Mason K-4 Staff Remote Learning Resources

Full Steam Ahead!

Things to consider as you plan...

Maintain your personal creativity!

You can customize the template to fit your style.

Make sure you shine through in the work kids are doing.

Keep Learning Fun!

Continue to focus on building students' curiosity and wonder! If you do genius hour, maker moments, and/or inquiry projects in your classroom - you can still do those remotely.

Take this opportunity to give students more agency!

We want kids to be doing the learning. This is NOT homeschooling in the traditional sense and our families will be juggling a lot. Ask yourself: How can I create a learning experience that allows kids to drive the learning?

The beginning of remote learning is like the beginning of the school year

Just as you set up routines and expectations at the beginning of the school year, it will be necessary to take the time to do this for remote learning too. Some examples could include:

Having students establish a reading spot in their home (just like you did in your classroom in August) and sending a picture or video of their reading space
To get students re-engaged with reading and writing, start off with something that really peaks their interests. Want to write a graphic novel? Go for it! Been wanting to write a scary story? Let's do it! Want to read about sharks? Tell me all you've learned! Take a week to get students re-engaged with literacy before diving head first back into curriculum.
Continue to build relationships with students, check in with them, and see how they are doing. Do you have space for them to share their feelings, wonderings, or general feedback on how things are going?

Do These Things...

When sharing your template with families, copy and paste the entire template into the email you are sending.
Send your email to yourself so that you can see if it looks correct.
Double check all links and share settings so that students and families can access what they need easily
If you are using the weekly template and you make changes mid-week, make sure you point this out to families in your next email and make sure you paste in the updated template.

Remember These Things...

If you are using a ‘fancy’ font on your template it may not translate well when pasted and opened on a mobile device.
You have to make ALL links to google docs “anyone with the link can view”. OR BETTER YET - use the publish to web link.

Adjust and Adapt Moment #999

A few of you discovered yesterday that if kids are working on a school Chromebook - they had trouble getting to links because our youngest kids can only receive email from within the system - meaning you could send them an email - but their parents can't...

A few potential solutions:

1. Wait until you hear from a parent, then add that child to your email group.

2. Just go ahead and add all of your kids to your email group.

We are fine with either option. Do what makes the most sense for you.

What about grades?

As you think about what and how to grade student work during this time, consider what the most essential learning components are and how students might be able to demonstrate their understanding in a variety of ways, using a variety of tools.

We are very fortunate that our state government has eliminated the AIR testing and TGRG requirements. As we all transition to an RLE, remember that we all have different circumstances to manage - some of our older learners may be providing support and child-care to younger family members while parent(s) are working in and out of the home (that goes for us as caregivers in our own homes), families may only have a few devices to work on throughout the day, Wifi bandwidth varies from home to home, not all families have access to a printer, and we all are navigating an unknown time which increases our anxiety and student anxiety. The key is to continue to develop remote learning experiences that are engaging and to continue to be flexible and empathetic to ourselves and to our learners.

Key Logistics:

- - Give Grace!
  - Fewer grades/ More Feedback
  - Standards-Based Grades (K-5, 6th specials)
    - Focus on hitting key standards - if you don’t get to one or two - just leave them blank in the gradebook - we will adjust in the fall.
    - Most kids will be a 2 or 3 and that’s OK - you will have to make judgements based on what you see and what you know about the learner
  - 6th Grade Content Areas
    - Consider if assignment can be pass/fail
    - Think about equity in grading - maybe it’s a letter grade or rubric grade rather than a percentage...

In closing, relationships are key. Utilize RLE to continue to connect with our students, families, and your colleagues. As we transition to RLE, the focus should be on how we can continue to care for each other and connect with our students and families. Developing engaging and meaningful RLE’s that include both essential content and opportunities to connect with one another is so important during this time. Take the time to go slow and ensure that we are caring for one another. Grades are one small piece of a much bigger reality, and our stance is to tread softly and ensure our students feel good about learning and are not worried about grades in this unusual circumstance.

Planning to use Raz-Plus?

Please read this critical information on how it can be used to supplement our existing workshop approach.

Click here to view a webinar on Raz-Plus, but still consider best practices from the document linked above.

Take a look back through the PreK-6 RLE Checklist for this week.

We are here for you!

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us!

Krissy, Danielle, Liz, Tina, Robyn

Friday Survey..

Please fill out the form shared by your building administrators to let us know about any families who you have not yet had contact.

** If families need device or wifi support, they should send an email to support@masonohioschools.com

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