What do you think school will be like in the fall? UPDATE page 29 for Mass.

[Lumpy1106]

For anybody who's interested CA Dept of Ed hosted a webinar this morning about reopening schools. Nothing terribly earth shattering though.

https://abc7news.com/education/heres-what-needs-to-happen-to-reopen-ca-schools/6201690/

Yeah...I feel dumber after reading that.

 

[DisneyJamieCA]

Yeah...I feel dumber after reading that.

Yeah, basically they'll offer guidance, but it will be up to each individual district on how to do it. I will say the panelists from schools across the board said kids need to be back in the classroom. One said full time, 5 days a week. Whether that's feasible is another question and I imagine it will be a hybrid model almost across the board. Their biggest hurdle is that the state budget cuts are 10% to education, which is really hard to reconcile with everything that is needed to safely open up schools.

 

[jlwhitney]

With Florida's news today I am leaning that schools will be back fairly normal.

“I’m pleased to announce today that effective immediately Florida will be lifting all restrictions on youth activities, including summer camps and athletics. We believe that this makes sense based on the data and observed experience,” DeSantis said. “We are not going to be instituting a lot of rules, or really any rules.”

 

[anniemae]

With Florida's news today I am leaning that schools will be back fairly normal.

“I’m pleased to announce today that effective immediately Florida will be lifting all restrictions on youth activities, including summer camps and athletics. We believe that this makes sense based on the data and observed experience,” DeSantis said. “We are not going to be instituting a lot of rules, or really any rules.”

I think all eyes will be on FL. they shut down later than most states and are opening up very rapidly.

 

[jlwhitney]

I think all eyes will be on FL. they shut down later than most states and are opening up very rapidly.

This whole time I have been so glad to live in Florida!

Georgia and TN have been pretty rapid too.

 

[hereyago]

How is it going to work,especially with the little kids?


Is the bus driver or bus aide(will they add one if not all ready the norm?) to take kids temp at bus stop? Or wait to get to school. Plexiglass barriers all over.

Then open just to perhaps close again if a second wave?

if they go virtual and parents have to go back to work.

My dd is mulling over the idea of finding a homeschool curriculum that would follow the guidelines of our state, as a backup while we wait and see what is going to happen.

 

[Tinijocaro]

I teach elementary school in western NY. Texts are flying between me and my coworkers as we try to imagine how this will work. We have about 25 kids in each class. If we utilize our support teachers and their classrooms, and re-work the schedule, we could reduce class sizes, but not to the point that we could keep kids 6 feet apart. And I have no idea how that would work with little ones. My kids are CONSTANTLY touching each other. And they hug me all day long. I can’t imagine holding my hand out to stop them. It breaks my heart to think about it.
But there are still so many questions. What about the bus? Playground? Gym? Lunch?

I'm in WNY too, teaching 4th and 5th grade string music students. Fun teaching violin over a computer. Participation is incredibly low. It's discouraging as a teacher. I'm thankful for the kids who do show up.

 

[Childs1stTime2Disney]

With Florida's news today I am leaning that schools will be back fairly normal.

“I’m pleased to announce today that effective immediately Florida will be lifting all restrictions on youth activities, including summer camps and athletics. We believe that this makes sense based on the data and observed experience,” DeSantis said. “We are not going to be instituting a lot of rules, or really any rules.”

So happy for FL and will be following closely, wishing great things to show the rest of our states!

 

[Skippy918]

With Florida's news today I am leaning that schools will be back fairly normal.

“I’m pleased to announce today that effective immediately Florida will be lifting all restrictions on youth activities, including summer camps and athletics. We believe that this makes sense based on the data and observed experience,” DeSantis said. “We are not going to be instituting a lot of rules, or really any rules.”

I have a feeling Texas will follow too. Our governor said that there will be college football with people in the stands.

 

[Tinijocaro]

So what do you suppose all of us should do, stay in our homes for as long as it takes until nobody dies?
Do we do that for anything else?
People are going to die due to COVID, I could even be one of them, but we can't stay locked in our homes forever.
The virus effects US ALL in different ways, but yes I'm more concerned with my low risk adult children's ability to finish college (can't without hands on labs) and graduate on time next year so they can (hopefully) find a job.
I'm concerned about other things but this is a thread about school so I'll leave it at that.

I'll have four kids in college in Sept-two in grad school and two undergrad. My boys can do distance learning fairly easily-Aerospace eng, computer science. Daughters, it will be more difficult. Speech Language Pathology and Elementary Education. Can't work with patients online so SLP daughter may have to take time off till this blows over. Elem Ed daughter has severe asthma and was hosptialized in Sept in PICU for 9 days-very scary. She will likely do online community college classes instead of the SUNY school she was planning on attending, too high of a health risk for her. I wouldn't be comfortable with any of my kids being in dorms in September. Too much unknown.

 

[barkley]

Can't work with patients online so SLP daughter may have to take time off till this blows over.

boy howdy i would hope that slp programs that didn't already offer certification classes in distance speech therapy would start sooner vs. later! i have friends who do slp in 2 different states and w/ one the students have been able to continue receiving services b/c their districts encourage their staff to become certified (lots of rural schools/bad winter weather closures), with the other those poor kiddos haven't gotten services since the schools closed a couple of months ago i have a family member who received on-line speech therapy services when he was younger due to lack of providers in his rural area-it was life changing for him.

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

I'm in WNY too, teaching 4th and 5th grade string music students. Fun teaching violin over a computer. Participation is incredibly low. It's discouraging as a teacher. I'm thankful for the kids who do show up.

I teach middle school English at a small Catholic school. Parents are paying tuition, so we are required to teach new material and grade assignments. Yet only 30% of our MS students are attending the Zoom lessons each week. You are so right - it is very disheartening. I'm starting to get depressed by this lockdown and by thinking about how next school year is going to go.

 

[hereyago]

I teach middle school English at a small Catholic school. Parents are paying tuition, so we are required to teach new material and grade assignments. Yet only 30% of our MS students are attending the Zoom lessons each week. Y

My dgd is in Head Start program and they don’t zoom, but each day the teacher will have an assignment and students will either do a video, picture etc and you can see how many students are doing it and not a lot are, there are about 17 students.

 

[Colleen27]

Good news, maybe? Or at the very least, a reason to wait and see what happens from school reopenings elsewhere before making decisions about the fall? (Have to log in to read the full story, but if you create an account and back out of the payment step for the free trial, it will open).

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politic...kuuCN5t7PrGobE6WpAuTYXFEJejYQ8VVmtANqSag3EpXA

 

[DopeyDame]

I'll have four kids in college in Sept-two in grad school and two undergrad. My boys can do distance learning fairly easily-Aerospace eng, computer science. Daughters, it will be more difficult. Speech Language Pathology and Elementary Education. Can't work with patients online so SLP daughter may have to take time off till this blows over. Elem Ed daughter has severe asthma and was hosptialized in Sept in PICU for 9 days-very scary. She will likely do online community college classes instead of the SUNY school she was planning on attending, too high of a health risk for her. I wouldn't be comfortable with any of my kids being in dorms in September. Too much unknown.

This made me laugh out loud. I was an aerospace engineering major, and while some of my courses certainly could have been online, all the advanced courses involved lots of hands on lab and specialized equipment. Operating a wind tunnel isn’t exactly distance-learning friendly.
I definitely would have assumed education and slp majors would be far more amenable to distance learning than aerospace engineering.
I hope your son ends up loving his career as much as I’ve enjoyed mine!

 

[HeatherC]

Good news, maybe? Or at the very least, a reason to wait and see what happens from school reopenings elsewhere before making decisions about the fall? (Have to log in to read the full story, but if you create an account and back out of the payment step for the free trial, it will open).

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politic...kuuCN5t7PrGobE6WpAuTYXFEJejYQ8VVmtANqSag3EpXA

I didn’t read the article you mentioned, but I think there is still a significant risk of transmission in schools. Since many scientists believe a very large portion of cases are being transmitted by asymptomatic carriers, this is very concerning to me. We simply don’t know whether we have the virus or not. Bringing millions of kids and adults together on a daily basis with the possibility of a large portion being asymptomatic is concerning to say the least.

The other concern is with the pediatric multi-inflammatory syndrome they are now seeing. While rare, it is still something that warrants concern. I wonder exactly how rare it might turn out to be or to find it is not rare at all when we send kids back to school. Will we see a large increase in cases as a result? We just don’t know.

‘I also know kids need to be in school and millions of kids rely on schools for stability, food, etc. which makes this all the harder to manage.
The whole thing is a nightmare and I certainly am glad that I am not the one who has to make these decisions and put plans into place which will inevitably upset a large portion of the population no matter what is decided.

 

[sk!mom]

The fact is, and yes, it is a fact, not conjecture, not-at-risk kids are not experiencing the really bad symptoms, are not ending up in hospitals, and again a proven fact, kids under 10 don't even transmit the disease to older parents and grandparents.

Can you provide the proof of these facts please? Especially that children don't transmit it.

 

[sk!mom]

I teach middle school English at a small Catholic school. Parents are paying tuition, so we are required to teach new material and grade assignments. Yet only 30% of our MS students are attending the Zoom lessons each week. You are so right - it is very disheartening. I'm starting to get depressed by this lockdown and by thinking about how next school year is going to go.

I feel you. I could teach pretty effective lessons via Zoom but only about 10% of my students showed up regularly. We even sent out a questionnaire letting them choose preferred Zoom times. We offered morning/afternoon/evening basically whatever you need. Almost all chose a time but still only about 20% ever showed up a single time.

Someone upthread had trashed teachers for using Kahn Academy, which we did some for Math, but we needed quality videos for those who wouldn't Zoom and would wait until Sunday to try to get the work done. We, also made videos but honestly the quality of Kahn felt so much more professional.

I hope we are back in person at least part time. I have enough time in to retire but really wanted to work 7 more years. If this continues into next year, I don't know if I'll stick around.

 

[monsterkitty]

I feel you. I could teach pretty effective lessons via Zoom but only about 10% of my students showed up regularly. We even sent out a questionnaire letting them choose preferred Zoom times. We offered morning/afternoon/evening basically whatever you need. Almost all chose a time but still only about 20% ever showed up a single time.

Someone upthread had trashed teachers for using Kahn Academy, which we did some for Math, but we needed quality videos for those who wouldn't Zoom and would wait until Sunday to try to get the work done. We, also made videos but honestly the quality of Kahn felt so much more professional.

I hope we are back in person at least part time. I have enough time in to retire but really wanted to work 7 more years. If this continues into next year, I don't know if I'll stick around.

I really don't think I could remote teach again. I did retire and I turned in my school keys for the last time on Tuesday. They are asking me to coordinate remote learning for instrumental music classes next year, but I don't think I will. I would rather sub in the hybrid system we will probably be using.

We had the same problems with Zoom lessons for our middle school kids. We discovered that the kids, especially the boys, were embarrassed about their appearances (no haircuts or bad haircuts) and their home surroundings. We tried doing a "fort" day where we all built forts and Zoomed from the fort and the kids also built forts. We tried crazy hair day, hat day, inside-out clothes day, anything day to get kids to attend meetings. Still didn't work.

When we asked why they weren't attending, most said that their parents were using their school-issued devices to work from home. The students also said they were babysitting younger siblings and couldn't really do school work until later. My most attended Zoom lessons were at 9:30-10:30 pm. Obviously they couldn't play their instruments that late, but we could talk and have the connection they all needed.

 

[monsterkitty]

Can you provide the proof of these facts please? Especially that children don't transmit it.

Here's what the CDC says about children and transmitting COVID:

If children meet in groups, it can put everyone at risk. Children can pass this virus onto others who may be at higher risk, including older adults and people who have serious underlying medical conditions.

• If others in your home are at particularly high risk for severe illness from COVID-19, consider extra precautions to separate your child from those people.
• If you are unable to stay home with your child while school is out, carefully consider who might be best positioned to provide child care. If someone at higher risk for COVID-19 will be providing care (older adult, such as a grandparent or someone with a chronic medical condition), limit your children’s contact with other people.

Not sure where people are getting the "children can't transmit" misinformation from.