[Insert Child’s Eye Roll Here] 🙄

RemoteLearning Start a Journal PIN (1)

I have many stories from when I was growing up living in Michigan.  I feel confident my boys can recite them by heart.  There is the one where I was in college and I remember walking to classes in -55* wind-chilled temperature.  There was the one about how I would take off my shoes at the first thaw of Spring and jump barefoot in the puddles because it was so warm at 40*.  It snowed at least once a season at my track meets. You know, the usual.

RemoteLearning Start a Journal INSTA

RemoteLearning Start a Journal PIN (1)

Boys Finishing Brain Break in book

At best this Coronavirus event will be a touchstone of their childhood.  If they are fortunate it is merely an inconvenience and does not adversely impact their family.  And if it is the best version of itself, the time at home for #RemoteLearning might be their “uphill to school, both ways” story with which they bore their children.

Help your Child Remember

Lane Got a Virtual Pat Today

Suggested Prompts

And in order to capture the details of the change I recommend a student journal.  Consider starting a Book Creator journal with them now.  You can start them with prompts and then allow them to improvise at the end of each day.

I snap pictures with my phone as we do unique things they would not do in traditional school.  I upload the pictures at the end of the day to a Google folder I share with them.  Students are able to upload a picture of themselves or take pictures with their Chromebooks to add to their Journals.

I am trying to not edit the books until this event feels “done.”  It is interesting that one of my boys is all about the formatting upfront and the other has the plainest book possible so far.

I will share this with their teachers and my family in Michigan, where a state not able to try #RemoteLearning like we were in Georgia.  I am grateful for the experience, excited to see many peers trying more #edtech, but I sure would like to know when this event can be something to reflect upon.

Here are a couple of examples from my 2nd and 6th grader:

Digital Learning Days by Lane

Digital Learning Day Journal by Seth

Creativity Break