[CardinalSagehen]

I have three different perspectives here in Palo Alto.  My wife is a high school teacher at Gunn, my son attends JLS Middle School, and my daughter is a 4th grader.  

The district does not seem to be equipped for or expecting any real-time distance learning. At the high school level, this week, they plan to assign a uniform set of work across the district, by subject and grade level, using Schoology. Teachers have to go in for a couple hours tomorrow to let students pick up Chromebooks (if needed) and coordinate with their departments on the assignment. After this week, it may change and teachers may be able to get back to their own curriculum. We’ll know more tomorrow.   

In my son’s 6th grade class, his two teachers sent an email saying they would assign the week’s work on Schoology by noon on Monday and help/support via Schoology during the week.

In my daughter’s 4th grade class, they were sent home on Friday with a one-pager with guidelines for how much time to spend on each subject per day and which resources to use (Khan, a packet of essays that they’re supposed to read, etc.) There doesn’t seem to be any firm expectation of the grade school teachers to adapt to distance learning. Her teacher is fantastic and a good family friend of ours, but he’ll be teaching preschool, second and fifth grade in his own home, while his wife tends to patients at Stanford Hospital. That’s emblematic of the situation.  

Assuming my wife’s prep load isn’t too burdensome, at least for this week, she will be able to keep our own kids on a schedule and help them through their work. I’m thankful for that. She’s also been planning some afternoon get-togethers with another family. It’s important that kids experience some normalcy through all of this, especially with their own risk (and ours, frankly) being so low. We are being careful not to spend time with grandma and grandpa, though.

[CardinalSagehen]

I have three different perspectives here in Palo Alto.  My wife is a high school teacher at Gunn, my son attends JLS Middle School, and my daughter is a 4th grader.  

The district does not seem to be equipped for or expecting any real-time distance learning. At the high school level, this week, they plan to assign a uniform set of work across the district, by subject and grade level, using Schoology. Teachers have to go in for a couple hours tomorrow to let students pick up Chromebooks (if needed) and coordinate with their departments on the assignment. After this week, it may change and teachers may be able to get back to their own curriculum. We’ll know more tomorrow.   

In my son’s 6th grade class, his two teachers sent an email saying they would assign the week’s work on Schoology by noon on Monday and help/support via Schoology during the week.

In my daughter’s 4th grade class, they were sent home on Friday with a one-pager with guidelines for how much time to spend on each subject per day and which resources to use (Khan, a packet of essays that they’re supposed to read, etc.) There doesn’t seem to be any firm expectation of the grade school teachers to adapt to distance learning. Her teacher is fantastic and a good family friend of ours, but he’ll be teaching preschool, second and fifth grade in his own home, while his wife tends to patients at Stanford Hospital. That’s emblematic of the situation.  

Assuming my wife’s prep load isn’t too burdensome, at least for this week, she will be able to keep our own kids on a schedule and help them through their work. I’m thankful for that. She’s also been planning some afternoon get-togethers with another family. It’s important that kids experience some normalcy through all of this, especially with their own risk (and ours, frankly) being so low. We are being careful not to spend time with grandma and grandpa, though.