Pasadena Schools Embrace Remote Learning

ByMay S. Ruiz

Inthe midst of health concerns caused by the coronavirus outbreak, safedistancing has been implemented. Schools closed to ensure the safety ofstudents and to help curb the spread of the disease. I set out to determine ifthere is a system in place to handle this sudden change and how equippedadministrators, teachers, and students in Pasadena are to switch to remotelearning.

Pasadena Unified School District’s (PUSD) Director of Curriculum, Instruction, and Professional Development, Helen Chan Hill, informs me by email that PUSD initiated its remote learning plan in earnest very shortly prior to the school closures on March 13.

Hill expounds, “We laid out a three-stage plan: Stage 1 would be general, standards-based content that would be made available online and in print, with enough material that students could engage in reinforcement of learning for 2-3 weeks – we were able to get these up and running by March 16. Stage 1 work was completed by a central team of Curriculum & EdTech specialists, with the intent to buy a few weeks of time for teachers to build out their own online classrooms in PowerSchool Learning.

“Stage 2 began officially on April 6, following PUSD’s Spring Break. At this stage, all online classrooms are active and students should be able to take in content and lessons that are custom created for them by their teachers.

“Stage3 is our transition to interactive learning, with the use of meeting apps andtools that allow for livestreams and more bi-directional communication between theteacher/student/ content.”

“PUSD,fortunately, had three key systems in place for several years that has helpedwith our readiness,” Hill continues. “The first of these is a network ofInstructional Coaches in every school. They are the crux of our professionaldevelopment design and have been instrumental in providing clarity and trainingto teachers. While teachers were planning prior to April 6, our InstructionalCoaches and Principals/APs have been attending custom tutorials on remotelearning that they can use with their staff.

“Wehave a network of TechLeaders that are early adopters of technology integrationin the classroom. These are teachers who are in the classroom, but receivemonthly training on apps, tools and best practices for instruction withtechnology. They too have been key in supporting teachers in this time!”

Asked if there are any assessments in place to determine if students are learning, Hill replies, “We have analytics on each online classroom in PowerSchool Learning with respect to usage, but as for assessment, that has not yet been fully determined. In alignment with CDE’s updates, we will be suspending nearly all of our local assessments. However, we want to help teachers to check on student progress and understanding through other means still to be determined.

“Furthermore, we have created a resource page to support our teachers and parents. We also want to emphasize that the well-being of our students and families is the utmost priority – while we are dedicating much work to ensure students’ academic opportunities, we are likewise encouraging grace, patience, and understanding around all of it. We know that families’ (as well as teachers’) lives have been uprooted and we need to take care of each other before we make demands for schoolwork.”

I’veread articles that highlighted the plight of some students who don’t havecomputers at home or laptops and, even when they do have them, don’t have WiFiand I ask Hill if this is a problem at PUSD.

“Becauseof our techequity initiative that began in 2018, our students are already oneto one with chromebooks,” Hill responds. “Sixth to 12^th grade havealready been taking them home, and K – 5 use them in the classroom. Thereforeon March 13 when we dismissed, we asked elementary schools to dispatch thechrome books from the classroom for students to take home. We are still workingon students with no Internet access – we have deployed all of our hotspots tothe majority of those families in need, and are working with others on a solution.”

Speaking with me by email, Dr. Benita Scheckel, principal of Altadena Arts Magnet School, says, “Teachers had two weeks to finish creating their virtual classrooms; students began remote learning four weeks ago with general academic content loaded by our district onto PowerSchool Learning. Our school’s instructional coach, Ms. Hanh Le has really been doing the heavy lifting of training teachers to use all the available online apps to support student learning. The district is working closely with each campus’s administrative team and instructional coach to collect data on how teachers are managing their virtual classroom set up.

“Iam trying to keep everything as normal as possible – I am continuing to sendthem my Sunday updates for staff. I am checking in on them every day formallyvia email and virtual staff meetings and then informally via text and phonecalls.” 

Dr. Scheckel adds, “I’m just so impressed by PUSD’s ability to move from in-person to virtual learning so quickly and seamlessly.  I am also incredibly inspired by our teachers’ aptitude and willingness to jump right in and learn so many new things in such a short amount of time. My teachers and so many across the district are commenting on how sad they are to not be able to see their students in person every day.”   

Ashley Butler teaches World History and AP World History to around 120 mostly sophomore students at John Muir High School Early College Magnet.

Shesays, “I have been communicating with students through email; surveys and allwork is being posted and submitted by students on a Learning Management Systemcalled PowerSchool. Next week, after our spring break, I will conduct digitallessons and hold virtual office hours via Google Hangout Meet.

“Iam working to create (and modify in real time, due to the situation) lessonsand activities to best support student learning and support student needs inthis uncertain time. I don’t have a model or a template that I follow, per se,but I am trying to provide instruction that supports my students in the mosteffective way possible.”

AddsButler, “I can’t speak for all high school teachers in this case, but speakingfor myself, I am learning to communicate with my students in different ways. Iam used to in-class conferencing to support student learning. However, withremote learning, this one-on-one time has changed. Now, instead of supportingstudents individually during class hours, students are being supported at alltimes during the day.

“Studentengagement really depends on the class. Virtual discussions can still takeplace on various learning management systems and other digital resources likeflip grid or padlet. Student engagement can be achieved with different types ofassessments, projects, research activities about which students are passionate,or assignments/activities that relate to their lives.

“Itis hard to say if high school students are better able to adapt to remotelearning, I think time will tell. However, many students have explained thatthey miss the in-person support their peers and their teachers provide. I thinkthat all students, no matter their age, are able to adapt to remote learningwhen they have teachers who have integrated technology into their classroomregularly. I think one of the greatest challenges high school students arefacing is that many have familial responsibilities outside of school work.”

Askedwhat has been the biggest hurdle for her, Butler remarks, “Not sure I have hadto overcome anything yet; I feel like every day I am faced with a newchallenge, but the challenges and new learning experiences are what makeeducation such an enjoyable profession.”

Armenui Manasarian, who is one of PUSD’s TechLeaders, teaches at Sierra Madre Middle School. She describes how she conducts her virtual classes. “For about ten years now, I have been using the LMS (Learning Management System) called Powerschool Learning. I post my assignments and content on my class pages; I record myself giving the lessons on screencastify and post them on my page for my students to listen to it and view it. To establish as much connection as possible, I check in with them by conducting polls and using discussion boards on Powerschool. I have embed Nearpod lessons, Listewise lessons, videos, etc. Eventually, I will be using Google Meets to connect to the class for live instruction.”

ContinuesManasarian, “I teach five periods – two classes of English, two classes ofHistory, and one elective that is a tech class/Hawk News with a total of 167students. My elective does the school news broadcast and we are trying to dothis remotely and sending them out to the school as a means for all of us toconnect.” 

“EveryMonday, I post an agenda for the week so students are clear about expectationsand are able to manage their time; I film tutorial videos which I send toparents and students to help them along and as to what my expectations are. Icreate a Dropbox so that students know where to turn in the assignments. Mystudents use various tools such as Kami (lets them type on PDF) so that theycan do the work and turn it in. I am also emailing my students/parents. I amavailable on Google Hangouts whenever students and parents have questions orare confused about lessons.”

“Ilook for interesting topics to cover. Some discussions are lecture types withonly me; some are interactive where they can respond to each other in theclass; and there are times when they record their voice response or, usinganimation, they record a face response. 

“Notbeing able to explain things in person is a struggle at times, especially sincethis happened so suddenly that we didn’t really have adequate time to preparethe kids. They all have various types of households with different schedules.Their parents might not be able to help as much or they might not have the bestaccess to internet. I try to make things very clear and set norms, guidelines,and routines so that everyone can follow along. I give them a suggestedschedule, but it is up to the family to enforce them.”

While this pandemic brought to light the limitations of remote learning, it also brought out the best in the PUSD. Manasarian notes, “I am proud of my district for the pace, teamwork, and efficiency with which they dealt with the situation. They set up learning materials for two weeks for teachers who needed time to learn, and to transition and plan all of this. They made sure all students had Chromebooks so that they can all access the content and curriculum. Everyone worked together to ensure this to be a success for both teachers and students. We really came together as district leaders and teachers in this time of crisis.”

Ifteachers are sometimes challenged engaging middle-schoolers, those who teachthe youngest learners have their work cut out for them. Five-year-olds needhand-holding and getting solid educational foundation is crucial.

Chelsea Eshnaur is a kindergarten teacher at Madison Elementary and has 19 students in her class. She expounds on how she delivers remote learning, “Using the PowerSchool, my students are able to log on to my page and see the assignments for the week; I am hoping in the upcoming weeks to try out a Google Hangout Meet. I don’t think I can use this to actually teach content because not everyone would be available at the same time to log on. In the past two weeks of online learning, I’ve only had about six students actually log on. But I’m hoping to just do a daily read aloud and just say ‘Hi’ to those who are available.

“Aswe have switched to this online platform for teaching, I have mostly just beencreating my own method for pushing out content. Being in kindergarten has madeit harder to adapt my content to a digital platform, but there are so many resourcesout there from other educators that have made it pretty seamless.

“Ihave created additional resources on my page that include ‘Enrichment’ and‘Intervention Practice.’ The goal of the ‘Enrichment’ page is to provideresources that would engage the students outside of the core academics. Forexample: art, science, social studies, P.E., etc…. In the ‘InterventionPractice’ page, I have a plethora of resources for the students to work on inareas that they might be struggling in, outside of weekly content.”

“Becausemy students are so young, I cannot expect them to engage the contentindependently,” Eshnauer says further. “They need the help of someone at hometo log on and work through everything with them (reading directions, etc…). Iknow that this model of school work has been an adjustment, not just for me andmy students but for their families as well, many of whom are still workingduring the day.

“I’ve had a handful of parents reach out for clarification. I’ve sent out emails, phone blasts, and messages on Remind (messaging system), with very few responses. This is the most frustrating part because, like I said earlier, for the younger students, they need someone to help them access all of this. And when I have 4 out of 19 parents respond to any updates, it makes me think that the other 15 students aren’t getting anything.

Howdo you know if the children are actually taking in the lessons you’re postingonline? I query. Eshnaur replies, “That’s a good question! Because I don’t haveevery student logging on daily, I cannot guarantee that all students areaccessing the content. I include an online ‘quiz’ at the end of the week foreach main content area (phonics, reading and math).”

Whileit’s still early days and there isn’t much data available, I nevertheless askEshnauer what has worked well and what hasn’t since remote learning has beenput in place. She says, “So far I have found that I just need to be asavailable as possible. For parents that are accessing the content during the ‘schoolday,’ I’m trying to check emails and messages as often as possible in case ofany questions. Also, be willing to troubleshoot everything! Online learning isnew for all of us. So I’m constantly checking links and asking parents to letme know if they’re not working on their end, etc…

“What makes me nervous since going to online learning is just the lack of data that I will have. I know people might think, ‘it’s just kindergarten,’ but this part of the year is critical. I still have about half my class that are struggling to master the alphabet (ID and sound). This part of the year would have been more intensive as I worked with them to get them where they need to be. But so far, most of those students are not even logging on. And now they’re going to go to first grade at a disadvantage and the gap will just get wider and wider the more they progress through the grades.”

Theseare unprecedented times we live in. The world as we know it has been upendedand most normal activities have practically ground to a halt. As disconcertingas our conditions are at the moment, however, life has to go on and so wepersevere.

Andas we have seen on television and read in the papers, during theseextraordinarily dire times when our resources are diminished and our spiritsare tested, we manage to make the best of our circumstances. Our collectivewill to fight the odds prevails and makes us soar above adversities.         

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