Knowing that as far as our Federal Government is concerned I am – along with pretty much everyone else – expendable, I am committed to avoiding contracting COVID-19.
So that means not going shopping. And it means arranging for deliveries. Almost a full time occupation in itself. And that means someone else taking the risks on my behalf because they need to work while I hang about in my retirement from rewirement.
And I am enormously grateful to them: The delivery woman from Shop-Rite and Nicholas, Sayeed, John and Jake who have brought me Tops groceries via Instacart.
It means an inordinate amount of time and logistics trying to get the delivery down to once a week and navigating around the items that are available when you order but are off the shelves when the shopping is done.
Flour has been a problem and forget yeast. Because, of course, like everyone else I have had the urge to bake bread – the supermarket alternatives being so awful. And this week no spinach or kale.
And – just when toilet paper futures were looking up – then the great capers drought. O my goodness! Imagine my suffering.
And then the serendipitous time when I ordered a grapefruit and got a bag of twelve and they were delicious.
And the tragic drama of receiving ‘calorie free’ tonic (which is disgusting) instead of traditional. Oh the deprivation! First world problems on a scale of Marie Antoinette.
And forget disinfectant wipes and rubbing alcohol. No sign of any such stuff these past six weeks. I just hope they are where they are needed and not stockpiled in some Republican basement.
Amidst all the despair, the gnashing of teeth and weeping and wailing over these dramas I am thinking of those who carry a continued and expanded burden of responsibility right now. And I am thinking especially of teachers and heads of school.
Not only do they have the lives of their own families to consider they must also a lead a school. And a school means the entire organizational structure and its community. This in a time a high anxiety, sadness, loss, grief and anger; everyone on a steep learning curve struggling to do the best they can to meet the needs of students and their families. Heading a school is a job that keeps folks awake at night even in the best of times. And now – for many – an existential concern for the very health and survival of their community and their organization.
After a Zoom meeting with school leaders around the world Will Richardson had this to say in a comment on Linked-In:
This of course is an important question, when and if heads of school can stop the noises in the brain, the bats in the belfry, the rats gnawing the sheets and the drumbeat of insistent emails that take four paragraphs of explanation when a simple one sentence question of complaint would be more than sufficient.
What learning looks like is – after all – what schools and school leaders should be about when and if they have the time to get their heads out of the balance sheet and the turn off the spigot on complaint and worry central.
Will goes on to say:
In reply Mary Ann Reilly, the Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning at Newark Public Schools said this:
I see a lot of opportunities now to set up what we do next with the work we do digitally with students. We are slowly shifting from curriculum as consumption to curriculum as production.
And she provided two wonderful examples:
Here is a project underway now: Stories from the Pandemic. This is for HS and college age students. https://maryannreilly.blogspot.com/2020/04/what-youth-says-about-pandemic-notes.html
This helps us to imagine what constitutes “content.” https://maryannreilly.blogspot.com/2020/04/what-youth-says-about-pandemic-notes.html
Learning as production not consumption. Yes.
We’ve known about all this for ever of course. I heard Jimmy Britton critique Matthew Arnold’s definition of education “to make the best that has been thought and known in the world current everywhere . . .” in 1970. And the idea that learning is about the transmission of knowledge has been under fire for decades. See the work of Douglas Barnes in the 1970s as just one example.
But here, in this moment, we can see that thinking in action and shared with the world. Great stuff.
Here’s the link to Will and Mary Ann’s exchange.
Featured image: Jonathan Player for the New York Times January 24th 2002.
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A friend of mine is working on a current affairs online 'magazine' for children and young adults (7-17). Bearing in mind that we had no classes about the state of the world we lived in, and that lack of education about political and social responsibility are partly to blame for the dire straits we're in, I see this as a possibility for change. Love the phrase 'retiring from rewiring', by the way.
That sounds like a really worthwhile project. I would be interested in knowing more about it.
The trouble with "current affairs" in school is always that the affairs that are current are usually so awful and disturbing you have to think about carefully about how to approach it without drowning students in despair and helpless horror.
Kids need to hold on to hope and have a sense of agency and the ability to change things for the better. And to be about doing that. As in - the best way to teach children to be respectful (or responsible) is to respect them (and afford then responsibility).
Since my grandchildren are home schooled, life hasn't changed drastically for them, but they dearly miss their home school friends. Anyone who thinks that home schooled kids are not socialized has never met their cohort.
As with any kind of education, home schooling runs the gamut from the "drill and kill " worksheet treadmill to the truly creative and inspired. And I agree that homeschooled does not have to mean mean socially isolated, although some times it can.
I am not a trained educator. Though I suspect I do educate others unconsciously each day by example...as I learn from others..where my mind is open to receiving and perceiving. Who taught the Artful Dodger and was this a good thing? Who decides what is the best that has been thought and said? The right wing press? I have only just woken up and read the blog so these are entirely off the top of my head..and what are we all learning now given the new life brought on by the virus...perhaps amongst many there are emerging some commonly experienced feelings..but there will always be those whose early experiences frighten them into acquisition, self "protection" and aggrandisment at the expense of others. In honesty we probably all do this it's just that some learn to trust and hope that working cooperatively rather than in competition produces a better outcome given the chance.
Competition v. co-operation; the individual v. the collective; hard work v. luck leads to success. There's some interesting research on the political leanings of people who think strongly one way or the other on these kinds of things.
I’ve always had an aversion to the idea if “delivery” in relation to the curriculum. The joy of learning is in making connections between what one already knows and new ideas. I think Matthew Arnold’s dictum that students should learn “the best and has been thought and said” can be interpreted as more than a process of delivery/reception. However this is a thought for another time. I so agree with you that the enormous shake-up to so many aspects of life from the coronavirus could improve education. We could re-discover true learning and doing rather than “performance”.
I agree with your comment about Arnold. I do object to how he is used to defend the cultural heritage wing but he is also one of the humanizing voices when it comes to schooling.
I expressed the idea a bit too crudely - wanting to say that education is not only about about the best that 'has been thought and said' but also about what can be now created, imagined, made and produced. About all voices participating and knowing that good thinking can come from everywhere. And if we want them kids to learn they have to be about the work of production and building on that 'best' in new directions.