We made it! The end is near, and we can all take a collective sigh of relief that we have done the best we could. I am reminded of a song by Michelle Branch called “Breathe”. A couple of lines from the song really resonated with me over this past year and a half.  

While I know the song is not about being a schoolteacher (I’m pretty sure the song is about unrequited love although you might feel that way about your school year) heck the song is almost 20 years old, but the phrasing of these words resonated with me. For some much of the past 15 months we have been moving and adjusting at a pace that seemed impossible back in March of last year. If I just take a moment and breathe, I know that everything will be alright and you know what, everything has been alright. 

As educators, we have adjusted to everything that has come our way. I just think about at that week in March where we all realized that things were about to change and change into something we’ve never seen before. As a district, we distributed almost 20,000 laptops, 100’s of hotspots and 100’s of Comcast codes so that every student had the opportunity to work from home. Thousands of educators were given a crash course refresher on Unified Classroom (our LMS system), along with countless other technology tools that we have access to in the district to reach all students. Which reminds me, I think doing 6 hour- long zoom trainings a day for almost a month is something that I never want to experience again.

Summer 2020

Then, over the summer, for K-5, we made a major shift to Unified Classroom 2.0, also known as Schoology to give the students and you a more advantageous learning management system. In a different world we would have had more time to launch the updated platform, but we were given mere weeks before school started. With that change, the K-5 Teachers knocked it out of the park. Those teachers have paved the way for 6-12 to make the jump to the updated platform over the summer.

Fall 2020

We also had several teachers really step up their game and help our department research and find solutions to problems that most teachers were running into. We helped facilitate the move to using Nearpod, which is embeddable into Schoology, for giving dynamic lessons. Programs like Kami have come and will soon go because of a major update to Schoology to solve the PDF writing issue. We expanded our use of Microsoft Tools (like PowerPoint), and teachers became Zoom experts. We continued the CSforAll work, despite being remote. You have also learned to teach concurrently; a term you didn’t think you were going to need to know. This is not even mentioning MCAS, which for some of you is still going on.

It’s also important to note that there were a lot of new curricula that was used this year, I know, this point doesn’t directly apply to us at Digital Learning, but it is something that we need to consider as we look back over these last number of months. You, as teachers, have done an incredible job and you deserve a break and I hope you take it this year. I think back to the Digital Learning Playbook book and how that first chapter is all about self-care and how I implore you to heed that advice. If you are not sure what I am talking about, check out this former blog post. 

Reflecting on the End of 2021

As I wrote this post, I definitely had this moment of exhaustion at looking at what we have done as a district. I am proud of how hard each and every one of us worked, and I can confirm that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Just Breathe and let it fill the space between and you’ll know that everything is alright. 

Of course, I had to include the song! 

Throughout the summer I will be posting irregularly, getting ready for the next year and all the fun stuff we have coming up. Have a great summer everyone!