NYC's administration and teachers union has handcuffed public schools ability to plan this out usefully.

Just finished our 8th graders middle school meeting. So many things still uncertain that could/should have been figured out a long time ago. So now we are pushed back two weeks so they can finally get off their collective asses and prepare. 

8th grade floppinho is doing blended- 5 days in person every 3 weeks. The school will attemp to live stream/teach the in-class day to the remote kids, so they'll all get the same exact teachers, lessons and days. Small school, so fingers crossed that it works. 

Right now they're not even allowed to leave their desks in order to maintain 6'. No outside, no nothing. We'll see how that works.
terrible.  all of our stuff goes back to semi normal starting next week.  cannot fing wait

 
I mean ... was I the only kid that loved it when teachers whipped out the old-school slide projector? * BEEP! * between each slide, queued up to a little Radio Shack cassette player? The teachers pet was usually the one who got to drive the projector and advance the slides. Ah, good times, good times.
I got short films from the National Film Board of Canada.  I distinctly remember one aboot the Voyageurs.

 
Central Florida

Started a couple weeks ago in person learning 17 year old daughter in public high school

Largely no issues mentioned by her at all, no COVID cases reported at her school yet

My girlfriend is a gifted teacher of elementary, three schools, with options of in-person or virtual learning

In person learning going well

Virtual is largely ineffective and while not the train wreck it was last spring it just doesn't work

 
I mean ... was I the only kid that loved it when teachers whipped out the old-school slide projector? * BEEP! * between each slide, queued up to a little Radio Shack cassette player? The teachers pet was usually the one who got to drive the projector and advance the slides. Ah, good times, good times.
I got short films from the National Film Board of Canada.  I distinctly remember one aboot the Voyageurs.
Did you all play them on a Dukane filmstrip projector like this? I will never forget those brightly-colored knobs.

 

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