When I tell people I teach kindergarten online the look I get is one of astonishment and wonder. What’s that like? How do you do it?
Well it hasn’t been easy that’s for sure. It started out last year. My paraprofessional and I put our heads together and worked like crazy to try and put together something that resembled kindergarten. We posted pictures of everyone in the class so that they could see their friends. We celebrated birthdays, sharing days, morning circle, read stories and even had a drive-up graduation.
This was all done with a class I knew in person for seven months. Moving forward to a new class in September 2020, we began online all over again. This was a whole new ballgame. What people don’t see behind the camera is the amount of time, energy and coordination it takes to create a meaningful curriculum, a sense of community and just a sense of normalcy.
I’m lucky enough to teach in a program that coordinates with two other teachers and a phenomenal para. There are endless meetings to discuss curriculum, what’s working, what isn’t, how we can make it better and how can we get students talking to each other even though they’ve barely met?
As we round a corner in this year of craziness the reality of going back in person is within reach. I can feel it, the kids can sense it and administration says it’s a real thing, so that really makes it one.
As I reflect going forward, I have to take a look back. What will I miss about online learning? I teach four groups a day so I get to see each child up close, watch their mothers comb their hair, see their favorite stuffed animal, get to check out what they’ve had for breakfast. I feel like each group has its own personality. There’s the group of talkers, the group that loves monster trucks, the group that tells me to mute and how to present properly and the group that delights in trying to be the last to hang up. I’ll actually miss these moments of “being in this together feeling” I have with my colleagues.
Each day is a miracle and we celebrate when a child learns a new vocabulary word or can describe what the difference is between the concepts of force and motion. We actually taught them things in a pandemic and I’m proud of how much thought and effort went into it by all of my colleagues.
This is my 35th year of teaching and I put in for retirement before the world turned upside down. I’m so happy I’ll get to see a full class one more time in person, but I will miss the guinea pigs and hamsters held up to the camera for my viewing, the morning song sung together with gusto and the “Adios! I’ll see you tomorrow!,” said like we’re old friends meeting each day. Kindergartners will always be kindergartners — wise, funny, kind and observant.
“What a year,” I’ll whisper to myself in the future.
Deborah Felix is a kindergarten teacher at Fort River Elementary School.