CPS teacher shares her thoughts about Chicago Public Schools' approach to COVID-19
Andrea Parker, a Chicago Public School teacher teaching her lecture remotely from home.
Robert Fulton Elementary school teacher Andrea Parker, like hundreds of Chicago Public School (CPS) teachers, has adjusted to the new normal of teaching her class remotely.
CPS announced in March their Pre K-12 remote learning plan in response to COVID-19 to get parents ready to be involved with their student's education, while still meeting the safety requirements of the stay home order for Illinois schools that went into effect on April 13.
With the tools CPS has provided for the teachers, Parker can consistently schedule lectures twice a week until June 18 - the original day set for the last day of school. She can collaborate with other teachers to make sure no other classes coincide with one another. Office hours are offered to students who are having issues with an assignment Monday through Friday for two hours during regular school hours.
Parker said CPS used professional development webinars to help teachers navigate effectively through these systems they are currently using now and educators have access to tech support. She learned how to use Google Classroom, an online platform, which is a free service for schools, nonprofits, and personal google accounts, making it easier for learners and instructors to connect.
Before teaching remotely from her home, Parker used to start her lesson for the day by splitting her class into small groups and allow them to collaborate with each other. When students shared their responses out loud, they looked around at their classmates for approval. Now, she feels that some students are hesitant to share their responses out loud due to the larger setting they are learning in.
"I feel like my students are talking a little bit less because they don't have another student next to them to confirm what they are saying makes sense or not now," Parker said.
Parker said she is very grateful for all the effort that CPS has put forth to ensure students receive high-quality learning, but there are still some obstacles that she finds hard to overcome.
The classes she taught in person lasted 75 mins per class prior to remote learning, now they have been shortened by 45 mins, leaving her with just enough time to stick with the lesson and explain to her students why it's important and how it can be applied to their lives.
Additionally, she finds the distance between her and her students has made it harder to maintain the relationships that she had once had when she was teaching in person.
“The relationship is definitely still there, but its depth is not as it used to be because it is not face to face,” Parker said. "If a student has not eaten and they come to school, I could see that, and I ask them what's wrong and let them lay their head down."
How laptops issued by Chicago Public School is helping education
CPS provided Robert Fulton Elementary with 300 laptops to issue to students who did not have access to one, according to Parker. As a result, she has seen an increase in class participation compared to the start of the transition.
CPS released information on its website for parents and students about the process of obtaining laptops, and Parker said her school did robocalls to reach parents within their community. Emails were also sent out to inform students of this information through their CPS student emails, and Parker made calls to the students in her homeroom personally.
Students who attend Robert Fulton Elementary and/or their parents could pick up laptops from the school from 9 a.m. until 12 p.m.
The laptops have a webcam that allows students to have the ability to show their faces, and this helps teachers to stay engaged with students while they teach their lectures.
Yet, through her experience of teaching so far, she wishes the conditions could have been approached differently.
"I wish there could have been more done in making sure that all homes had internet access, because even though you may have a laptop, you may not have internet access," Parker said. "Then sometimes you may have internet access, but it's not that strong, so I wish there were some way that there was a strong partnership between our district and a cable or internet network."
Parker tries to be compassionate to parents that may not be internet savvy or parents who may be working, but she doesn't want her students to believe that one assignment is enough to meet her expectations. She said she may only see about forty percent of her students on a daily basis, and predicts 60 percent of her students log on to Google Classroom.
"One thing that some of my students struggle with is when they get on, they don't show their faces. I have asked students as a compromise if they can show me an emoji with their picture, so it seems like I'm looking at them,” Parker said.
She said she understands there may be some circumstances that discourage students from showing their faces, so she tries to compromise to make them feel comfortable as they learn to adapt to the alternatives set in place.