Bellingham teachers still adapting to online ed, trying hard to keep kids involved

School teachers across the U.S. are learning to adapt to distance learning and online teaching in the strange times caused by coronavirus pandemic, relying on already built relationships with students to get them through the year.

In Bellingham, the Bellingham Public Schools District closed schools March 16 and all students have spent weeks learning at home. Teachers who were midway through the school year were suddenly forced to switch to an all-digital format, forcing some who have never taught online to learn on the fly.

Some teachers have described the process as emergency learning rather than regular online teaching.

“When we say it’s online learning, I think really we need to view it as kind of emergency learning,” Shuksan Middle School science teacher Will Middlebrooks said. “This isn’t like a thoughtful methodical process where we say, ‘Hey, what are the best practices for students? How can we take time to like really develop like the best strategies and the best tools and being mindful about it?’”

Middlebrooks, like many in the district, has not had experience teaching classes online but has utilized some online elements during in-person classes, which helped when the shift became mandatory.

Right now, plans for the 2020-21 academic year are still in the air, but if it does have to start online, teachers such as Sehome High School math teacher Angie Desler are concerned that they won’t get the same relationship-building time with the incoming class.

“I think the biggest challenge ... will be the relationship piece,” Desler said. “A lot of what we’re able to do right now is because we had seven months to build relationships with these kids and know what their strengths and weaknesses are and really build that trust.”

Something that was learned quickly after the transition was to keep things simple and not try to do too much when it comes to teaching.

“Just keeping it simple, keeping it really direct for kids because it’s not just content that the kids are trying to wrestle through,” Desler said. “The kids had eight different classes, eight different teachers with eight different expectations. The biggest thing that doesn’t work is trying to do too much and trying to get too complicated.”

After classes resumed online, the first two weeks were spent reviewing the last material taught in the classrooms before moving on to new lessons. Middlebrooks said the adjustment period helped everyone come to know what to expect.

“At this point, about a month in, it’s feeling a little more routine for teachers, for students,” Middlebrooks said. “A lot of those little technology quirks have been kind of ironed out. So the tech side of things I think is going better, but it’s still a struggle.”

Though the transition may have been sudden and drastic, some are finding positive things out of the experience, such as improved communications between staff.

“The collaboration across the district actually is better than it was previously,” Shuksan math teacher Dustin Heaton said. “Us trying to come together and figure out what we can do collaboratively, even remotely, I think that’s been really positive.”

Likewise, online instruction also has given people such as Heaton a chance to get a good grasp on online components including Microsoft Stream and Flipgrid.

“I found the time now to actually, like, practice that and use it with kids, which has really been awesome,” Heaton said. “In the past, I didn’t know how much time it would take to do that. So it would always fall to the wayside. Now, I have a chance to figure out how to do those things. So I’m finding more ways to improve my instruction once I’m back face-to-face with kids.”

One of the biggest concerns was keeping students engaged during online instruction, given that it is already a challenge for some students in person.

“That’s been the biggest change for us with this digital platform. How do you engage with the kids on that level? It’s just really, really hard,” Desler said. “You can deliver content, you can push out a lesson, but to give that kid feedback has just been the biggest thing we’re wrestling with right now. And we’re trying to innovate, but it’s challenging. “

And with the added presence of distractions such as television, internet and video games at home, some parents already have noticed their kids’ waning interest in assignments.

“I’ve heard from lots of parents that their kid wants to have their phone out and next to them the entire time that they’re doing the work and then the work is taking two or three times longer than it’s supposed to,” Shuksan language teacher Erin Meese said. “Not because the learning is hard, but because the environment is hard.”

Meese talked about how one of her top students was slowly starting to disengage from the class when they went fully online.

“One thing that they love so much about learning is the collegial nature of school,” Meese said. “It is really hard for them to find the motivation to get off their device, sit down and do work.

“Students are willing to do homework if it’s based on something that motivated them and excited them in the classroom that day, then they’ll go home and build on their learning. But when it’s all homework and no school, it’s tricky to figure out how to hook them in.”

For special education teachers such as Squalicum High School’s Mary Lippiatt, distance educations presents unique challenges on how to teach everyone virtually.

“The individualized nature of special ed makes it really hard to meet everybody’s needs and see what’s working for them,” Lippiatt said. “Our students with special-ed needs have such a huge variety of learning difficulties that if you are putting things out in a print format and the reading level makes it difficult to access or you’re putting something out in a video format and their auditory processing makes it hard to follow along.”

One thing she has done is reach out to students individually to see where they are and design things that can help them.

“That’s the nature of special ed is to individualize,” Lippiatt said. “When you can do that because your students are all there, it makes it easier. But if I am developing individualized learning plans for all of my students, and then how do you get those plans to them and the follow up? Yeah, it’s difficult.”