SCHOOL YEAR 2020
Online or in-person, expect challenges By Sandy McDaniel
T
eachers in California and some 1. Schoolwork first. other states have been told that 2. A reading period. The best way for schools will re-open online, using a child to develop English skills outside of the media as their means of school is to read. A ticket to success in the teacher communication. Those students will future is that the child is able to read. A not be returning to the classroom. Idaho Gov. 30-minute (minimum) reading time should Brad Little has stated he wants K-12 students be in their schedule six days a week. A to return to schools. He did, however, also young child can read aloud while a parent is state that remote learning plans should be cooking dinner. Young children can read to in place in some areas. As I’m writing this in older siblings. My daughter-in-law and son mid-July, uncertainties remain. But there are read with their children (sometimes read to, two possible scenarios for Idaho parents to sometimes reading to the child) every night consider: 1. Their children go back to the Sandy McDaniel of the week. There is a magical time found classroom or 2. their children continue in books that this generation is skipping because of the to be home with online school. media. There is NO substitute for the connection, the Distance teaching and distance learning are not optimal bonding that happens between parent and child while ways of educating our children. Every credible teacher curled up together, reading. I know longs for personal connection with each year’s 3. My primary concern, because I have done research students. That being said, the risk of children, teachers, on learning and the brain, is HOW excessive use of families, grandparents becoming ill – even dying – are a cell phones, iPads, computers and other media objects high price to pay. Should children return or not return to affects the development of a brain. Research is showing school in August? That is the question of the day, and with that continual use of the media trains the brain to the potential starting date three weeks away, how are we re-pattern itself, cutting off the branches that access going to train our teachers to function within all the rules creativity and intuition. We are raising a non-creative, that will be set? Who is preparing parents for the changes non-intuitive generation. Even more frightening are the at hand? Who is going to pay for extra sanitation and results in terms of what kind of people we are creating: necessary teaching equipment? narcissistic, angry, arrogant, apathetic and morally If Idaho children are required to stay home from deficient human beings who are constantly stressed and schools, parents need to put their children on a schedule: overwhelmed. Continued on Page 14
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