Maryland Recovery Plan for Education has been posted
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Anonymous
That’s non-sensical. MS and HS might not be in physical school buildings because those buildings may be repurposed for ES students. Sheesh! |
Anonymous
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All English for Speakers of Other Languages, Special Education, and resource teachers will work with small groups of students to reduce the student teacher ratios to 10 or less in each learning environment. Fine Arts teachers, Physical Education and Health will be included in the rotations to reduce the student teacher ratios. * One day is used for teacher planning and professional learning. Students will not report to school, distance learning will continue.
Our elementary school has almost 1,000 students. We have one ESOL teacher. My class of 23 students had two speech IEPs. Even with specialist support it would be tough to get classes sized down to 10. |
Anonymous
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Half of the student population will report to school for four full days each week, while the remaining second half of the school population participates in distance learning at home. The student population will alternate between each week. All grade bands will be included. Students will be provided assignments to support their learning on the days in which they do not report to school that could include paper, pencil, eLearning or a combination.[i]
I assume an extra teacher would have to be hired. One teacher would not be able to teach in person and online on the same day. |
Anonymous
Middle schoolers and high schoolers going to school on line is a non-starter. |
Anonymous
A typical kid at our public high school might have 7 classes, averaging 25 students each. There is some overlap but not a huge amount, so they're exposed to over 100 different people a day, plus 20 more on the bus, etc . . . Many adults have jobs that expose them to many fewer people. Opening schools is going to be a major task. We've got several months to look for solutions but it's not as simple as "if it's OK for adults, it's OK for kids". |
Anonymous
There were just two studies conducted that concluded that kids shed as much virus as adults, regardless of how severe their illness. That’s a huge issue. Honestly, as a teacher I’m most worried about those sick kids being sent in. You know parents are going to be thinking “I need to go to work, I can’t afford to take more time off.” If students have a fever Monday they should not be allowed back to school for the next fourteen days without a negative COVID test. I can already see the kids in my class staying home with a “cold” one day and parents trying to send them back the next. |
Anonymous
Then you have other issues. Most MS and HS students should be able to handle this. Is it perfect? No, but they should be able to handle this without mom or dad babysitting them. Look at the feds memo from awhile back expecting parents of 10yo to report to work. Parents with kids under 10 get some exemptions. If your kid cannot handle this, then you’re gonna have to make some lifestyle choices. Rotate babysitting teenagers with a couple other families, alternate your schedule, take a leave of absence, ... just like with daycare for infants/toddlers. Many, many people here are highly educated, yet act like divas. Start using some of those brains to come up with solutions for the (temporary?) future. This is what poor families do who manage to pull themselves up and out of poverty — without the $$$ so many DCUMers here have. |
Anonymous
I’m an ESOL teacher and my only certification is ESOL. I’m not certified to teach general ed. So let’s say they gave me 10 ESOL students. Isn’t that directly in violation of the push to get rid of sheltered instruction like METS programs? They are dismantling those and putting those students back in their home schools, without any additional ESOL allocation or support, because they said research shows students don’t benefit and are even harmed by being separated from the general population. Same issue with special ed. But let’s just say we ignore everything we’ve been told. It’s still a numbers game. Me taking 10 ESOL students from a grade level is a drop in the bucket numbers wise. We still don’t have enough staff to make every class have 10 students, which would probably need to be 9 if it includes the teacher and 8 if there still will be any para support. Then there’s also the issue of rooms. For instance, I have a room but it’s about a third of the size of a regular classroom, so there wouldn’t be a way to keep kids 6 feet apart (theoretically of course—we all know that won’t actually happen due to kids being kids). |
Anonymous
I’d assume a week of assignments during the remote week, but a teacher would be needed to answer questions. |
Anonymous
Where does it say this? I didn’t see that anywhere. |
Anonymous
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Maybe all of the helicoptered kids who can't tue their own shoes without mommy or daddy telling them to will finally get a chance to develop normally and do their work on their own.
A century ago children could get themselves up, do their chores and make their way down to the factory for work by the time they were 8. |
Anonymous
Many adults don't. Opening schools is no less complicated than many other workplaces that have been shut down or that have had a lot of problems with covid transmission. And it's just as much of a priority, if not more. |
Anonymous
The good old days of child labor in the factory. |
Anonymous
Elementary school kids need to go to school. Middle school kids need to go to school. High school kids need to go to school. |
Anonymous
And those filthy germ bombs on many faces will become a delightful source of contagion. |