By Sophia Ferrara
Covid-19 has given both teachers and students alike a new perspective on learning. Counties, districts, and school boards have taken steps that are supposed to benefit everyone. However, the people that are supposed to benefit from the actions being taken may not agree. Students might look like the main “beneficiaries” to all of these new learning methods and decisions, but teachers have views on these topics as well! Are students putting in the right amount of effort? Should we be taking standardized tests and SATs this year? Is the curriculum correctly tailored to LaunchEd and face-to-face students alike? Students may think that teachers just grin and bear it, but what do our educators truly believe should be happening this year?
Many schools this year, including Timber Creek, have at some point or another had to go fully online for a period of two weeks while their school is being sanitized. This may lead teachers to believe that it becomes a challenge to separate work life from home life. Miss Victoria Sell, who teaches our school’s speech and debate class as well as senior English classes, says that it is extremely difficult to set her work life apart from her home life while being fully online. She says that since everything takes place in the same environment, it can become hard to separate yourself from work. Adding some emphasis on this point, Mr. Tesch, who teaches AP Human Geography and Comparative Politics at TCHS, says that it can definitely be difficult to work from home, but that he finds time with his loved ones through doing things that are as simple as eating dinner as a family every single night. He and his wife welcomed a baby girl into the world in August, and he says that before it was hard for him to be at home but be working as opposed to playing the role of dad and being able to help take care of his daughter. However, at the end Mr. Tesch claims that he is pretty good at being able to separate work and home life while having both events occur in the same place.
Aside from the more personal aspect of work/life balance when it comes to times like these, teachers have also noticed a change in their students. Many students this year (especially those in LaunchEd) have been failing their classes or have most likely become unmotivated to continue now that there is a whole new set of challenges when it comes to learning and education along with the ones that existed before the pandemic. Ms. Sell and Mr. Tesch both say that most of the kids that are failing are online, and both also believe that many are failing because they do not put in the effort, or have lost motivation. Ms. Sell in particular believes that the kids online in the situation where they are feeling undetermined or unmotivated would not be failing normally. Mr. Tesch claims that there are many students who are not doing what they need to do when it comes to online school, but for complex reasons. He says that students get demotivated when they see themselves failing. However, he believes that when those same students are in the classroom, they have more support and he is able to hold them accountable or give them encouragement whenever they need it. Both teachers also had input on the fact that this year in particular, it takes more or different traits than it would to do well in a normal year. Ms. Sell and Mr. Tesch both say that it takes dedication and motivation, but Ms. Sell says it also takes focus, and making sacrifices. This is because the kids that are online have unlimited options to what they could be doing. She says, “You are in an environment that almost begs you to be distracted.” Mr. Tesch believes that when it comes to this, we need to think about how much students are actually taking in. He claims there’s a giant disconnect between turning in work for classes and actually having the knowledge, and that “work ethic isn’t just correlated, it’s causative.”
Another recent topic of discussion when it comes to the changes occurring in school this year has been standardized testing and the changing or adjusting of school curriculums. Unlike the view most people may take on standardized testing in the 2020-2021 school year, Ms. Sell claims that it is more useful this year than it has ever been in past years because schools need to ensure that all kids are learning the same things and being taught what they need to know. Mr. Tesch takes a similar view, saying that tests such as the SAT give a meaningful and fair way to measure students because it is the same test for everyone. He adds that this year in particular, a lot of colleges are allowing applications without the SAT and that due to the times we are in, it is one of the best (and only) options these colleges have. Aside from that, this year many would think there have been drastic changes to the curriculum being taught, but have there been enough? Ms. Sell does not believe that the curriculum she teaches is correctly tailored to accommodate both face-to-face and LaunchEd students. However, she also believes that if everyone were face-to-face the curriculum still would not cover a broad enough range of different types of students and how they learn. Despite this, she does in fact believe that for her class specifically both groups of students have equal advantages. She claims that even if online students are having trouble, she puts everything she explains verbally to her students onto Canvas. This essentially means that if any student (from either group) is struggling to pay attention or is distracted for any reason, there is enough information on Canvas that enables them to pass. Mr. Tesch believes (and has read research that shows) that when it comes to online school, face-to-face/in-the-classroom learning is simply more effective, and that regardless of the curriculum’s design and content, his instructional strategies in particular do not transfer well to digital teaching. In other words, nothing can replace the classroom. He claims that each method of learning has its own disadvantages and that the system is under stress. He says, “There’s no good solution.”
Many teachers have different opinions on how online learning combined with face-to-face learning impacts their classes, their work/life balance, and their ability to teach, and it is clear that it has its ups and downs. It may be deemed as the new normal, but it seems that neither teachers nor students will ever be able to make the true adjustment. However, it is important to remain positive and make the best of this situation and the perks that come with it. Remember that everyone is struggling a little bit in their own way, teacher or student, but that we will all get through this together.