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I have a 1st grader and pre-schooler. While the district mandated google classroom for all kids, teachers of younger ages have been given the option of using S

I have a 1st grader and pre-schooler. While the district mandated google classroom for all kids, teachers of younger ages have been given the option of using Seesaw. For young kids its miles better. Even as an adult I find Google classroom to be awful. It feels like enterprise shovelware with bad UX, inefficient workflows, etc. A lot of it is both how much work the teacher puts in, and how much leeway the school/district give. At this age, it requires an adult nearby at all times. It may be to help him stay on task, occasional assistance (finding something, tech issues, etc.), and even just company of another person. We've had to juggle help from family, and my wife is not working just to keep things going. We were lucky last year to have an amazing Kinder teacher who did a lot to try and hold things together for the classroom (including 1:1s, summer penpals, and a lot of things on her own time). This year is a WIP, but our school has been very receptive and flexible. I worry most about the kids with two parents who must be at work and cannot give the same level of support we've been able to. They are likely to fall behind :( Thankfully teachers are trying to help those kids the best they can. It is not easy. Last spring while my son was finishing kindergarten it was extremely difficult. Seesaw helped a lot because they enabled community sharing so kids could see each others work and reply to it. We had to put a lot of effort in to keep him engaged, doing as much work as possible, etc. There were many meltdowns over seemingly simple things like "write 1 word". Preschool is different and in a tougher position. The primary goal is socialization and kinder-prep. Both are largely out the window for online only. Kids of this age just can't sit for that long in front of a Zoom type session. In person is limited but now available. The main challenge is preschools are struggling. The regulatory burdens force class sizes to be a fraction of normal. Naps are basically non starter (physical space requirements), food is tricky. That means the pre-schools are losing huge amounts of money every month or laying off staff. To top it off, the recent fires create such pollution you have to choose: (1) Close windows and violate covid regulations (2) Close for the day.

giantg2 6y ago
Seems odd the schools even do that much screen time for kids that age. I mean, isn't the school going against the AAP recommended screentime limits for that age group?
- gwittel 6y ago
  Absolutely, but there’s no alternative short of no school. Our first grader is still adapting. Historically he got maybe 20m of screen time a day max. Now it’s about 4.5 hours. There’s a lot of movement breaks and some non screen activity (quiet draw or read), but it’s still a lot of screen time. He’s often pretty bored. For preschool when they could not open for in person the most they could offer was about 30m a day. That was basically story time and sharing so kids could say hi. Many families opted out.
  - giantg2 6y ago
    I remember when I was a kid (first grade) they would send home the text books and a bunch of worksheets if you were out of school, or for summer work. I would much rather have my kid reading the books and practicing writing via the worksheets. I guess I'm biased, but I hate how reliance on computers is being ingrained at such a young age. Especially if it's just being used for something like Google slides, which to me seems like a poor replacement medium for paper worksheets.
    - gwittel 6y ago
      Slides are indeed a poor way to submit work. That feels more like a lazy way out vs a thought through curriculum. Writing is an important part of the learning process. In our case most of the work is done on paper and they hold it up to the camera for the teacher to see or take a picture and submit it.
      - giantg2 6y ago
        That's sounds better

giantg2 6y ago

Seems odd the schools even do that much screen time for kids that age. I mean, isn't the school going against the AAP recommended screentime limits for that age group?

gwittel 6y ago
Absolutely, but there’s no alternative short of no school. Our first grader is still adapting. Historically he got maybe 20m of screen time a day max. Now it’s about 4.5 hours. There’s a lot of movement breaks and some non screen activity (quiet draw or read), but it’s still a lot of screen time. He’s often pretty bored. For preschool when they could not open for in person the most they could offer was about 30m a day. That was basically story time and sharing so kids could say hi. Many families opted out.
- giantg2 6y ago
  I remember when I was a kid (first grade) they would send home the text books and a bunch of worksheets if you were out of school, or for summer work. I would much rather have my kid reading the books and practicing writing via the worksheets. I guess I'm biased, but I hate how reliance on computers is being ingrained at such a young age. Especially if it's just being used for something like Google slides, which to me seems like a poor replacement medium for paper worksheets.
  - gwittel 6y ago
    Slides are indeed a poor way to submit work. That feels more like a lazy way out vs a thought through curriculum. Writing is an important part of the learning process. In our case most of the work is done on paper and they hold it up to the camera for the teacher to see or take a picture and submit it.
    - giantg2 6y ago
      That's sounds better