Happy World Teachers’ Day 2020: Educating During a Global Pandemic

Posted 10/6/20

OKEECHOBEE — Today, October 5th, we recognize World Teachers’ Day. As a school principal, today always stands out as a day of meaning and importance, but in 2020, the celebration of World …

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Happy World Teachers’ Day 2020: Educating During a Global Pandemic

Posted

OKEECHOBEE — Today, October 5th, we recognize World Teachers’ Day. As a school principal, today always stands out as a day of meaning and importance, but in 2020, the celebration of World Teachers’ Day has never held more relevance.

World Teachers’ Day was created in 1994, as an effort to commemorate the anniversary of the adoption of the 1966 International Labor Organization (ILO)/United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) recommendation concerning the status of teachers. This recommendation set benchmarks regarding the rights and responsibilities of teachers and standards for their initial preparation and further education, recruitment, employment, and teaching and learning conditions. When we dig deeply into the intended meaning of recognizing our teachers today, in the environment in which we find ourselves immersed during a world pandemic that has already caused more than a million deaths worldwide and nearly 210,000 deaths in the United States alone, the work being carried out by our teachers is nothing short of incredible. Our teachers are literally making the impossible happen.

In a joint statement released from ILO, UNESCO, and Educational International, the organizations responsible for World Teachers’ Day had this to say:

“In this crisis, teachers have shown, as they have done so often, great leadership and innovation in ensuring that #LearningNeverStops,that no learner is left behind. Around the world, they have worked individually and collectively to find solutions and create new learning environments for their students to allow education to continue. Their role advising on school reopening plans and supporting students with the return to school is just as important.”

Make no mistake about it. Our world’s teachers are working harder than ever before to serve all students. The challenges they’re facing are unlike any other time we have faced in education. What our teachers are working to overcome in terms of challenge is nothing short of amazing.

Teachers’ Challenge and Reality
At our Yearling Middle School in rural Okeechobee, Florida, I have witnessed our teachers expand their instructional unit planning to include strategic use of every instructional minute involving our students who are attending school on a face-to-face basis as well as our student population attending classes online from home. Our teachers have worked together to plan to switch between their face-to-face and online groups of students by alternating direct instruction and student-centered task completion. Other times, our teachers have utilized Zoom’s breakout rooms to combine the two kinds of students and to allow our online crowd to work in collaborative groups with our face-to-face population.

Early in the school year, when this complex learning environment was new and foreign to us, I watched as some teachers on our leadership team volunteered to lead professional learning sessions to model how to best juggle the face-to-face and online student groups in the same lesson. I’ve noticed our teachers devising new methods of delivering instruction and monitoring student learning both in person and online throughout a class period. And I’ve been amazed as our teachers have worked diligently to follow up with students who are struggling, and many of our at-home, online learners are struggling, by providing small-group instruction and communications with parents to support the commitment to not leaving any students behind.

In addition, our teachers are forced to expand our school’s commitment to creating a campus-wide culture of learning. One where all staff members and students share in the responsibility for every single student’s social/emotional development and mastery of standards. In doing so, we are in the process of growing the use of our greatest resource when it comes to learning – our students. During elective periods, high-performing students are joining our teachers in our classrooms to provide extra learning support by working with online students, re-teaching lessons to students whether online or face-to-face who are struggling, and to learn the value of their own civic responsibility to make others better while developing a high level of social/emotional maturity in assuming a leadership role with peers. Now more than ever before, the phrase, “It takes a Village,” rings true. To achieve our vision of guiding ALL students to the deepest levels of learning, we need every member of our learning community on our team. We need them all: staff, students, parents, and community members.

Our Teachers and Staff are Essential Workers

Our school is a Title 1 school where we serve a student population that includes an economically disadvantaged family rate of 97%. A percentage of our students receive their best meals at school. All of our students have access to social/emotional supports, gain a basic human need of belonging, and develop as critical thinkers and learners.

Students need structure in their lives. They needs a community where they feel safe physically, emotionally, and socially. They need to grow intellectually to become critical thinkers. Our students’ development as citizens and as future contributors to our society depends on our schools. In the face of a global pandemic that continues to ravage our planet and take loved ones from families, leave behind long-term health impediments to its victims, and completely disrupt what was once, “normal life,” our teachers and school staffs provide consistency, normalcy, support, and stability for our students. These aren’t wants but needs. Our kids need these things. And our schools are continuing to provide our students with these needs all while putting themselves at some degree of risk due to the intense level of contagion involving Covid-19. It is essential that our students continue with their education, but let’s recognize the commitment our teachers and school staffs are making daily.

In 2020 Thank You Isn’t Enough
The traditional thanks we might give our teachers on World Teachers’ Day doesn’t seem enough in 2020. For many reasons, the year 2020 will go down in history as a uniquely challenging year that very few will forget. Let’s make sure we also make it a year in which we take a moment to reflect on the incredible contributions our teachers and school staffs are making and to let them all know how much we appreciate their sacrifices and work.

David Krakoff is principal at Yearling Middle School.

yearling middle school, YMS, schools

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