Returning to “my” Apple Park: In-Person Teaching and Learning
It is my goal to write and publish a blog post for each day of this week. Readers of this blog know how much I enjoy writing so this seems like it would not be too lofty of a goal. Sometimes though I find it difficult to think of things to write about. Sure, I have interests, yes, I keep lists but sometimes ideas for what to write just don’t come.
This week, I decided to use some of what is going on around me, things I’m listening to via my favorite podcasts, what I’m reading, and even what I’m purchasing (see tomorrow’s post) as my “muse” so to speak. Mind you, I am not looking for one-to-one correspondence from any of these things. For example, the post I published Tuesday, written Monday, was informed by an interesting discussion I heard on Monday’s episode of AppStories. That particular post’s topic of Focus Mode on iOS 15 wasn’t the topic of the actual podcast, I just felt compelled to write about something I had done some reading and thinking about; which, if you listen to the episode of AppStories, will make all the sense in the world.
Today’s post, started Monday and finished up Tuesday was inspired by another podcast I listened to Monday afternoon, Upgrade. In what turned out to be a very serious “chapter” of the show, the co-hosts spoke about a memo that Tim Cook sent out recently to Apple employees about coming back to work and the subsequent push back from the employees. At one point both hosts spoke out critically about a related blogpost from fellow podcaster, John Gruber. They did not like at all Gruber’s “pro-Apple” stance, especially his take on the employee’s response to Tim Cook’s memo (see his June 4th post). The conversation on this podcast got me thinking about my own situation; being a teacher, who, like the employees at Apple, have worked remotely from home for most of this past year, and who, baring a summer catastrophe, will, like the employees of Apple, be asked to go back to work (full time) later in the summer.
Like Apple, our school district’s human resources department sent out an email recently outlining “Workplace Models-Now and Post-Pandemic.” The gist of the email is that “we” (educators) need to work on-site in order to, “best serve students who experience their learning in classrooms...” It goes on to lay a foundation of thinking that, after much deliberation, the district has decided that, “...the vast majority of positions across the district will require in-person work on a full-time basis.”
Earlier this year I wrote extensively about my remote teaching experience. It was, overall, a very positive experience. Yes, I had to work twice as hard and many more hours than I would have had I been in the building teaching in-person but, I did some amazing things with technology I never would have dreamed of trying teaching in-person all while doing my best to provide my students with a “best in class” experience. At the beginning of the this past school year and in the “thick of it” each day, if you’d asked me what I thought about the prospect of having to go back to “in-person work” in the Fall, I would not have been very keen on it; even after I became fully vaccinated. Sitting here, 3 weeks in to my Summer Break; I have some revised thoughts.
On and off throughout the remote teaching experience I got subtle hints from my students that they very much missed being in school with each other. As the year came to a close, some of the students that were very participatory throughout the year started to fade, not turning in assignments on time and needing more encouragement to “keep going” and “finish strong.” This was to be expected. Being 9 and 10 years old, on a Zoom call for the majority of the day, working synchronously at times and asynchronously at other times; some without the support necessary to pull that off let alone do it well; took its toll. I myself saw a change as I was asked to work within a hybrid structure; teaching a small group of students in my classroom while working simultaneously with the majority of my students who were still at home. There is something to be said for being face-to-face interaction, teacher and student, working side by side. I began to cherish the moments I was not Zooming with students and working with the in-person group; those moments felt more intimate, real.
I could easily see myself working as a remote teacher and loving every minute of it. I saw it work for students and I saw it not work so well. The point I want to make here is that whether or not remote learning works for a teacher or student it’s the social aspect; physically being in the room with each other, talking to each other that literally makes teaching and learning 3-dimensional. And it is that 3-dimensionality that has me excited about the prospect of returning to “my” Apple Park: in-person teaching and learning this Fall.
