Homeschooling with DCPS Style

At some point during the summer, DCPS sent out a survey asking for our opinions on how homeschooling went. Really? It was necessary to ask us how it went? That’s like asking how 9/11 was. It wasn’t good, dude. It wasn’t good.

You want to know how it went? It was like nailing jello to the wall. We got emails from teachers, directing us to a ton of platforms, we were told to zoom, then we were told to not zoom because it wasn’t secure. Then we were given no less than 743 apps our kids had to log in to. And we were told to pick up packets from the school. Packets which were colossal wastes of paper and had nothing to do with anything being taught by the teachers.

It felt like there was less than zero of an attempt for DCPS to offer any directives on how to salvage the school year. I didn’t expect magic, but it was astonishing how poorly it was executed. It felt like they turned up the heat on a boiling pot, threw all the teachers in and said, “Figure it out.”

It’s no secret we have Super Nanny. Real Estate Dad and I just went on developing land and selling houses as usual while Super Nanny took care of the rest. In March, Princess Roundhead left a classroom behind with some kids with serious behavior issues and she could barely add. By May, Super Nanny had her doing multiplication. And the bonus was there was zero threat of her getting punched in the face at our kitchen table by some asshole kid who’s trashy mother encourages him to do so.

Homeschooling for the win.

So back to that survey. DCPS sent a follow up that the overwhelming majority of survey responses gave them this info.

“You want more “live” synchronous instruction. 88% of survey respondents favored “live” synchronous instruction over asynchronous instruction.

You want a common platform, and a place where expectations, assignments, and schedules are clearly posted.”

Really, you idiots? Really? You needed a survey to tell you that parents wanted the teachers to maintain some actual live teaching hours and not just send emails with 322 links every week of things the kids had to do on their own – while the parents scrambled to work from home while teaching multiple children whatever it is that day that needed to be taught? There are parents with full time jobs and 4 kids. How can they possibly manage this? And the 74 log-ins we had for all sorts of programs and apps, you really needed a survey to tell you that this was total bullshit?

I feel bad for the teachers. Chubs has the best best best teacher on earth this year for first grade. I’m super bummed that she will be missing this in-person time with her. But when she asked me to be Class Mom I was all fan-girl and what not, and then she was telling me she spent days creating her virtual classroom. I logged in and was blown away. We have nothing to worry about this year.

I assume all the powers that be at DCPS will pat themselves on the back as this year hopefully gets off to a better start, and they really deserve none of the credit. It’s all the teachers, DCPS.

Here we go!

Here we go!

 

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