School in a time of COVID – Monday

Day 1 of virtual school

We've the girls for the school week, but they had to arrive at least Sunday, since Monday is bright and early. Sunday, we set up the two offices, checked out the laptop connections, and the wifi for the printer. Their schedules are taped to the door. They get 5 minutes between periods. Both girls are in cohorts of about 35 kids. Isabelle has about two teachers. As does Josephine. Both are in French Immersion, as Papa is from francophone roots. Their French pronunciation is amazing. 

Grampa had to be up early. He had garbage to put out, and a physiotherapy appointment at 8 a.m. What pressure? I was awake, listening to the 7 a.m. news. The girls I woke up at 7:15. 

Schedule

09:00 - 10:00 - first period

10:00 – 11:00 – second period

11:00 – 11:45 – break for lunch and some exercise (tree climbing?!)

11:45 – 12:45 – 3rd period

12:45 –   1:30 – 4th period

  1:30 –   1:45 – asynchronous, independent work

  1:45                 –45 minute break

  2:30 –   3:30 – final asynchronous work period.

Morning routines done, they logged on. Happily, they'd done virtual school in the spring. There was a lot less pressure, and some skills, and Google Classroom strategies that we mastered. (We had them 18 weeks in the summer.) This term, they are taking attendance. There is supposed to be a report card at the end of October. I hope that changes. 

All went well. After 10 minutes, I texted Momma to tell her we had lift-off. We were all relieved.

I kept running down the hall to peek in on them, giving thumbs up from the doorway. There was one math question from Jos. It wasn't quite clear, but they were doing equations based on litres of gas, km/h and gas prices. They had to figure out the difference per litre for premium and regular gas. Whew. I taught gr. 7/8 math in 2005, so no worries! I find their questions are somewhat vague, sometimes.

They also discussed the right answers on a test the teacher had assigned. Josephine had 100% on the test. She patiently sat there while they discussed the corrections

Also, they were discussing a piece of French writing, a reflection on environment issues. Papa was the president of the Green Party, so she has lots of food for thought. The other students were working on it, and Jos had already gone to a website to correct punctuation and grammar. She sat patiently, mushing Cinnamon. It was an excellent opinion piece, Grampa and I both read it. She was ready to hand it in, which is quite different in virtual learning. We scan them, or do the work online.

Isabelle did well. There is a huge difference between gr. 5 and gr. 8. 

During their breaks, they grabbed some food, and read their books, mushed cats. Isabelle had been running around the house three times at home, timing the event. It rained ALL day Monday, so she did one lap in 33.45 seconds. We'll do more tomorrow. 

We planned meals for the week. (This was Josee's work!) I began to prepare the ribs, when I realized they had to cook for a couple of hours. Plan B, hamburgalers. Carrots, and a berry pie for dessert.

 

We watched several more Border Security episodes after dinner. Izzy got tired of it and went downstairs to read. Then, teeth and jammies!

This is where I moved Frosty. His tree stump rotted after 9 years.

Surprisingly, I still have petunias.

Poor Bear. I took off his ear moving him. You can see how he is falling apart!

BTW: OCV – Ottawa-Carleton Virtual School (Elementary)! There are six virtual campuses, which include a diverse community of 13,500 students from across the OCDSB.