Mitchell Robinson: Welcome Back to School! But Not So Fast… | Eclectablog

Welcome Back to School! But Not So Fast… | Eclectablog

Welcome Back to School! But Not So Fast…

As someone who visits a lot of schools each year to observe student teachers and work with my colleagues in the schools, a few thoughts on these newly-released CDC “back to school” guidelines…

• kids can’t keep their shoes and socks on for a full school day…masks?
• no shared items? everything in school is shared…pencils are shared, books are shared, construction paper is shared, glue is shared, drum sticks and mallets and tubas and bari saxes are shared, desks are shared, art supplies are shared…no school I’ve been in in the past 20 years has enough cubbies for each child to have their own. and let’s not even get started on morning and afternoon kindergarten rooms…
• unless we are reducing class sizes to single digits there is no way to keep desks at a 6 foot distance–and our ed reform friends have been telling us for decades that smaller class sizes are “inefficient and do not improve students’ test scores,” so that one is not happening…
• one child per seat and skip rows on school buses? yeah, right…adding another bus run in a public school budget is like crossing the River Styx–it just ain’t gonna happen.
• we can’t get sneeze guards installed in school salad bars…
• a “one way route” in many schools will require children and teachers exiting the school, walking completely around the building, perhaps in snow, rain, and/or mud, and reentering the school at the other side of the building–and yes, any architect who designed horseshoe-shaped schools was not real bright
• you *might* be able to get teachers to keep their classes in their rooms to eat lunch, but no shared playgrounds? what is a “personal playground”? so no recess? for young children?
• as if a plexiglass shield in a middle school bathroom would remain clean–we haven’t had doors that close in school restrooms for decades; sometimes no doors at all CONTINUE READING: Welcome Back to School! But Not So Fast… | Eclectablog