In a previous post, I mentioned that my kindergartener is receiving lesson plans to work on from home that is up to 8 pages in length. Ridiculous. I can’t keep up with that and I teach for a living and have an M.Ed. Imagine a parent who has a really demanding job, such as my wife, an Interior Designer. She has no clue what is going on and doesn’t have time to read through 8 pages let alone get everything done. We don’t have whole days to devote to our daughter’s education, but mere minutes, in chunks of about 20-30. The same is true for high school students, whom I teach. They aren’t sleeping well, they are depressed and out of sorts and having to navigate through multiple assignments on multiple platforms is too much right now. Our expectations need to be lowered, significantly.
To me, less is more. I also adhere to the KISS model: keep it simple, stupid. Lesson plans should be easy to navigate and found in one place, on one platform. My child’s school uses too many programs and websites. “Is it on Clever, Sawyer, Happy Numbers, istation, youtube…” It frustrates me and makes me shut down. Instead, everything both parents and students need to access should be found in one place. My favorite tool is the Google suite. I use Google Classroom and Google Drive with my own students, so they never have to navigate between more than one platform and can find things easily, as I sort assignments by Topics under Classwork. I have created a new topic, specifically for Remote Learning, only give two assignments per week, and give my students choices and a lot of leeway/grace.
I also want to express to teachers that sending home a lesson plan where parents have to click on multiple links that go to activities that take two minutes is a waste of time. If you are going to assign it, it should be meaningful and authentic. Take advantage of circumstances to create lesson plans that play on current events, feelings, situations, etc. In my own lessons I have had my students create comic strips, memes, artworks in various media that speak to how they are feeling about social isolation, virus fears, and working from home with limited supplies.
Education is changing and this can be scary but also exciting! Let’s take advantage of this opportunity to see what is working and what isn’t and create meaningful instruction and learning for our students, whether they are working from home or in our classrooms.
