by Brandon Wright
Teachers and staff in schools across Canada have been learning alongside their students over the past few weeks.
These days, students are heading to their computers instead of classrooms to access their lessons. For an Oshawa, Ont., elementary school teacher, this change has been quite difficult.
Gillian Crosbie, a music teacher at Seneca Trail Public School, says the last few weeks have felt completely foreign to her.
When did you begin to realize the COVID-19 situation was becoming serious enough to impact school?
I think it was the Thursday night and we had finished [the school week] and I was driving. We were supposed to leave on, I think the Saturday to get on a cruise ship. So, Thursday night, school finished and I remember I flew out of there because I was getting eyelash extensions. I was on my way to the appointment and I know exactly where I was coming across Conlin Road and I heard on 680 News that the minister of education announced that schools would be closing, and like, I remember my reaction, I hope I’m allowed to say it but I was like, ‘holy shit.’
What steps were you and other teachers taking in the lead up to school cancellations to keep your students healthy?
We had been talking to kids about washing their hands, being very careful with mouthpiece sanitization, cleaning recorders, things like that. I don’t think, at least myself, didn’t realize how big it was going to get, especially this quickly because at the time it hadn’t really touched Canada yet.
Were you able to go into the school to gather all of your supplies once the school closed?
Yeah, so at first, we weren’t able to go get it until we went last week when the board announced that schools would be doing distance learning. There must have been quite the outcry from teachers being like, ‘how are we supposed to teach with no resources?’ So, the board set up one day where we were able to go in. We had to let our admin know that we needed to go in, then they made a schedule because only one person was going in at a time. There was a table that you signed in and then you would go wash your hands. You had to go straight to your classroom, get what you needed, and go straight back out again.
Now that classes have moved online, what has the actual delivery of classes been like?
We are being strongly advised to avoid live calls, especially where video is included. There have been some horror stories, I think coming out of the U.S. where kids are taking pictures of teachers are making it inappropriate or taking pictures of their classmates and then using them for online bullying, things like that. I am using video with some grades. I used a screen casting program to record myself working through an assignment and explaining how to do everything and kind of demonstrating like, ‘this does this, and this does this.’
Can you tell me about what student reception of online learning has been like?
A lot of kids are engaged. I mean, I think kids are excited to see what this is going to be about. It’ll kind of, you know, taper off a little bit but I know for our four intermediate classes, there were only a few kids who did not get involved in our online community.
Finally, how are you feeling as an educator but also as a parent?
It feels so like, self-centered to say but it’s kind of been nice for us. My family in particular is very busy. My daughter is a kid who wants to try everything and is generally pretty good at everything. Therefore, she wants to do it to the highest level possible. Because of that, we were constantly running around. Monday nights for voice lessons, Wednesday nights for violin, Thursday nights for lacrosse, and all winter on Saturday and Sundays we had ski racing all day. This has been a really nice opportunity for us to connect as a family. We are all home and we all do things together. It wasn’t like, you know, ‘let’s go to the zoo’ or ‘let’s go the CN Tower,” it was more so, ‘let’s do a puzzle, let’s go play in the backyard.’ Both of my kids have been the best versions of themselves, which makes everything really nice.
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