Belton Middle School

ANNOUNCEMENTS

We are continuing to grow as a united community of learning in our final grading period of the 2020-2021 school year. Beginning on April 12, we will be operating in Scenario 2. Students attend school five days per week with a one-hour early release on designated Wednesdays. See our A/B Calendar for early release dates. In Scenario 2, prevention and mitigation strategies remain a priority, however, some restrictions have loosened to allow increased access to campuses and higher capacity at events. You can view more details of Scenario 2 for at-school learners HERE.



Overview

BMS Learning Environments for 2020-2021

  • Following the guidance of TEA, BMS, as well as all BISD schools, will provide a traditional “at-school” environment for students as well as an “at-home” option for families who have concerns about their child physically returning to school. The decision of which learning environment is best is a personal, family choice. We are committed to providing exceptional learning opportunities to each and every one of our students in both environments.

At-School Learning

  • At-School Learning is available for all students on all campuses in BISD. This option is a traditional school experience with enhanced health and safety measures taken in an effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19. It is possible that At-School learners may begin classes in person and later need to move into intermittent remote learning environments due to COVID-19 outbreaks and/or government mandated closure of school buildings.

At-Home Learning

  • At-Home Learning in the 2020-2021 school year will look different from what students and families experienced last spring. At-Home learners will participate in an online learning option that is engaging, rigorous, and aligned with on-campus instruction. BMS students will be taught by BMS teachers and will experience synchronous learning opportunities and asynchronous learning during the school day. The schedule will include time for learning activities completed both individually and together with teachers/classmates using a learning management system. Students have been issued Chromebooks and are expected to follow a daily schedule comparable to the regular bell schedule for At-School learners.


IMPORTANT DEFINITIONS:
  • Asynchronous Learning- a general term used to describe forms of education, instruction, and learning that do not occur in the same place or at the same time. The term is most commonly applied to various forms of digital and online learning in which students learn from instruction—such as prerecorded video lessons or game-based learning tasks that students complete on their own and in their own time—that is not being delivered in person or in real time. Yet asynchronous learning may also encompass a wide variety of instructional interactions, including email exchanges between teachers, online discussion boards, and course-management systems that organize instructional materials and correspondence, among many other possible variations.
  • Synchronous Learning-a general term used to describe forms of education, instruction, and learning that occur at the same time, but not in the same place. The term is most commonly applied to various forms of televisual, digital, and online learning in which students learn from instructors, colleagues, or peers in real time, but not in person. For example, educational video conferences, interactive webinars, chat-based online discussions, and lectures that are broadcast at the same time they delivered would all be considered forms of synchronous learning.