What should MCPS' virtual learning plan be ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The thing is, the virtual learning would just be "check the box, we did it" like the days at the end of the school calendar. It would put an extra burden on teachers and parents (and even more on the many teachers who are parents), extra expense for more devices for MCPS, and it would make 99% of the kids miserable and not really amount to any additional learning. So why?

Oh come on. Just because most kids don't learn as much virtually as they do in person doesn't mean no one is learning anything. Most kids learn some stuff and some learn just as much as they would in person.

That is clearly better than pushing the calendar in June into half days in the following week, which is truly zero learning. Most kids don't even go and there is absolutely no educational activity going on for the ones who do come because everything got wrapped up the week before or even earlier.

It is also clearly nett

So someone might learn something. Maybe.

What high standards you have.

Yes, I think virtual "many or most kids will probably learn something" days are superior to "no kids will learn anything" days. You prefer the "no kids will learn anything" days?

I am sure I will be booed but I would absolutely rather my kids be in school with their friends doing games and watching movies than home, isolated doing mediocre learning. If we are talking about 4-5 days time

[Anonymous]

I was a week. Nothing will happen.

It won’t happened again for a few years.

No need to plan for remote learning.

Tell your kid to read a book. A good book. Any book.

Just read. It will be the best thing. Period.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The thing is, the virtual learning would just be "check the box, we did it" like the days at the end of the school calendar. It would put an extra burden on teachers and parents (and even more on the many teachers who are parents), extra expense for more devices for MCPS, and it would make 99% of the kids miserable and not really amount to any additional learning. So why?

Oh come on. Just because most kids don't learn as much virtually as they do in person doesn't mean no one is learning anything. Most kids learn some stuff and some learn just as much as they would in person.

That is clearly better than pushing the calendar in June into half days in the following week, which is truly zero learning. Most kids don't even go and there is absolutely no educational activity going on for the ones who do come because everything got wrapped up the week before or even earlier.

It is also clearly nett

So someone might learn something. Maybe.

What high standards you have.

Yes, I think virtual "many or most kids will probably learn something" days are superior to "no kids will learn anything" days. You prefer the "no kids will learn anything" days?

Those aren't the choices. Kids learn things all the time, from all sorts of sources. The hurdle that virtual needs to overcome is not "will the kids learn anything?", it's "will they learn more than they would learn otherwise?" and "will they learn enough to justify the negative impacts of going back to 1:1 devices for elementary, and disrupting parents who are working from home?"

My kids cooked, and read, and played their instruments on the snow day. Some of them set up a business shoveling people out. One of them went to work with a family member who works in the trades. They learned from all those activities.

Other kids went to snow day camps, or their parents got together and had day long playdates at various houses to reduce the number of hours each parent took off work. They developed their social skills and learned new games and activities. Virtual learning would have been impossible in those situations.

If there is a long break in school, like covid, then virtual learning makes sense. But over a few snow days it makes very little sense, with the exception of maybe high schoolers, and we can handle this by allowing high school teachers to email home written assignments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Virtual school is a joke, what’s wrong with giving the kids a week off? The sledding was great. The days off were great for on our family. No day is make it break in school, and it doesn’t matter if they extend the school year either since we already have commitments the sat school is supposed to end anyway with plane tickets bought. Somehow I think my kids will remember how to read.

If you want your kids to have a week off, you do that. The rest of us want our kids to get an education and not have make up days. This isn’t a week off as it has to be made up. You sound like you don’t care.

The tact on days are a joke and many s most kids don’t go. Trust me it’s a week off

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The thing is, the virtual learning would just be "check the box, we did it" like the days at the end of the school calendar. It would put an extra burden on teachers and parents (and even more on the many teachers who are parents), extra expense for more devices for MCPS, and it would make 99% of the kids miserable and not really amount to any additional learning. So why?

Oh come on. Just because most kids don't learn as much virtually as they do in person doesn't mean no one is learning anything. Most kids learn some stuff and some learn just as much as they would in person.

That is clearly better than pushing the calendar in June into half days in the following week, which is truly zero learning. Most kids don't even go and there is absolutely no educational activity going on for the ones who do come because everything got wrapped up the week before or even earlier.

It is also clearly nett

So someone might learn something. Maybe.

What high standards you have.

Yes, I think virtual "many or most kids will probably learn something" days are superior to "no kids will learn anything" days. You prefer the "no kids will learn anything" days?

Those aren't the choices. Kids learn things all the time, from all sorts of sources. The hurdle that virtual needs to overcome is not "will the kids learn anything?", it's "will they learn more than they would learn otherwise?" and "will they learn enough to justify the negative impacts of going back to 1:1 devices for elementary, and disrupting parents who are working from home?"

My kids cooked, and read, and played their instruments on the snow day. Some of them set up a business shoveling people out. One of them went to work with a family member who works in the trades. They learned from all those activities.

Other kids went to snow day camps, or their parents got together and had day long playdates at various houses to reduce the number of hours each parent took off work. They developed their social skills and learned new games and activities. Virtual learning would have been impossible in those situations.

If there is a long break in school, like covid, then virtual learning makes sense. But over a few snow days it makes very little sense, with the exception of maybe high schoolers, and we can handle this by allowing high school teachers to email home written assignments.

This was a week, not a few days adn its different with ES kids than HS. HS kids don't do play dates, and its not as easy as reading and cooking and instruments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was a week. Nothing will happen.

It won’t happened again for a few years.

No need to plan for remote learning.

Tell your kid to read a book. A good book. Any book.

Just read. It will be the best thing. Period.

Yes and hopefully with that lack of instruction, they’ll become good writers like you with well-crafted sentences like “I was a week.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The thing is, the virtual learning would just be "check the box, we did it" like the days at the end of the school calendar. It would put an extra burden on teachers and parents (and even more on the many teachers who are parents), extra expense for more devices for MCPS, and it would make 99% of the kids miserable and not really amount to any additional learning. So why?

Oh come on. Just because most kids don't learn as much virtually as they do in person doesn't mean no one is learning anything. Most kids learn some stuff and some learn just as much as they would in person.

That is clearly better than pushing the calendar in June into half days in the following week, which is truly zero learning. Most kids don't even go and there is absolutely no educational activity going on for the ones who do come because everything got wrapped up the week before or even earlier.

It is also clearly nett

So someone might learn something. Maybe.

What high standards you have.

Yes, I think virtual "many or most kids will probably learn something" days are superior to "no kids will learn anything" days. You prefer the "no kids will learn anything" days?

I am sure I will be booed but I would absolutely rather my kids be in school with their friends doing games and watching movies than home, isolated doing mediocre learning. If we are talking about 4-5 days time

That’s what you want for your kids, but it’s not what I want for mind. Virtual instruction need not be mediocre if the teacher is not mediocre. I’ve seen plenty of virtual classes that my kids have had during the Covid period and beyond, and just like with in-class instruction, there are good teachers who make virtual instruction worthwhile.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The thing is, the virtual learning would just be "check the box, we did it" like the days at the end of the school calendar. It would put an extra burden on teachers and parents (and even more on the many teachers who are parents), extra expense for more devices for MCPS, and it would make 99% of the kids miserable and not really amount to any additional learning. So why?

Oh come on. Just because most kids don't learn as much virtually as they do in person doesn't mean no one is learning anything. Most kids learn some stuff and some learn just as much as they would in person.

That is clearly better than pushing the calendar in June into half days in the following week, which is truly zero learning. Most kids don't even go and there is absolutely no educational activity going on for the ones who do come because everything got wrapped up the week before or even earlier.

It is also clearly nett

So someone might learn something. Maybe.

What high standards you have.

Yes, I think virtual "many or most kids will probably learn something" days are superior to "no kids will learn anything" days. You prefer the "no kids will learn anything" days?

I am sure I will be booed but I would absolutely rather my kids be in school with their friends doing games and watching movies than home, isolated doing mediocre learning. If we are talking about 4-5 days time

That’s what you want for your kids, but it’s not what I want for mind. Virtual instruction need not be mediocre if the teacher is not mediocre. I’ve seen plenty of virtual classes that my kids have had during the Covid period and beyond, and just like with in-class instruction, there are good teachers who make virtual instruction worthwhile.

Most of us lived through covid and remember how awful virtual was. Calling it "mediocre" is generous. It was actively harmful.

[Anonymous]

As a nation we should have agreed to have our children take a gap year from learning. Rather than force them to develop critical learning skills from a screen we should have used that time to foster emotional growth and development instead of educational. So our children graduate at 19 instead of 18. Oh no think of the horror of sending older and more emotionally mature students into the next phase of their life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When are they going to make this a priority to get the plan submitted?

At the rate they move, I doubt they'll even have it approved by winter 2027. They have to do public consultations, and if one parent complains, they'll say they had parental opposition and won't do anything. Because that's their preference anyway.

Of course they do but they aren’t as loud and litigious and ready to go to the media with everything as MCPS parents. Also, folks have never actually asked anyone in those other places how everything went during virtual, they just assume it was better.

Are you saying that no parents complain in the other counties, such as in Anne Arundel?

Of course they do. And I'm sure they have kids younger than grade 3 and with special needs in Anne Arundel, Baltimore and PG County, yet somehow the state of Maryland approved the virtual learning plans they submitted.

But these are all the excuses DCUM gives as to why MCPS can't have a virtual learning plan for snow emergencies, and MCPS does like to make a lot of excuses for its inaction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a nation we should have agreed to have our children take a gap year from learning. Rather than force them to develop critical learning skills from a screen we should have used that time to foster emotional growth and development instead of educational. So our children graduate at 19 instead of 18. Oh no think of the horror of sending older and more emotionally mature students into the next phase of their life.

Why? They are going to be in front of a screen for work in most office setting or working from outside one particular office space like working from home or the cafe. More digital literacy not less.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a nation we should have agreed to have our children take a gap year from learning. Rather than force them to develop critical learning skills from a screen we should have used that time to foster emotional growth and development instead of educational. So our children graduate at 19 instead of 18. Oh no think of the horror of sending older and more emotionally mature students into the next phase of their life.

Why? They are going to be in front of a screen for work in most office setting or working from outside one particular office space like working from home or the cafe. More digital literacy not less.

Digital literacy, sure. But you don't get that through virtual school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a nation we should have agreed to have our children take a gap year from learning. Rather than force them to develop critical learning skills from a screen we should have used that time to foster emotional growth and development instead of educational. So our children graduate at 19 instead of 18. Oh no think of the horror of sending older and more emotionally mature students into the next phase of their life.

Why? They are going to be in front of a screen for work in most office setting or working from outside one particular office space like working from home or the cafe. More digital literacy not less.

Digital literacy, sure. But you don't get that through virtual school.

They can absolutely get it. Let the "experts" figure that out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a nation we should have agreed to have our children take a gap year from learning. Rather than force them to develop critical learning skills from a screen we should have used that time to foster emotional growth and development instead of educational. So our children graduate at 19 instead of 18. Oh no think of the horror of sending older and more emotionally mature students into the next phase of their life.

Why? They are going to be in front of a screen for work in most office setting or working from outside one particular office space like working from home or the cafe. More digital literacy not less.

Digital literacy, sure. But you don't get that through virtual school.

They can absolutely get it. Let the "experts" figure that out.

I can't tell if this is a joke.

[Anonymous]

Elementary School: Send on-paper worksheets home. Preferably a lot of them (but not so many that kids can't also go sledding). It's a great opportunity to have kids work at their own pace. Offer teacher office hours (or a required teacher check-in if that's what is required to have the state give 'credit' for the school day.

If it's feasible to send ES kids home with chromebooks (I think that's why MCPS has been relucatant to do virtual til now), then have kids work through Khan Academy lessons at home. These are adaptable. Teacher can track the kid's progress and see how much time was spent. Teacher isn't overwhelmed with a lot of grading on return. The actual work can adapt to the kid's needs so can provide more differentiation than is usual at school. This could actually make virtual days more effective than in-school days because kids who need more help can get more remedial lessons and other kids can work ahead on challenge problems.

High School: Regular online zoom sessions a la 2020 but give teachers flexibility to record lessons instead, or only come online to introduce the assignment and then let kids work offline.

In both cases, deadlines should be strong suggestions to keep kids on track but everything is due 24 hours after the return to school -- in case there are power outages or kids have special scheduling challenges during that week (taking care of siblings or whatnot). Maybe this is set up as actual deadlines during the snowweek, but extensions on request.