Be Excellent To Each Other, Sleepless

 I see you and I hear you, my colleagues. This is a wild year and things are ... unusual to say the least. As Bill and Ted used to say, “Strange things are afoot at the Circle K. And ... everywhere.”

Which of these Pandemic Professional-educator Profiles are you? 

(PS: I put Pinellas geography in these teachers' pseudonyms merely  for the alliteration of it. I am not referring to any actual person by their location because you are multitude. I could not possibly refer to a single teacher if I wanted to. There are too many of you and anyway, that would be insensitive and rude of me. And for every profile below, there are a dozen or two people who probably fit the description)

Sleepless in St Pete (or anywhere): Trying desperately to keep up with the Most Amazing Lessons Ever (!!), even though they are teaching simultaneously all day and still figuring out Canvas, these teachers are still bringing their A+ game. Since Simultaneous Teaching has been described by many teachers as having “two very different preps at the exact same time” (especially when the Online kids don’t have your in-class materials and your in-class kids don’t have or aren’t allowed to bring devices), Sleepless in St Pete (and her brother, Sleepless in Safety Harbor) are literally working around the clock, working harder and longer hours than they did in the BC times (Before Covid) and are therefore not sleeping. Or eating. Or going for runs. Or hanging out with their friends or families. Or watching TV. They are neglecting everything including their own physical and mental health chasing down the perfect simultaneous lesson for next week. These folks are in danger of burning out by Halloween. 

Lonely at Lake Seminole (or anywhere): Some of our colleagues are working from home. OR some of our colleagues come to school each day only to lock themselves in their classrooms (or their closets?) and not see another live human all day. This is hard to do. And lonely. And weird. To know that some of us are feeling like the students are too close and too many and others really miss those loud, smelly germ factories. And are feeling lonely and forgotten and lost and like an afterthought. It’s hard to collaborate from your living room. And it’s hard to be a part of things when you’re literally apart. 

Digitally Drowning Downtown (or anywhere): Some of us can barely keep up with the tech. Just when we got Teams down in the Spring, they sprung Canvas on us. It’s all we can do to get the calendar set up. To heck with the rest, amirite? Except ... It’s the fourth week of school and everybody is expecting all this cool stuff from my Online classes and I am LOST. I don’t know half of what they’re talking about, let alone how to DO what they’re talking about! Canvas is not easy and I think I still have all that Latin stuff that came on there. And I know it makes my life more complicated. If I just knew how to make things easier on myself, well, things would be easier. Uggghhh. Can’t we just go back to a projector?

North County Newbies (or anywhere) These folks might be new to teaching or new to your school. Everytime they turn around, there’s a new THING they didn’t know about -- a new procedure, a new acronym, a new tradition, a new meeting, a new part of things they didn’t know about -- ON TOP OF learning Canvas and teaching in a pandemic and all the things we are ALL learning together. A lot of veteran teachers say they feel like they’re first year teachers again this year -- but these folks are ACTUALLY NEW. And exhausted. And overwhelmed. 

Loner in Largo (or anywhere): Some of us don’t have time for anyone else. Some of us just need to close our door, take our Teams “off the hook” and get stuff done. There’s a lot to do. Online live teaching is new, simultaneous teaching is a hot mess, and it all takes focused time. We just don’t have time to deal with all these extra people if we are going to get stuff done. If I ask for help, it will take too long. And I’m sure they would do it differently than I want to anyway. Plus, I might look dumb. I’m sure they’re all fine. I’m fine too. I just. Need. To. Get. This. Thing. Done. Can we get a raincheck on this conversation? Cute mask! Bye!

Panicking in Pinellas Park and Palm Harbor (or anywhere): It’s so hard to know where to start. Do I plan for my virtual class first or my face-to-face one? Or do I clean my classroom, again? Do I focus on my standards or the social-emotional learning first? Should I give a traditional assessment or something more project-based ... or just, nah? Can I open a window in here or is it going to rain again? Should I figure out how to have kids collaborate even though the face to face kids can’t get near each other and a bunch of the online kids don’t have cameras or mics? How do I do that? Especially at the same time? Arrgh!!! What materials can I use that my face to face can use Analog and my Online kids can use digitally that doesn’t have me reinventing the wheel every period of every day? And what do I do when schedule changes make me restart all my classruum culture stuff? AAAAAARRRGGGHHHH!!!!! Can I take a day off yet? What if I get Covid and need the days off? 

This is a friendly reminder that 1) the best “dumb” movie in the world is Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (and no, I haven’t seen the new one, but I will) and 2) Bill and Ted have exactly one piece of wisdom. 

“Be excellent to each other.” 

There is absolutely NO reason to do everything yourself. There is no reason to be lonely. There is no reason to panic alone. There is no reason to go through the Newbie Learning Curve alone. There is no reason to be digitally drowning. 

You have colleagues and they are awesome. (I actually know almost all of the middle school social studies teachers and a whole lot of the high school social studies teachers and I can say that with confidence and authority). Let me say that again. 

You have colleagues. Your colleagues are awesome. (truth)

Please go find your colleagues (either masked and socially distant OR via Teams meeting) and be excellent to each other. Help each other out. 

Don’t have a meeting that is useless. Each of you can bring a problem you need help with. And then... help each other. Many hands make light burdens.  

• If one of you is Sleepless in St Pete (or Safety Harbor), one of you knows a great resource or shortcut to help sleepless work a little less.

• If one of you is Lonely in Lake Seminole, talk to that person while you plan. Bounce your ideas off them. It will make your lesson plans better and will do wonders for the person who doesn't’ see humans all day.   

• If one of you is Digitally Drowning Downtown, one of you knows how to do some of that. Help that person. One trick or process or application at a time. 

• Please find that North County Newbie and help that person. Honestly, it doesn’t matter if you have time or not. Remember when you were new and remember the colleagues who had time for you and the colleagues who didn’t. Some people make a difference in the lives of their colleagues too. 

• The Loner in Largo thinks they can do it all by themselves but honestly, their lives would be a whole lot easier with a “divide and conquer” strategy, too. Fine them and divide some work. You take this task and you take that task and everyone has less to do and our stress levels decrease. And maybe we take a deeper breath tonight and relax more. 

• And our colleague who is Panicking in Pinellas Park and Palm Harbor also needs ... a friend/colleague to talk it out with. Because who can better help you prioritize than someone making the same decisions. Who may have figured out one of the problems. Who may have a good idea. Or who can talk it out with you. 

Be excellent to each other. It’s a little harder now with social distancing and masks and teachers working from home and Teams meetings. But it’s crucial for OUR OWN mental health and professional well-being to find our colleagues and work together, safely. 

In Bill and Ted, Socrates told them “The only true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing”. Bill and Ted replied “That’s us, dude!”. Of course you don’t know nothing, but recognize that you have things to learn from a colleague.  

Find your colleagues and work together. Find the ones you like and the ones you need specific skills from and the ones who need something from you. Socially distant or virtually, but don’t let this slide. It is so important to your stress levels and to your overall wholeness. 

And ... you can always call us here at the district SS office if you need us. We are happy to help with the panic, digital needs, overachievers, newbies, and EVERYONE! 

This is hard. Don’t let anyone tell you it isn’t. Make it easier on yourself by letting many hands make light work. And then, enjoy a virtual happy hour to celebrate actually having some free time when that happens (hey, it will!)

As always, I love to hear from you! Email me at newmantr@pcsb.org

-Tracy

All The Things

An awful lot of you are Livin La Vida Loca called “Simultaneous Teaching” or sometimes “Hybrid Teaching” An

On behalf of all humans everywhere, not a dang one of us who have personally cured Covid-19 by now, I apologize for putting you in this position -- where no teacher should be. 

I am seeing my veteran master teachers feel like first year teachers and I am seeing my first year teachers ... feel even less “together” than they would during a normal year. I am seeing you all work even longer hours than usual (I didn’t know that was possible. Get some sleep, y’all!)

This is so hard, you guys!  

Whoever said to just “do the same thing with both groups” has obviously not been in a simultaneous class, especially in a school where Face-to-Face kids aren’t allowed to bring technology into the classroom (or don’t have any to bring, which is killing me!)

I facilitated PD last night where I mostly asked questions and listened to our colleagues talk about their Simultaneous Teaching problems and victories. 

Here’s what I learned. I’m like Robin Hood today, stealing (with permission) the great ideas from our colleagues to give to those who need great ideas. I hope at least one will make your simultaneous teaching life easier. 

 Here are the Top Ten Things I have learned (from our colleagues!) to make Simultaneous Teaching easier on Teachers (and kids, too)

1. Plan for the Virtual Part First: I am hearing that it is easier/faster to adapt the digital activities to face to face (play the video whole-class, make the discussion verbal and not a chat, print the reading) rather than the other way around. This is especially true if you are using district-created resources and not making/finding all your own stuff.

2. Establish Bellwork/Beginning procedures: There are plenty of ways to start class, and starting class smoothly has always set the tone for the rest of the class. That hasn’t changed, but maybe the logistics have. Some teachers have the face-to-face kids (F2F) start on bellwork by looking at the board and writing in their notebooks while the teacher gets the Online kids started on their digital bellwork. Some teachers have all kids (F2F & Online) do their bellwork the same way -- all in a physical notebook or all in Canvas. But all teachers who feel like they “have this down” have the kids do some sort of bellwork while the teacher takes attendance. 

3. Build Relationships with Online Kids Differently (but intentionally): Remember, some of the online kids don’t see another human all day. And some of them have their whole families breathing down their necks. They have a lot of emotional needs and they really need to bond with you and with each other. (please don’t forget this! Please be intentional in building classroom culture with them!) Some great ideas to help with building relationships included:

1. Asking kids (at their choice and discretion and comfort level) to turn on their cameras for a few minutes at least once a week so you-the-teacher can get to know their faces.

2. Asking kids to turn on their mics for an extended culture-building bellwork once a week where everyone shares their answers out loud. Something like “Thankful Thursdays” or “Good news Mondays” would be great for this!  

3. Having each kid create a Bitmoji to use in your physical & digital classroom, even as their “signature” on a Class Agreement or classroom Social Contract. 

4. Have Online kids respond with emojis and F2F kids respond by drawing emojis on whiteboards (they can be cleaned at the end of each period).

5. Let Online kids be “seen” and known by having “bring your pet to Online Class day” or use that as an incentive for Online kids (like dress-down day for F2F kids)

4. Manage Canvas Confusion: Kids are confused in Canvas. To manage this, our colleagues suggested the following:

1. Put a due date (of that day, if possible) on everything so it shows up under today’s “to do” list and not under a future “to do” list. 

2. Hide everything kids don't need to see. Hide the apps on the left that they aren’t going to use.Hide future lessons and future tasks. Less clutter is less confusion!

3. Make tasks “prerequisites” to each other. Meaning that they can’t go on to Task B if they haven’t completed or looked at Task A. 

5. Doing Too Many Things At Once (and None Well): Use rotations to give some special, focused time to each group -- your Online kids and your Face to Face (F2F) kids. Depending on your numbers, this might just be two groups, say 15 minutes of direct instruction with your Online kids while your F2F kids do some independent work (maybe a reading task or map activity). Then, switch! Ask your Online kids to do the reading while you do some direct instruction with your F2F kids. 

*Bonus -- this can help with the bonding/relationship building that you’re doing with your kids (that’s harder with those Online kids AND can possibly decrease your stress level one notch [we can’t work miracles here] while you only work with only one group at a time). If your class numbers are uneven (maybe one of those two groups are larger than the other) you can split it into two and have a rotation of three groups (for example, two F2F groups and one Online group) or if you have One Giant Class, you can have four rotations. You can split those rotations over two days if necessary. 

6. Using Channels: Do you have an ESE teacher who needs to meet with ESE students for pull outs -- online? Use a Teams Channel! Do you want to have your online kids discuss things in small groups? Use a Teams Channel! Do you want kids to work in groups? Use a Teams Channel *One caveat! Kids can get up to mischief if they are unsupervised in a physical room OR a virtual room. Please make sure to be really good about popping into the Teams Channel(s) to make sure kids are being supervised and not up to mischief.

7. Nearpod:  Nearpod is great for lots of things -- including the checks for understanding and kids collaborating and giving feedback. This gives them a voice -- which THEY need right now because the world is crazy and YOU need because you’re reinventing your teaching. 

8. Thumbs Up: Have kids use “thumbs up” and “thumbs down” both in F2F and (when cameras are on) with Online kids. It’s an easy way to see if kids are okay, and if they’re with you, and if they’re understanding coursework. 

9. Online Kids Can Check Out and Come Back: If your audio won’t work or the simultaneous content won’t work ... ahem .. ..simultaneously, have the Online kids go watch the video on their own and come back to Live Class at such-and-such time. It’s not skipping class. It’s doing their classwork! 

10. Having Patience: In a normal year, by the third week of school, half the kids still don’t know where to turn in work. Or how to put a heading on their paper. They have seven (or eight) different teachers with seven (or eight) different expectations. Now amplify that with in-person and/or virtual expectations. OF COURSE they don’t remember how to do all of the new things! That is also changing as we all work through things. Add the stress of a pandemic and the learning curves of new technology (for us AND for the kids) and the economic stresses hitting a lot of our families and they’re all a hot mess. (so are many of us, to be honest) Not turning in work. Ghosting class. Not answering questions. Not turning on mics. Acting like fools.  Just having patience with ourselves and with our kids when we/they mess up can make all the difference. 

I know that this is ALL different and weird and crazy. Do you? Do your colleagues? Do your kids? Do their parents? 

This is your weekly reminder that this is a GLOBAL PANDEMIC (yes, I’m yelling) and NOBODY HAS EVER DONE THIS SIMULTANEOUS TEACHING BEFORE (because why the heck would they?). 

It’s ok that it isn’t great yet. Don’t forget to be patient with yourself and your kids. It takes small, incremental fixes to go from terrible to okay to good to great. Start small. 

And let us know how we can help. 

-Tracy

 

With Grace

Tales of the first week of school. Here are some things I saw and heard of from the first week of school 

• Hand sanitizer everywhere

• Kids (in-person) forgetting how to be around other kids

• Teachers adapting

• Kids who literally don’t see another live human being all day

• Kids not getting “let in” to a class all period. *Bonus craziness if it was during block schedule. 

• Some kids and teachers glad to be home and safe.

• Some teachers crying. 

• Some technology failing. 

• Great cleanliness processes 

• Younger kids melting down and having nightmares.

• Older kids being weirdly sweet and nice to their families. 

• Classrooms shut down due to Covid. 

• Schools not letting children bring school-issued computers to class (yes, really!)

• Plexiglass.

• Super-cute face masks.

• Teachers ghosting their jobs. 

• Canvas confusion

• A lot of Tech-Help tickets

• Creative teacher geniusness 

• Kids glad to see other kids 

• Everyone trying to figure out the “new normal” so we can get into routine. 

This “Home Learning Dome” below is a joke. It’s, sadly, not a real thing, otherwise, I would have put two on my credit card. But I wish it was real...

Y’all.Y’ALL!

I know we had to do a hard shift in the spring. And this is a whole ’nother giant adjustment. 

So this week, all I can ask you for is this. 

Grace. 

I ask that you give yourself and others around you grace. 

By grace, I mean goodwill, understanding, and kindness. 

This is not a normal year. So don’t treat it as one. Not at this point, anyway.

• Sure you normally start giving homework -- and grading it -- the second week of school. Show a little grace. Maybe wait another week. Or extend the due dates. 

• Sure, you normally have a certain set of expectations . It’s not “lowering expectations”. It’s giving a little grace when it takes the kids a little longer to learn those expectations. 

• I know you are a perfectionist and you expect yourself to have amazing lessons. But Canvas is new and it's hard to tell what’s going on behind the kids’ masks. And you have to sleep sometimes... Give YOURSELF a little grace. Let it go. Not every lesson can be an A+. It’s okay if this one is only a B. 

• Your administrator set up this wild schedule and it’s not what you wanted. It’s messy and hard to pull off. Show a little grace. They’re doing the best they can, too. 

• The parents are emailing you all the time, even sticking their faces into the screen to see what’s going on. Of course it makes you anxious. It’s so weird! They’re anxious, too. They’re worried if they made the right choice (about online or face to face learning). They’re worried about their kid. They’re trying to be involved (which they know they’re supposed to do). Give the parents a little grace.

• The kids at home have their cameras off.  It’s so hard to teach to a set of initials instead of to a face. But there are a million reasons why you can’t see those beautiful faces, starting with lack of cameras, moving to adolescent embarrassment about peers, and ending with home lives they don’t want others to see. Show grace and allow cameras to be off (although you might do a one-on-one conference with cameras on in the coming weeks and let the kid use a fun background, just so you can get to know their face).

• Your awesome lesson bombed because of technical difficulties. You worked so hard and the internet went down or the computer froze or Canvas acted up. You deserve grace too. S--- happens and you are still a wonderful teacher even when technology doesn’t cooperate. Take a breath. It’ll be okay. 

The only people you do not have to show grace to are the ones who use their anxiety to attack you in some way. If their anxiety turns into blame, bullying, unsafe behavior, or manipulation, then you do not have to show grace in that moment. You can walk away. But you can show grace. It feels good.  

But generally, we are all trying our best right now. Parents, students, staff, administrators, and teachers. We all want what’s best for our kids, with what we have to work with. 

Give yourself and others grace. Assume good intentions. Show understanding and give kindness. 

We will get through these first few weeks and we will figure out how to do this. It will get easier. And someday we will look back and tell people “I taught during the pandemic” and they will say “Holy crap! How did you do that?”

And you will say “We did it with grace” 

Have a better week than last week. 

Let me/us know how we can help. 

-Tracy

Pop Tart Habits

 

What were your bad habits during our long quarantine time? 

I had a late-night impulse buy of Pop Tarts once in April or May that I could not take back. Once Pop-Tarts entered our house, they became part of the family and we loved them and adopted them. 

I know they’re crap for nutrition. But tasty, tasty crap. Mmmmmm... 

So, two days into Weird Pandemic Teaching already? It’s definitely getting better, but still messy, I think, huh? 

Before you go any further into this school year, do yourself and your kids and families a favor. 

Ask them how it’s going. NOW. Before you get into any bad habits. Or before the kids get into bad habits. Or before things just... happen... in an unintentional way...

I know it’s harder than ever before to gauge how things are going. Some kids are at home. Some of THOSE kids have cameras on and some don’t. Some of your kids are in your classroom. Those kids have masks on, making it harder to read their faces than usual. 

Plus it doesn’t help that we are spending half our days troubleshooting our tech and not spending as much time really bonding with our students as usual. 

So, do yourself and your kids and families a favor. 

Ask them how it’s going. 

And then, read their answers and adapt your class if and in ways that you can. 

Now, quick -- before you pick up a ridiculous Pop-Tart habit (or worse, a weird new teaching/learning/management habit) that you don’t want to have to unlearn.  (Poptarts, I dread quitting you!)

I made you some survey questions you can ask. You can put them in Canvas or in Teams or on the board or in a Word Doc. Have kids answer in Forms or in Canvas or on a notecard. I know there’s so much variation with how you’re doing all this. 

But here’s one template you can use in Canvas. (you can also search in Canvas for “Newman” and “survey”). You can copy it into your course (it’s an assignment) and then you can see how this is going for your kids. 

I get it. It’s hard to see how kids are through a computer, with some cameras on and some off while you’re teaching live with masks on to make face-reading harder, too. It’s a lot. So, instead of guessing or waiting for eight million questions -- ask the kids right up front. It might help! 

Don’t wait for bad habits to form. Nip those bad habits in the bud and find out what’s happening now.  Before your whole family (I mean class) is addicted to pop tarts) Full survey link  https://lor.instructure.com/resources/59d61d3e45944bef8fa12296313f3cd1?shared  

And as always, let me know how it’s going. I want to hear. The good, the bad, and the crazy. Let me know! 

-Tracy