Teacher Tom: We're All Scrambling: Talking With Parents About These Interesting Times

Teacher Tom: We're All Scrambling: Talking With Parents About These Interesting Times

We're All Scrambling: Talking With Parents About These Interesting Times

With millions of preschoolers staying home from school, we suddenly have millions of parents scrambling to figure out how to step into the role of their children's preschool teachers. They've found themselves as accidental homeschoolers, or as I've been thinking of it in my moments of dark humor: coronavirus homeschoolers.

Contrary to what many in the business and policymaking worlds seem to think, being an early childhood educator is a skilled profession, one that we've spent years honing, practicing, and improving through ongoing professional development. Now, quite suddenly, a generation of adults find themselves in our shoes with little or no training and if my social media feed is a reliable barometer (and it probably isn't) a lot of them have already concluded that we deserve raises.

In unprecedented times, we are all finding ourselves having to scramble. As for me, I had a full schedule of speaking engagements at conferences around the country cancelled or postponed, wiping out 90 percent of my expected income for the next 2-3 months and maybe longer. I'm not sharing this to evoke pity, but rather by way of letting you know that, one of the ways I've shifted gears is to work with my friends at Fairy Dust Teaching to produce my first e-course called Partnering with Parents: Making Allies of the Parents of the Children You Teach. It's a six-part series in which I've shared what I've learned from my two decades as a teacher in a cooperative school, working day-after-day in close CONTINUE READING: Teacher Tom: We're All Scrambling: Talking With Parents About These Interesting Times

No Child Behind Failed, But Kevin Carey’s New Article Doesn’t Go Deep Enough to Explain Why | janresseger

No Child Behind Failed, But Kevin Carey’s New Article Doesn’t Go Deep Enough to Explain Why | janresseger

No Child Behind Failed, But Kevin Carey’s New Article Doesn’t Go Deep Enough to Explain Why

On Wednesday, Kevin Carey published an important piece in the Washington Post—a profile really of Amy Wilkins, currently the chief lobbyist for the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, and formerly a lobbyist for many years at The Education Trust.  Carey, the Vice President for Education Policy at the New America Foundation, also worked for three years as a policy analyst at The Education Trust, from 2002-2005, in the years right after the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act.

In this week’s article, Carey accurately identifies The Education Trust, founded and directed for many years by Kati Haycock, as “a pro-school-reform organization.” He explains that The Education Trust’s mission grew out of the promises of the Civil Rights Movement—grounded not only in commitment to school integration, but endorsing the mission of the No Child Left Behind Act that test-based school accountability would ensure that schools better served black children, who had for generations been left behind.  The organization was a cheerleader for ending what was often described as the soft bigotry of low expectations: “National tests showed that white students were, on average, far surpassing their black and Latino peers, and that low-income students were falling behind. The Trust called this the ‘achievement gap.’… After the long, inconclusive battles for desegregated and well-funded schools, the federal government would finally ensure that the most disadvantaged students got the good schools they needed.”  The Education Trust also supported expanding school choice through the proliferation of charter schools.

It is significant that in his recent article Carey acknowledges the collapse of the two-decades-long national school accountability narrative. While Amy Wilkins hasn’t compromised her belief in test-based accountability and the creation of escapes for some children into charter schools, even Wilkins concedes a shift away from the vision she continues to endorse: “Amy Wilkins hasn’t given up on school reform.  She remains ‘struck by how politics allows the stubborn self-interest of adults to undermine again and again what’s right for poor kids and CONTINUE READING: No Child Behind Failed, But Kevin Carey’s New Article Doesn’t Go Deep Enough to Explain Why | janresseger

CA Meals for Kids App Update - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

CA Meals for Kids App Update - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

State Superintendent Tony Thurmond Announces "CA Meals for Kids" App Update to find Meals for COVID-19 School Closures

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond announced today that the California Department of Education’s (CDE) “CA Meals for Kids” mobile app has been updated to help students and families find meals during COVID-19-related emergency school closures.

“Food insecurity is a daily struggle for some of our students and their families and that struggle is even more difficult and complicated during the current COVID-19 emergency we’re all facing,” said Thurmond. “I’d like to thank the Nutrition Services Division, the Technology Services Division, and all CDE staff who worked on updating the app—and the hard-working school nutrition staff around the state who have heroically continued working, and who are continuing to serve our students during this unprecedented emergency situation.”

On March 10, 2020, the CDE received a special waiver from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) that enabled a site that had previously been approved to operate the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) or Seamless Summer Option (SSO) to provide meals to students during a coronavirus-related closure.

As of today, the CDE has processed requests for more than 3,100 emergency feeding sites throughout the state. As school districts continue to update the Child Nutrition Information and Payment System, these sites will be populated into the “Meals for Kids” app. For the most up-to-date information, families should still contact their local school or district for free- or reduced-price meal availability in their area.

The “CA Meals for Kids” app was originally released in 2018 to help users to find the locations of California’s Summer and Afterschool Meal Programs, which are spread throughout the state. These programs provide no-cost meals to children aged eighteen and under. The app is available for free download through Apple’s App Store , Google’s Play Store, and Microsoft’s App Store web pages.

More information about the app is available on CDE’s CA Meals for Kids Mobile Application support web page.

More information and resources regarding coronavirus (COVID-19) and California's response is available at the CDE’s Coronavirus (COVID-19) web page.

# # # #

Tony Thurmond — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5602, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

CA Meals for Kids App Update - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

CA Meals for Kids App Update - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

Rick Smith Interview with Thomas Ultican | tultican

Rick Smith Interview with Thomas Ultican | tultican

Rick Smith Interview with Thomas Ultican

By Thomas Ultican 3/20/2020

Rick Smith is a radio talk show host from Pennsylvania. He moderates the Rick Smith Show. On Wednesday (3/18/2020) Rick had me on his two hour show for a 15 minute segment. The central point of our discussion revolved around cyber education which students throughout America are being forced into because of the current pandemic.

Share this: 

Rick Smith Interview with Thomas Ultican | tultican

Parents-Turned-Homeschoolers Agree: Teachers Are Amazing!

Parents-Turned-Homeschoolers Agree: Teachers Are Amazing!

Parents-Turned-Homeschoolers Agree: Teachers Are Amazing!

As parents everywhere in the midst of the coronavirus outbreak are trying to keep instruction going at home with their children, they’re realizing something: Teaching is very hard work! Though it comes as no surprise to educators, it feels good to be acknowledged by so many, even in these dire circumstances.

It’s been a stressful time for everyone, so we thought we could lighten the mood a bit with a round-up of shout outs from the twittersphere that say it all — teachers are amazing, they work extremely hard, and they deserve much higher pay. CONTINUE READING: Parents-Turned-Homeschoolers Agree: Teachers Are Amazing!

CURMUDGUCATION: PA Scraps the Big Standardized Test

CURMUDGUCATION: PA Scraps the Big Standardized Test

PA Scraps the Big Standardized Test

Word has been shooting out over social media for the last twenty minutes. The PSSA, the Keystone exam, and even the PASA are officially not happening this year.

“Our school communities are operating within unprecedented conditions,” said Secretary of Education Pedro A. Rivera. “Schools are making extraordinary efforts to remain connected to students and families, to provide food service and to put appropriate systems in place to continue student learning. Assessments should not be the focus of school leaders right now."

And just in case that isn't clear--

“To be clear, all assessments are cancelled for this year,” Rivera said.

They'll submit paperwork to the feds. They'll presumably have to figure out what to do about the missing data for school and teacher evaluation. They'll probably dither and kick the Keystones-as-a-graduation-requirement can further down the road.

But for the moment, Pennsylvania teachers have one less damn thing to worry about. And all the other states have one more source of pressure for doing the right thing and canning the useless, pointless tests this year.

CURMUDGUCATION: PA Scraps the Big Standardized Test

An Updated Stack Of Links On COVID-19, LAUSD And Resources For Families – Los Angeles Education Examiner

An Updated Stack Of Links On COVID-19, LAUSD And Resources For Families – Los Angeles Education Examiner

An Updated Stack Of Links On COVID-19, LAUSD And Resources For Families

Please be wary of what you read on the internet, folks. I came across so much that is so suspect. From “public health professionals” no less, too. Following below is a list of reliable sources of information.

The last section at the bottom contains some crowd-sourced parent-lists of activities and Education-y suggestions. Other’s lists haven’t been vetted for accuracy. But they’re also less risky as they are, at least, not directives. Please take your information from public health agencies directly, not from random social media postings of folks self-titled as “pediatricians” or “epidemiologists” or “healthcare professionals”. Remember, on the internet, “nobody knows you’re a dog”.

LA EdEx’s updated resource links:

Governmental response including health information, public health measures

• • Federal Center for Disease Control (CDC), comprehensive authoritative health information including a testing tracker and even open source public health images!
  • International World Health Organization (WHO) coronavirus outbreak website
  • State of CA Department of Public Health CV information
  • Governor’s clearing house for CV information
  • Governor’s videos addressing Covid-19 response and policy. Directives include: Executive order waiving State testing mandate, Emergency Legislation to fight Covid-19, Executive Order ensuring state funding for schools even in event of physical closure; Call for the Closure of all bars and wineries, self-isolation of seniors and high-risk individuals
  • Los Angeles County background and symptoms information including guidance for families, daily count updates, videos and FAQs in 14 languages [Note the City of Los Angeles’ health agencies are part of the County government not municipal]
  • LA County residents can also call 2-1-1
  • City of Los Angeles Mayor’s press releases and video updates

Data banks

• • Continually updating series of data-centric factoids and issues surrounding Covid-19
  • Johns Hopkins mapping project of CV outbreak include state-by-state counts, population denominators
  • Schiffmann CV tables tracker (a HS student)

Employment Concerns

• • CA Labor & Workforce Development Agency resources for employers and workers, including information on filing a Paid Family Leave claim and other FAQs

Resources for families

• • LAUSD notification of TV partnership: At-Home Learning, Aprendiendo En Casa
  • Schedule of PBS-SoCal/KCET/KLCS-TV
  • LAUSD Family Resource Guide, Guía de Recursos Para Los Familias
  • A very full and weighty page of LAUSD Resources, including map and list of the 60 “Grab And Go” Food Centers; free educational resources from PBS SoCal, KCET and KLCS-TV; student and parent resources for instructional continuity, including for students with disabilities; online learning resources and IT support
  • LAUSD Communications; statements on school closures, resource center staffing, news links, cool videos on handwashing (though the Wildcats seem proverbially shy of the water).
  • LAUSD Hotline for questions from families (213-443-1300) and staff (213-241-2700)
  • The Los Angeles Public Library is open online!

Practical, helpful blogs and articles with kid-centered information, instructional activities and ideas

• • QuaranTime, livestreamed (and then archived) every 8am (PST) with “Science Mom” and Math Dad. Check out Science Mom’s archive of excellent videos here.
  • Facebook Groups: Parents Supporting Teachers (formed during the UTLA strike of early 2019) – join here for links (active only upon membership) to:  Learning Resources – for Elementary, Middle and High Schools; Business Resources, including information about free wifi and hotspots for K12 students
  • Another Facebook group with great ideas: – Momtivist
  • Covid19 Los Angeles Community Resources by theebighonk at gmail
  • Quarantine with a Toddler by Jayna Zweiman
  • Giant list of ideas for being home with kids by Princess Awesome & Boy Wonder
  • 150+ Enrichment Activities for Children While Parents are Working Remotely
  • Virtual Field Trips and birdcams
  • Education Companies Offering Free Subscriptions Due to School Closings
  • Resources from the ASA for teaching K12 statistics including lesson plans, live weekly graphs discussion and more
  • Explaining Covid-19 to kids:  ES, MS, HS and beyond
  • So You Think You’re About To Be In A Pandemic by virologists Ian M MacKay and Katherine E Arden
  • How To Survive A Pandemic by NELA LAUSD mom Erin Plossmor

Please post your favorite resources below for others to share!

An Updated Stack Of Links On COVID-19, LAUSD And Resources For Families – Los Angeles Education Examiner

You are brave, you are courageous, you are amazing, you are NEA - Lily's Blackboard

You are brave, you are courageous, you are amazing, you are NEA - Lily's Blackboard

You are brave, you are courageous, you are amazing, you are NEA

Hola NEA.  Here’s my message in this surreal moment that we’re all facing.

It seems like the end of the world.  And I’m here to tell you it’s not.  You have been sending me some of the most inspiring, courageous stories about bus drivers who are delivering meals to kids at their homes, teachers who are finding ways to engage students, grateful parents who now understand what it is to teach their children.

You’re doing it. And we’re doing so much at NEA.  Even though our doors are closed, we’re working hard remotely at home.

We got a Senate bill to pass this morning. It’s to help extended paid sick leave, and paid family medical leave and unemployment insurance. Twenty thousand calls went from you when we asked just on one little email.

You’re going to be getting more information every day. Check your email. Go to nea.org/coronavirus if you have questions.  There’s so much up there.

And please don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid. We are going to get through this. And we’re going to get through it together.

I want to thank you for the love that you bring to everything you do. Even when your own crisis is hitting, you care about your loved ones.  You care about your students.

Stay healthy.

!Gracias de todo corazón!

You are brave, you are courageous, you are amazing, you are NEA - Lily's Blackboard

’How do I plan a lesson?’ A teacher’s guide for parents reluctantly homeschooling their kids. - The Washington Post

’How do I plan a lesson?’ A teacher’s guide for parents reluctantly homeschooling their kids. - The Washington Post

‘How do I plan a lesson?’ A teacher’s guide for parents reluctantly homeschooling their kids.
‘What if my kids won’t listen to me?’

Parents nationwide find themselves serving as teachers of their own children — some of them reluctantly — with most of the nation’s schools closed amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Many schools are sending home packets of work and moving to online education, but most parents aren’t trained as educators. In addition, researchers have warned parents in the past that getting too involved with homework can hurt their children’s academic achievement because they don’t always know the right way to approach it. Parents have no choice at the moment, but there is often tension between children and parents when they work on schoolwork together.

Here is a practical guide for parents who are doubling as teachers at the moment, written by educator and author Roxanna Elden.

Elden combines 11 years of experience as a public school teacher with a decade of speaking about education issues. Her first book, the nonfiction “See Me After Class: Advice for Teachers by Teachers,” is widely used for teacher training. Her debut novel, “Adequate Yearly Progress,” follows a diverse group of educators in an urban high school as their professional lives affect their personal lives and vice versa.

By Roxanna Elden

I’m often disappointed at how little my teaching experience prepared me for parenting. Eleven years in front of the classroom has done nothing for my skills at managing supermarket tantrums, getting a toddler to finish a yogurt in less than two hours, or reliably getting dirty clothes placed into the hamper.

So now, as school districts around the country announce coronavirus-related shutdowns, I’m no more excited than any other parent about becoming my kids’ full-time teacher until … whenever. In this one small corner of our new parenting normal, however, instructional experience offers an edge. At the very least, I’ve been able answer some of the questions raised by non-teacher parent friends as they prepare for the unasked-for career change ahead. Here are a few.

How do I structure the day? CONTINUE READING: ’How do I plan a lesson?’ A teacher’s guide for parents reluctantly homeschooling their kids. - The Washington Post

Kids and coronavirus: Is it safe to take them to playgrounds? Can you hire a babysitter? - Vox

Kids and coronavirus: Is it safe to take them to playgrounds? Can you hire a babysitter? - Vox

Playgrounds, babysitters, grandparents: What’s safe for kids in the age of coronavirus?
The ins and outs of social distancing for children.

In an effort to slow the spread of coronavirus, cities and states are implementing new restrictions, seemingly every hour. The most effective tool is for everyone to stay home, but that’s a tough ask, especially when you’re living with young kids.

“We are fundamentally social animals, and it’s very difficult for us to maintain isolation,” says Dr. John Williams, chief of the division of pediatric infectious diseases at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, in an email to Vox.

But because kids tend to congregate, sneeze, cough, wipe their noses, hug, wrestle, and “put everything in their mouths,” says Crystal Watson, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, being social comes with added risk.

RELATED

Why we need to protect children from Covid-19, even if they face lower risks

The new guidelines for everyone of limiting social contact and keeping six feet away make sense as part of a general containment effort, but that calculation gets trickier when kids are involved, especially for parents who have to work. The main question in that case remains, “I have to stay in this house with them for how many days?” followed quickly by “What do I actually do with them?”

Some options get eliminated as cities close down public services. No school. No libraries. No museums. No movies. But not everything can be locked to the public. And a lack of information has parents wondering: what exactly is safe?

Frustratingly, there are no absolutes. Families have to weigh risks versus the demands of work CONTINUE READING: Kids and coronavirus: Is it safe to take them to playgrounds? Can you hire a babysitter? - Vox

TODAY’S UPDATE On New Resources To Help Educators Figuring Out How To Support Students During School Closures | Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

TODAY’S UPDATE On New Resources To Help Educators

Figuring Out How To Support Students During School Closures 

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

Pins Of The Week

by Larry Ferlazzo / 18min

I’m fairly active on Pinterest and, in fact, have curated 21,000 resources there that I haven’t shared on this blog. I thought readers might find it useful if I began sharing a handful of my most recent “pins” each week (I’m not sure if you can see them through an RSS Reader – you might have to click through to the original post). You might also be interested in MY MOST POPULAR PINS OF 2019 Here

Fun Video: “I Will Survive, Coronavirus version for teachers going online”

44by Larry Ferlazzo / 3h

PublicDomainPictures / Pixabay Emily Francis shared this funny video on Twitter. It’s important to keep our sense of humor in these kinds of situations!

Just Sent Out ANOTHER Special Edition Of My Ordinarily Monthly Email Newsletter

by Larry Ferlazzo / 6h

geralt / Pixabay I’ve just sent out ANOTHER special mid-month edition of usual free and simple monthly email newsletter (I emailed one earlier this week). This is the first time in ten years I’ve sent out more than just one newsletter at the end of the month. This special edition is designed to support teachers coping with school closures.It has over 3,000 subscribers, and you can subscribe here

If You Are Teaching Theory Of Knowledge & Have To Go Online, Here Is The IDEAL Project For Your Students!

by Larry Ferlazzo / 6h

geralt / Pixabay I’m pretty lucky because the last three months of my International Baccalaureate Theory of Knowledge curriculum is mostly online anyway (an Oral Presentation and essay). You can see it at HERE’S MY ONLINE TEACHING PLAN IF OUR SCHOOL CLOSES DOWN BECAUSE OF THE CORONAVIRUS , However, I suspect most TOK teachers don’t have their classes set up that way, and are trying to figure out

YESTERDAY

Thursday’s Additions The “Best Of The Best” List Of Resources Supporting Teachers Facing School Closures

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

kaboompics / Pixabay Though now there is a lot out there on teaching online, I’ll only be sharing ones that I believe should be added to The “Best Of The Best” Resources To Support Teachers Dealing With School Closures . Also, in a day-or-two, start looking for a series of commentaries at my Education Week Teacher column written by teachers explaining how they are managing the transition to onlin

Is Summer School In All Of Our Futures?

by Larry Ferlazzo / 20h

natureaddict / Pixabay Today, two pieces have appeared discussing the possibility of expanded summer school (and the federal government paying for it) this year in an attempt to recover from school closures. Check these out: Using federal stimulus to get schools through the coronavirus crisis: The case for summer school and summer teacher pay is from Brookings. After coronavirus school closings,

Microsoft Translator Might Be Helpful When Working With Newcomers Online

by Larry Ferlazzo / 21h

geralt / Pixabay As we all try to get our heads around teaching online, I was thinking about teachers who don’t speak the home language of many of their students and the challenges that presents. I speak Spanish, and 90% of my students this year are Spanish-speaking, so it’s not an issue for me. However, when you’re looking at screens and are obviously more limited by what you can do to communica

Are You – Or Will You Be – Teaching An ELL Class Because Of School Closures? Want To Write About It?

300+by Larry Ferlazzo / 22h

As regular readers know, I’ve been recruiting teachers from a variety of areas and subjects to write about their experiences moving to online learning (see Let Me Know If You’re Teaching K-12 Students Online Because Of COVID-19 & Would Like To Write A Guest Post About Your Experiences ). Those commentaries will be appearing in Education Week and/or in this blog and have already begun ( Guest Post

Brainpop IS Offering Free Individual Accounts For Students – What A Gift For ELLs & Others

53by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

Let Me Know If You’re Teaching K-12 Students Online Because Of COVID-19 & Would Like To Write A Guest Post About Your Experiences I’ve previously posted about Brainpop’s generous offer to provide free accounts while our schools are closed. Initially, it appeared to me that they were only offering one common sign-in for everyone at a school, and that students would have to email a teacher their te

Most Popular Posts Of The Week – Mostly Coronavirus Related

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

I’m making a change in the content of the regular feature. In addition to sharing the top five posts that have received the most “hits” in the preceding seven days (though they may have originally been published on an earlier date), I will also include the top five posts that have actually appeared in the past week. Often, these are different posts. You might also be interested in IT’S THE THIRTE

Here’s The Message I Sent To Students Last Night After Our Governor Told Us To Expect Schools Not To Reopen

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

After our Governor said last night that he didn’t expect California schools to reopen this year, I was inundated with panicky text from many of my students. I have been in regular touch with my Beginning ELL students, and this is what I 

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007