Distance learning: a new way of engaging in school
Mya Brainard is a seventh grader at Oakland Middle School. Mya kicks off the day right by getting her distance learning done for the day.
April 13, 2020
Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, distance learning delivers a new way of learning and will continue until the end of the school year. Students have mixed responses to the distance learning compared to traditional learning.
Distance learning started when Governor Tim Walz declared Minnesota was on “lockdown” and the stay at home order was put in place. Now distance learning is going to continue through the remainder of the school year. All school work will be online and students will not return to school to slow the spread of COVID-19.
Stillwater setup distance learning through a program called Schoology. Teachers post their students’ assignments a few days in advance and attendance is based on a student finishing their homework for the current day.
“Some of the assignments do not have a thing to do or no description and that really bothers me,” freshman Makayla Matiski said.
“I think that finals are not going to happen because most classes are just having open note quizzes so if they have finals they will not be actual finals since they can not tell if you were cheating or not”
— Aaron Mosey
However, even though students are not in school, teachers have online call times set up to meet with students to answer questions. Some teachers have set up individual meetings with students as well just to check-in on individuals alone. Most teachers have a class set up from 10 a.m. to noon as well as 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.
“The Schoology connection is always weird and it sometimes does not work early in the morning and it is really weird so I wish they fixed that,” sophomore Dylan Stickan said.
Stillwater has five weeks of school left, which means teachers must figure out what they are doing for finals this year. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak and school being closed, teachers have to figure out a way to create online finals for the end of semester two. If teachers do finals online, there will be a lot of changes to grading and the way they put together.
“I think that finals are not going to happen because most classes are just having open note quizzes so if they have finals they will not be actual finals since they can not tell if you were cheating or not,” senior Aaron Mosey said.
Google Meets is used by most teachers for their calls with students. It is a video call software and allows students and their teachers to communicate with each other besides email. The call allows one to video chat and type messages as well. Most teachers set up links for their calls and send them to students when they have a scheduled meeting or have already set up a meeting for open call time.
Matiski said she would rather be at school than do distance learning because she just does not have the motivation to do her school work anymore.
The school year is coming to an end quickly and bringing a lot of pressure on students to get their stuff done for school, but there are students who do not care about this new learning program they just want the school year to be over with already. The end of the year is just around the corner and some students are ready for school to be done, but distance learning changes the layout for the last two days of school which are semester two finals.
“I get to do my school work when I want and when I get it done it only takes me two hours instead of six,” Stickan said.
“The school year went by really fast and hopefully this COVID-19 stuff does not affect this summer and next school year,” Mosey added.
