[Snorlax94]

Is it worth mentioning that the online schooling options seem to be going better than expected? That's just my anecdotal data, gathered from 8 grandkids and their parents in New York City and Eugene OR, ages 9-16. Three different families. In all cases the parents and kids are pleasantly surprised. The online classes, in all cases through public schools, are giving them structure for their day and a learning experience that includes the teachers they already know, homework, evaluations...

I wish I could say I have found this to be the case. I do think distance learning works better the closer you are to being a college student, but
1) this is greatly increasing the gap between the haves and have-nots. If my child has problems setting up the computer, I can offer tech support. We already had extra laptops and gigabit fiber running to our home. But what happens in households without a good Internet connection? What happens in households where the parents don’t supervise the kids? What happens to households where the parents aren’t fluent in English?
2) i really hate the distance learning for my younger child. Kids in kindergarten or younger should not be on electronic devices all day. We made all these efforts to get our child to stop being an electronics junkie (non-stop want for electronics, tantrums, the harm of decreasing human interaction) and now it’s electronics all day. I am urging our school to go back to paper-based teaching for younger children, and to reduce the use of apps (versus just maybe reading to kids using Zoom and having a virtual circle time each day)

[Snorlax94]

Is it worth mentioning that the online schooling options seem to be going better than expected? That's just my anecdotal data, gathered from 8 grandkids and their parents in New York City and Eugene OR, ages 9-16. Three different families. In all cases the parents and kids are pleasantly surprised. The online classes, in all cases through public schools, are giving them structure for their day and a learning experience that includes the teachers they already know, homework, evaluations...

I wish I could say I have found this to be the case. I do think distance learning works better the closer you are to being a college student, but
1) this is greatly increasing the gap between the haves and have-nots. If my child has problems setting up the computer, I can offer tech support. We already had extra laptops and gigabit fiber running to our home. But what happens in households without a good Internet connection? What happens in households where the parents don’t supervise the kids? What happens to households where the parents aren’t fluent in English?
2) i really hate the distance learning for my younger child. Kids in kindergarten or younger should not be on electronic devices all day. We made all these efforts to get our child to stop being an electronics junkie (non-stop want for electronics, tantrums, the harm of decreasing human interaction) and now it’s electronics all day. I am urging our school to go back to paper-based teaching for younger children, and to reduce the use of apps (versus just maybe reading to kids using Zoom and having a virtual circle time each day)