The Reality of Facilitating Distance Learning

Well, week two of distance learning is in the (virtual) books, and I've got some time to dispassionately reflect on how it's gone, especially now that I've purged myself of the angst and negativity I felt during the first week.

To be honest, so far, the results have been—on the surface at least—encouraging. Participation and work completion isn't dire, although it's certainly worse than normal, and the general feedback is positive.  I'm in a bit of a routine now and I can see some patterns emerging that require a little more objectivity —not ranting —to analyse. Let's say I have a more well-rounded perspective. Here's what I have come to understand:

It still sucks. Perhaps even more than it did a week ago.

A month or so ago, when it became clear that distance learning was going to be the way forward, I smugly went over a litany of reasons why this episode would make us appreciate the value of public schools. I envisioned articles, Facebook posts, memes, and maybe even a politician or two lauding the amazing work public school teachers do because it's well nigh impossible for the average family to educate their children at home. I imagined emails, public recognition, free Starbucks for teachers, maybe even a parade or two.

What I've come to realize is that we're not even ready to think about this, although perhaps I secretly wish people would. Part of it is that most of us are either in survival mode or hibernation mode and can think of nothing else. But the other part of it is that what we are doing is not actually distance learning as education experts and pedagogical gurus understand it. What we are doing will not be used as a future blueprint for how teachers can effectively develop our students, academically, physically, socially, and emotionally without being in the classroom. Not even close.

What we are doing is emergency distance learning, and that's completely different.

On one hand we are trying to triage—and this is not a hyperbole—a potential educational catastrophe. We are desperately trying to do whatever it takes to keep students engaged in some form of the educational process at a time of year when many teachers feel it all starts to come together. Most of these kids cannot afford to switch their brains off between March and late August. Every year, there are students who—despite the best efforts of teachers—fall through the cracks. It's the nature of the system. Since emergency distance learning began, those cracks have become crevasses—picture the kind Bear Grylls likes to explore— and I am already seeing the consequences, and I can't overstate how heavily this responsibility is weighing on me.

At the same time, we are being asked to do pedagogically sound distance learning. My administration has, on the whole, been supportive, understanding, and utterly reasonable in what they're asking us to do. But now we are being asked to address essential skills, make our instructions as succinct as possible, gather data, and ensure that we are on the same page as our colleagues. I am working at least 10 hours per day just trying to ensure students have meaningful engagement with me and my subject. Anything more complex or coordinated might just make my brain explode.

A Wordle I made a couple of years ago based on a conversation I had with some new teachers on assessment.  It struck me that I've used hardly any of these words in the last two weeks.

The best analogy I can give is this: in this situation I'm an ER doctor and a nutritionist. At the same time. They're both connected to keeping people healthy, but they have completely different roles and sets of skills. An ER doctor isn't going to give you advice about developing good eating habits when he's trying to give you stitches for a gash in your head.

There are the things in my job that I am contractually obliged to do. There are the things that I know I must do if I am to succeed at my primary job, which is to ensure my students learn the skills and habits of mind necessary to meet whatever standard is required of them. To go back to the analogy, that's where I'm the nutritionist. I'm trained for this. I'm an expert in this field. As I have become a better teacher, the time required to do this has gradually decreased, but not by much because I don't use the same material or teach the same classes year after year.

At the same time, time spent on things that I am not contractually obliged to do -- let's call it things that I feel morally obliged to do -- has increased dramatically. Additionally, these are things that I am not actually an expert in: counseling, trauma, suicide prevention, coaching, motivation, conflict resolution. This my ER doctor role. I've had a little bit of training in these things, but not much. Nonetheless, my emotional bandwidth has been increasingly devoted to this aspect of the job.

Emergency distance learning has increased the stakes in and the time spent working on both realms of my job -- contractual and moral -- and I am really struggling to do either. I know I cannot do both.

To be honest -- and let's persist with the imperfect analogy here -- I have been increasingly more of an ER doctor ever since I realized the mental health calamity that our youth are facing. This awakening has been accelerated and clarified by my opening up about my own mental health struggles and by my teaching of a much more vulnerable population of students. That was long before March 13th.

I am not an expert on trauma, but I do know that it impacts the same area of the brain that learning uses. I also know from experience that a student whose social and emotional needs are not being met is not going to be able to learn. So issues like depression, divorce, sexuality, and abuse force their way into my consciousness because they prevent me from fulfilling my contractual obligations to the best of my ability.

But helping kids navigate their school day and creating an environment where they can learn or at least feel secure when everything around them feels as if it's collapsing requires physical presence. Dozens of my students are struggling, and now I can't see them. So now the focus is on reaching out and trying to engage those students in some meaningful way so that I can check in with them. It's not even learning at this point.

I am working so hard just to keep them engaged because if they're engaged, I keep telling myself, then maybe they'll learn or maybe they'll at least "show up" on the days they'd otherwise skip. And if they do that, then maybe they'll not be so far behind when they come back to school. 

I am banking on the capital that I've built up in my students during the year by showing myself to be someone who cares and who knows what he's talking about -- and let's face it, there are times when I have to fake both -- to keep the students motivated and willing to engage. That somehow their lives will be better if they log into Google Classroom every morning. That they would do it out of respect for my wishes and efforts.  I know some are doing precisely this, and it means the world to me.

My co-teacher and I (we teach 9th grade college prep English classes in which over 40% of the students have some form of learning disability or legally required accommodation) have talked about this.  The little interaction students have with us during our Google Meets is great for them.  It's healthy, educational, meaningful participation in something useful.  It's not great for us.  We end the meet feeling down, discouraged, and missing our students.  Most of the time, we spend time sharing our grave concerns about individual students whose educational needs are not being met.

I will end this with just a small example.  During Friday's Google Meet, one of the students -- let's call him Lorenzo -- was confused on the directions.  He needed several explanations, re-directs, and reminders before he was able to do something that we have been doing every other week for the entire school year.  Lorenzo does not have a diagnosed learning disorder.  He is just a regular kid who has problems reading and following directions.  

Reading directions and asking questions: it seems like such a small thing, but we have dozens of Lorenzos who need this kind of intervention multiple times every single day and who, unlike Lorenzo, lack the motivation or conviction to ask for help, either because they don't know that they don't understand or because they don't care enough to understand since they have other, more important things to worry about.

And those tasked with solving this are people like me, sitting in my bedroom at a makeshift desk and armed with nothing more than a laptop and a moral imperative.  

Yeah, it sucks. 

I know I should be grateful, but this isn't what I signed up for

Before you read this, a warning. This will come across as selfish, self-indulgent, and self-pitying, and any other adjective you can think of that starts with "self" -- except selfless. Apologies.

OK, now that's out of the way, here comes the rant...

Yesterday was the "first day back". The first day with students engaged in distance learning, a phrase that, truthfully, I had never heard a month ago. The first day seeing the faces of students I had not seen since March 13. The first day sitting at my makeshift desk in my bedroom, going "live" with my students. And to be honest, in many ways, it felt like the first day of school: I was nervous, I was sleep-deprived, and I was underprepared.

My first class was at 8:30, and although I had worked most of Monday afternoon and evening, I still needed a couple of hours in the morning to frantically record those last few screencasts and post them on Google Classroom. It felt a little bit like preparing for having a substitute teacher.

For those of you who are not teachers, it is important to understand that preparing for a sub, preparing for when you are not going to be in the classroom -- which is exactly what I was preparing for -- takes far longer than planning for a normal lesson. Trade secret: this is the reason why so many teachers, myself included, only take sick days when they are at death's door. It is too much effort to take a couple of hours to write those sub plans, make the copies, and ensure the directions are simple enough to be understood by an 8 year old. Just dose yourself up and go to work so you don't lose a day of instruction.

Anyway, that's what it felt like. The instructions had to be perfect and the links all had to work. There was a video on Google Meet etiquette that I needed to make. I know there is so much information out there to help, but, trust me, we have been overwhelmed with information -- dozens and dozens of emails touting strategies, training, links to webinars, resources, blogs -- to the extent that I can't handle it anymore. In that sense, I feel like a first year teacher again.

A first year teacher making sub plans. Great.

Oh, and did I mention that I have no way to make the students do the work I set them?

On the bright side, at least I'm not going to get a snotty note from the sub about how the instructions were too complex and how the kids spent too much time on their phones.

To their credit, most of my students were actually "in class". They watched the screencasts, attended the Google Meet, and waved dutifully at me and answered the basic questions I threw at them. I thought it would be energizing and uplifting to see them all again, but something was missing.

On the plus side, my workspace is tidier than it's ever been.

It was physical presence.

I couldn't high five anyone. I couldn't catch someone's eye and say hi. I wanted to reach out and connect but I didn't know how. Each class over the course of the year establishes its own routine: the same kids arrive first, the same kids rush up to me to spill the latest tea or rant about their science teacher, and I greet the same kids in pretty much the same way every single day.

These are the myriad small moments that add up to a genuine relationship, and they are impossible to generate in a Google Meet with 36 students. Not having this made me feel powerless: I don't see a way to establish the kind of classroom culture I know I am good at fostering. Sure, I made a cute Flipgrid assignment but that actually made things worse because now they were speaking to me individually in their videos but I couldn't respond in real time.

And if classroom culture and authentic connection is important for teachers, imagine what it means to students. That's another post for another time, though. It's all about me today. I told you this was going to be self-indulgent.

These are kids whom, until March 13th, I had seen for 5 hours per week since August and -- there's no other way to say this -- I love them. They are the reason I do what I do. It was a very strange rush of emotions as the familiar faces popped up on the screen. I feel like I've already had to say goodbye to these kids and seeing them again made me realise exactly what this pandemic has cost me. And, truth be told, it hurt. In eight weeks I'll have to say goodbye again, but who knows whether there will be any semblance of a connection at that point.

A case in point: at the beginning of the break, over a month ago, I told one of my classes I didn't want them to do anything except read. As I watched their Flipgrid videos and looked at their faces in the Google Meet, it became patently clear that they'd done absolutely no reading of note. Despite my pleas in the various videos and letters I'd sent out them and their parents, urging them that they'd be losing valuable opportunities to improve the one thing that will help them in so many ways, it all fell on deaf ears. I felt so discouraged, especially since I knew that I'd be able to hold them accountable if they were physically in class with me.

And, moving forward, I don't even know if the kids are going to get anything out of this at all. They don't have to do any of the work (see my previous post for an explanation), they are not especially cognizant of this moment (hardly surprising, I suppose, since they're teenagers), and now they're dealing with a teacher who is basically lost.

Of course I also miss my colleagues, and I suspect I'll feel their absence more keenly as the workload gets more intense and the frustration and exhaustion rises. More than anything, we are each other's support system. I spoke to one of my colleagues this afternoon and she was already in tears. She is fed up of being alone in lockdown and today, although providing her with an opportunity to connect with students she hadn't seen in a while, merely reinforced that reality.

By now, I am totally aware that I am being self-indulgent and ungrateful, so I'm going to shut up in a minute. I don't want to come across as selfish. After all, I have a job. I'm healthy, and so is everyone in my family. We has enough food, good wifi, and a decent supply of toilet paper. I am not suffering like so many people. This is our new, albeit (hopefully) temporary, reality. I also know this will get better; it was only the first day, after all.

But as I fell into bed, exhausted and brain still whirring -- it actually hurt to close my eyes, yet another new sensation -- I could only come to one conclusion. I'm either going to hate being an online teacher or I'm going to be a terrible one, which in education is essentially the same thing. "Doing what I do" now looks totally different, and I feel cheated. Worse still, the kids are being cheated, and I'm not sure they even realise it.

Rant over. Time to get back to work.

"Coronabreak" has forced me to admit that I need my students more than they need me

It's been, to put it mildly, a strange time to be a teacher.

On March 13, I left school weighed down, both by the massive pile of grading in my backpack and by the uncertainty about the future. On April 13, we will start up again. The grading will be electronic, and probably considerably less, but the uncertainty is still very much there. What will class look like? How will I connect with students? How do I reach those who are unable or unwilling to engage in distance learning? How do I have video calls without children or piles of laundry embarrassing me in the background?  And, most importantly, can I do all this while still in my pyjamas?

Plenty to do during the "break".

A frustration has been that at our site at least, teachers have been moving a lot quicker than the district, which has been moving quicker than the county, which has been moving quicker than the state, which has been...You get the picture.  Finally, though, there seems to be some clarity to the plan moving forward, although what that will really look like on a day to day basis is anyone's guess.

One of the initiatives our district has put in place during this time of distance learning is a "do no harm" policy when it comes to grades. Any work students do during this time period can only help their overall grade in the class. It cannot lower it. When I consider the difficulties and stressors faced by many of our students at home, it makes sense. Being at school levels the playing field somewhat, mitigating some -- but certainly not all -- of the impact that children's very different home experiences have on their education.

This, however, was not my initial response to the policy. Like many teachers, I was deeply skeptical. A student who had an A on March 13 is now guaranteed that A at the end of the semester and has no obligation to do any work whatsoever. My mind reeled with the change: the traditional carrot and stick approach is now all carrots. And who wants carrots when you can have cake?

Of course, there were the platitudes from administrators about focusing on the learning and not the points. You come and teach my class, I wanted to say, before essentially preparing to present the same argument to my students.

As I hosted a Google Meet for my AP Literature students last week, I explained the new policy. And as I did so, I suddenly felt powerless. So much of the authority I wield as a teacher lies in the fact that students have to be there and that I have the power to impact their futures with my assignments and assessments. When I think about students who fail my class, the one trait they all have in common is that those things do not motivate them. These, it is no coincidence, are also the students who present the biggest behavioral problems.

So that was my first "gut check": my power to mandate and enforce has vanished. I will now have to rely on my ability to appeal to students' intrinsic motivation. And there are many strong arguments for continuing to learn when the rewards and consequences are not immediately obvious. I have been challenging my students in the lead up to this next Monday -- when we "go back to school" -- to embrace this unprecedented moment when they can learn without fear of failure.

My own fear of failure, however, looms large whenever I sit down at my makeshift workstation in my bedroom. During the three week break only about 30 of my 80 AP Lit students participated in my Google Meet readings of Hamlet; a handful reached out via email to ask what they could do to increase their grades, and still fewer listened to the podcasts I made every day.  If only 50% of my AP students, who have huge exams coming up in May, were engaged during this time, it doesn't augur well for my other classes.

The truth is, I want my students to want to participate in my activities. I'm insecure. My ego needs massaging. Put it any way you want: I take it personally when students don't do my work. I feel like a failure as a teacher when I realise that the only reason students are doing my work is because they have to. Sure, they -- mostly -- enjoy my class. They appreciate my attempts to meaningfully connect with them. But what do those smiling faces, kind words, and fun banter count for when it's no longer mandatory? I pour a lot of myself into my classes and my students, but I worry that they're only doing it for the grades and not for the meaningful interaction. Who am I kidding? They're high schoolers: of course they're doing it for the grades! That's the system's fault, and I am an integral, complicit part of that system.

Worse still, I am coming to the realization that many of my students don't actually need me at all. My AP students, for example, are talented kids, many of whom are much smarter than I am. They don't really even need me to prepare them for this year's truncated AP test. 45 minutes to write an essay on a prose passage? They have the whole internet at their disposal and 5 weeks to prepare. I was watching an AP Lit review webinar this morning. There are going to be about 25 of these daily lessons. They don't need me at all!

Yes, I know that there are a lot of my students, particularly my freshmen with special needs, whom the federal government has spectacularly and unforgivably tried to claim are no longer our responsibility, that desperately need guidance. They don't do their work a lot of the time. Those classes are often chaotic and very difficult to teach effectively. I know for sure many of them will see words like "optional" and see the writing on the wall. That will lead to a different kind of sadness: the sadness of seeing young people wasting their opportunity and not valuing their free public education.

One of the perks of being a teacher is the feeling of fulfillment that comes with knowing you're making a difference. I would love to claim that it it's a pure, noble, altruistic feeling, but to be perfectly honest, it's also a massive ego boost. And now that's gone, too.

I also think that one of things that makes me a decent teacher is the ability to connect with students. I do make an effort. I do care. It's an emotionally exhausting but wonderfully rewarding aspect of my life and it's why graduation is such an emotional occasion for me. It's also why it takes me several days to decompress after the end of the school year. I think it's because I'm grieving. And that grieving process has already started.  I really miss my students, even the knuckleheads. Especially the knuckleheads.

It's been hard to come to terms with this truth, let alone admit it, but my students don't need me anywhere near as much as I need them.