Covid-19

About a month ago, my 6 year old had a porch playdate with her best friend. While it wasn’t the first time they were seeing each other post-quarantine, it was the first time they were spending a decent amount of time with one another and actually playing together. As her best friend’s mom and I sat on the porch chatting, I kept looking down at the girls, thinking they were unusually quiet. These are two outgoing, chatty girls so it seemed odd that they were quietly playing with the flip sequins on my daughter’s backpack and not really interacting with one another. I commented on this to the girls and jokingly told them it was ok to talk. A few minutes later, her friend’s dad came outside and was surprised to see us on the porch still. He said that it was so quiet outside, he thought we had gone for a walk.

This went on for the first hour or so of our visit, but eventually, the girls seemed to warm up and began playing and talking like their normal selves. I didn’t really give it much further thought until a week or so later when I was working with the staff of a small Catholic school in northern Indiana.

During the training, I asked the teachers to name their fears about returning to school in-person with students. One primary teacher in the back of the room raised her hand and said, “I’m worried about how the students will do communicating with one another.” She went on to add that since the kids had been quarantined for so long and not had the opportunity to interact with anyone outside of their immediate family, she was concerned about how they would interact with one another. Would they feel shy or scared? Would it cause anxiety in some? Many other teachers went on to agree with her and share their own stories of the anxiety they felt after their first trip to the grocery store or doctor’s office.

As the teachers continued talking through this with one another, I thought back to the day of the playdate. I suddenly realized that my daughter and her best friend were the perfect example of this teacher’s fear. I shared the story with the staff, and we all took the opportunity to reflect on how this might play out in the classroom environment.

Since that day, I have told this story at every school I’ve worked with, and without exception, at least one teacher raises their hand to say this is one of their fears. So, as educators and parents, what can we do to address this in our homes and classrooms?

Talk about it

Be open and honest with kids about the things we may now find difficult. Help them to understand that some things are going to be harder since we are out of practice. Tell the story of how overwhelmed you felt after your first trip to the grocery store. Talk about the things you did to help ease those feelings.

Validate their feelings

Be sure to let kids know that the way they are feeling is normal and they are not alone. Once we are able to name our recognize and name our emotions, they lose their power over us.

Brainstorm strategies

Understanding the root cause of a child’s fear is key to identifying strategies that will work for them. Are they fearful of being around people outside of their immediate family because of the virus? Do they feel overwhelmed by suddenly being thrown into a classroom with 20 other people? Are they feeling shy because they are away from their parents for the first time in 6 months? Dedicate a time to brainstorming strategies to help all students feel more comfortable communicating with their peers.

Practice

Practice, practice, practice. Given time, kids will become more comfortable doing the things that were once second nature. Provide them the time and space to make this happen. Role play a variety of situations, reinforce the strategies you brainstormed and integrate oral communication with peers into instruction as often as possible. Just as kids do at the beginning of every school year, they will soon become comfortable with this new environment they are in.

Be patient

It will come. We are all adjusting to a new normal – new feelings, new routines, new rules. It may take a bit more time and practice than normal, but before you know it, the kids will be back to communicating more than you ever wanted them to!

Over the past few weeks, for a variety of reasons, I’ve struggled with putting pen to paper here on this blog. Life has come to a standstill, it seems, but in an odd juxtaposition, a standstill in which time is in short supply.

With two school-aged children, as well as a toddler at home, my life (just like many of yours) has been thrown a curveball. Instead of meetings with administrators, planning professional development sessions and speaking at conferences, I am homeschooling a kindergartener and third grader while also trying to entertain a three year old…and work…and cook meals…and keep a house clean…and the list goes on and on.

While all that is challenging, I feel grateful everyday that I am an educator, equipped to continue providing my children with high-quality instruction based on their needs. Most parents aren’t afforded that luxury. In fact, most parents cannot just put their work on hold to attend to their family’s needs. They rely on their paycheck to survive, and that paycheck may now be much smaller or altogether non-existent. They may have just gone from being worried about buying groceries last week to being downright panicked this week.

So many of our students were living in deplorable conditions or in frightening home environments just mere weeks ago. And now? Well, now their homes may just be unimaginable. Neglect. Abuse. Food insecurity. Domestic violence. All of these things are on the rise and only worsening around the world, as this pandemic stretches from weeks into months.

How do we cope with this as educators? What do we do to help care for our students from afar?

If you thought I was a proponent of trauma-informed practices prior to this pandemic, just wait until you see me once it’s over. I will be singing their praises from the rooftops! The good news, though, is that we don’t have to wait until it’s over. We can start right now.

I came across this article this evening that is so concisely written and full of specific ideas for incorporating trauma-informed practices into e-learning. I urge you to take a few minutes to read it and reflect on how you can implement some of the strategies mentioned into your own distance learning plan.

The cornerstone of trauma-informed education is relationship-building, and there are still plenty of ways to maintain and grow the relationships you have with students during this time. In fact, it’s even more critical to do so now. We have an uphill battle ahead of us in the weeks and months to come. But I know that if anyone is up to the challenge, it’s educators.