Return to DL anxiety K-3

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a teacher and I am looking forward to it. The sooner we get started again, the sooner it will all be over. It will be a slow week for us. I do not plan on overloading them and instead, just doing some review type of work with no homework and only participation grades. Lots of fun activities and keeping it short.

The slow weeks are the absolute worst. My kid is bored with the normal speed, especially since half the time is reminding kids to get back in their seat and to mute. The slow weeks are excruciating. Ugh.

This. The slow weeks are terribly tedious. The “fun” activities are not fun. They don’t work out and the kids get frustrated, or their
laptop is too slow to run the “fun” thing. It’s not fun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a teacher and I am looking forward to it. The sooner we get started again, the sooner it will all be over. It will be a slow week for us. I do not plan on overloading them and instead, just doing some review type of work with no homework and only participation grades. Lots of fun activities and keeping it short.

We are at a bilingual charter school and my kids are online 2 hours a day broken into bits. Part of our issue is that in person class time is so short that they have no time to really learn anything and then the asynchronous learning is watching little videos that they finish in 30 minutes. There is no learning which is less stressful during vacation when that's expected but so depressing the rest of the time. They are young and even feel and hate it. We have lost faith in our school and it's so sad.

+1 And our school has no real plan to bring kids back this year. They have basically said hybrid is not an option. Maybe they will at least open a CAREs classroom for the families who are really struggling. 😞

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a teacher and I am looking forward to it. The sooner we get started again, the sooner it will all be over. It will be a slow week for us. I do not plan on overloading them and instead, just doing some review type of work with no homework and only participation grades. Lots of fun activities and keeping it short.

Which grade to you teach? The activities my son's 1st grade teachers comes up with probably sound like a lot of fun but it just doesn't work out in practice, unless the kid has a parent there to help out. My kid doesn't and feels like a failure every time he is not able to accomplish the "fun" activity on those old clunky laptops they are using.

+1. My 2nd and 4th do not enjoy ‘fun’ activities online and ‘slow’ just means tedium. They would rather the teacher teach something substantive and interesting and then let them get off the call and do something that is actually fun.

Well, take that up with administrators that push teachers to keep elementary aged students in live sessions all day and begin curriculum as soon as winter break ends. One of my colleagues ended a session 15 minutes early because his students were drained and got a nasty email from admin about it.

Remember we have bosses that dictate most of what we do. Please don’t blame teachers.

And you know why he got a nasty email from admin? Leaving aside the minute possibility (seriously, tiny) that an admin happened to be remotely obseverving his class at that exact moment -- he got that email because A BITCHY PARENT COMPLAINED.

And do you know why that BITCHY parent complained? Because the teaching is happening in her living room instead of in schools where the CDC, Dr. Fauci, National Teachers groups, and more say it SHOULD Be taking place. Don’t like it? Tell the WTU.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here: we were told we could not ask the kids about their break or allow them to share because for some kids the break might have been rough or stressful.

Frankly, this is insane. You can’t ask about break? How would a break from DL learning be any more stressful, even for an at risk family?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here: we were told we could not ask the kids about their break or allow them to share because for some kids the break might have been rough or stressful.

Frankly, this is insane. You can’t ask about break? How would a break from DL learning be any more stressful, even for an at risk family?

Perhaps someone in their family died or is now in the hospital?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Er, the stressor is DL.


Yep, and that's why my kid doesn't log in to DL classes anymore. We log into Canvas and do the asynchronous work. I will even send the videos of my child working on certain activities as requested by the teacher, and we do submit assignments. But the actual live sessions are excruciating and my kid hates them. She does a 1:1 with her teacher once a week that is okay because once they are connected, there are minimal tech issues or interruptions. But not even the small group session was worthwhile, so we stopped. It's been much better since then.

But I only work PT and have the time to dedicate to this, most parents understandably can't (and I only can because I was partially furloughed in April, so we're working down half my salary and can't afford any outside childcare).

DL for this age group is garbage.

This is helpful. I was pushing too much at the beginning. I was afraid I would get in trouble if my child wasn't logged on. :/ Okd stuff, my stuff, I'd bet.

[Anonymous]

I get grumpy emails from teachers complaining that my 3rd grader hasn't turned in this or that, telling me that she'll get a poor grade in a particular subject that quarter if we don't catch up. I've started to respond by saying, fine, grade her down, but know she's still learning. We keep up on her math assignments religiously, but are doing our own thing on the rest to a greater and greater extent as time goes by. If she takes an interest in a science topic, a history topic, we may run with that rather than what the school wants us to do. I have her read independently for a couple hours most days, whatever she wants to read in a corner of my home office. She tunes out during whole class live instruction because she can hardly speak. She wants to ask a question, but by the time she's called on, she's generally forgotten what she wanted to ask.

If teachers aren't willing to return to work in the building, OK, but they don't get to beat up on us for not turning an 8 year-old's work in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Joining the add-on of fourth grader kid and parent despair. I don't know how this generation of DCPS kids is ever *not* going to hate school. And it's not as easy as saying, "they'll get to see their friends! They'll be happy to be back!" While that's true, there's also, I imagine, going to be lots of separation anxiety and some hard adjustments for everyone when (if anytime in the near future?) they go back into the buildings.

Thank you! I don’t think this issue is addressed enough. I fear the transition back to school will be another big hurdle. Teachers will have to plan for extended slow weeks or fun lesson plans to get them acclimated to new routines and long days, only further delaying real academics and an education. Maybe my anxious kids are in the minority; hopefully I’m wrong. But I foresee an emotional, stressful transition back to school for a lot of teachers and students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here. We all are dreading it. I need a light at the end of the tunnel

Biden’s inauguration?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I get grumpy emails from teachers complaining that my 3rd grader hasn't turned in this or that, telling me that she'll get a poor grade in a particular subject that quarter if we don't catch up. I've started to respond by saying, fine, grade her down, but know she's still learning. We keep up on her math assignments religiously, but are doing our own thing on the rest to a greater and greater extent as time goes by. If she takes an interest in a science topic, a history topic, we may run with that rather than what the school wants us to do. I have her read independently for a couple hours most days, whatever she wants to read in a corner of my home office. She tunes out during whole class live instruction because she can hardly speak. She wants to ask a question, but by the time she's called on, she's generally forgotten what she wanted to ask.

If teachers aren't willing to return to work in the building, OK, but they don't get to beat up on us for not turning an 8 year-old's work in.

+1.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, in the end, it is up to you to make sure your child can reduce the anxiety. You see it, you need to confront it. Ask your child why their anxious. Remove the stressors if possible, even a little helps. Praise your child. Encourage your child. Give them attainable goals. Give them more frequent breaks. Give them rewards related to desired behavior and outcomes. Set AM and PM targets. Have you told the teacher? Have you asked for help from the administration or mental health services at your school? It's not easy being a parent, even harder under these circumstances. Complaining might help short term, but start attacking the long term. Stay positive and good luck.

OP here. I did contact support services and my stressed child is now on their radar but they are not really offering anything at the moment. No evals or counseling.
I do think DL is the stressor. My child thrives creatively when not logging on and off the computer. But it's 1st grade and learning to read is critical at this age. At least this is what I have been told.
AM and PM targets is helpful. Thank you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here: we were told we could not ask the kids about their break or allow them to share because for some kids the break might have been rough or stressful.

Frankly, this is insane. You can’t ask about break? How would a break from DL learning be any more stressful, even for an at risk family?

Perhaps someone in their family died or is now in the hospital?

Ok fair. But isn’t that something the teacher might be aware of already? Or if break was rough or stressful for kids for other reasons, wouldn’t that be something that the group can talk about to help the kid process the emotions? Isn’t part of school emotional support?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get grumpy emails from teachers complaining that my 3rd grader hasn't turned in this or that, telling me that she'll get a poor grade in a particular subject that quarter if we don't catch up. I've started to respond by saying, fine, grade her down, but know she's still learning. We keep up on her math assignments religiously, but are doing our own thing on the rest to a greater and greater extent as time goes by. If she takes an interest in a science topic, a history topic, we may run with that rather than what the school wants us to do. I have her read independently for a couple hours most days, whatever she wants to read in a corner of my home office. She tunes out during whole class live instruction because she can hardly speak. She wants to ask a question, but by the time she's called on, she's generally forgotten what she wanted to ask.

If teachers aren't willing to return to work in the building, OK, but they don't get to beat up on us for not turning an 8 year-old's work in.

+1.

Part of our job is checking in on kids who aren’t logging in. In fact, I’m evaluated down if my student attendance isn’t great. I do not agree with this, and I am completely understanding of situations like yours. But I’m required to send documentation to administration that I am engaging with families.
As teachers we are on the front line, we get all the attacks and complaints. But remember who is making the rules. It’s not us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here. We all are dreading it. I need a light at the end of the tunnel

Biden’s inauguration?

Lol is that when all the kids will return to school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get grumpy emails from teachers complaining that my 3rd grader hasn't turned in this or that, telling me that she'll get a poor grade in a particular subject that quarter if we don't catch up. I've started to respond by saying, fine, grade her down, but know she's still learning. We keep up on her math assignments religiously, but are doing our own thing on the rest to a greater and greater extent as time goes by. If she takes an interest in a science topic, a history topic, we may run with that rather than what the school wants us to do. I have her read independently for a couple hours most days, whatever she wants to read in a corner of my home office. She tunes out during whole class live instruction because she can hardly speak. She wants to ask a question, but by the time she's called on, she's generally forgotten what she wanted to ask.

If teachers aren't willing to return to work in the building, OK, but they don't get to beat up on us for not turning an 8 year-old's work in.

+1.

Part of our job is checking in on kids who aren’t logging in. In fact, I’m evaluated down if my student attendance isn’t great. I do not agree with this, and I am completely understanding of situations like yours. But I’m required to send documentation to administration that I am engaging with families.
As teachers we are on the front line, we get all the attacks and complaints. But remember who is making the rules. It’s not us.

The front line is not your couch.