WIMBERLEY, Texas -- While school districts across Texan remain closed for the time being, many parents and guardians are having to serve as stand-in homeschool teachers. So how are students handling these new uncharted waters of "distance learning" or "remote learning"?
- Remote learning and homeschooling taking place as Texas schools remain closed
- One family has set up "classroom" in grandmother's home
- Texas schools to remain closed until at least May 4
"It was fun. I liked it but it did feel a little weird," said Lilliana Gonzalez, a fourth-grader in Eanes ISD. The district moved to remote learning on March 26. An order issued by Texas. Gov. Greg Abbott Tuesday will keep schools closed until at least May 4.
When Lilliana logged on to her classroom's Zoom meeting for the first time, it was quite chaotic at first. This was the first time she had "seen" her classmates after spring break was extended. This is the way many districts are choosing to continue schooling, with electronic learning via a video chat with their teachers.
"I feel like if we do it for a while then it'll get a little more normal, but it'll still feel a little weird," Lilliana said.
Once the teacher logged on and muted the kids' microphones on her end, the class meeting was able to resume without a hiccup.
"It feels a little more like school. But, if I was in my bed by myself, I would kind of get a little confused and not know what to do," Lilliana said.
Lilliana Gonzalez, a fourth-grader in Eanes ISD, attends class via video conference in this image from March 2020. (Stacy Rickard/Spectrum News)
To bring a sense of normalcy, Lilliana is “attending” her class while at her grandmother's house in Wimberley. Her grandmother, Cindy Reeves, is in a unique position right now serving as a stand-in homeschool teacher for Lilliana and her cousins Braden and Rylie Reeves.
“It hasn't been that hard for me because I'm an elementary teacher, retired, so I knew pretty much what fourth- and second-graders were expected to know by the end of the year,” Cindy Reeves said. "But they sent Zoom to Liliana’s iPad. It took my husband, who is a computer expert - that's what he does for his job - it took both of us an hour to figure out how to set it up."
Some teachers created packets of work to keep students engaged and learning during this confusing time of being out of school and not physically in the classroom. Wimberley ISD, where Braden and Rylie attend, has extended campus closures to comply with the Hays County "Stay at Home, Work Safe" order.
"It's social studies, math, and some stuff for STAAR, even though they canceled STAAR," Wimberley ISD fourth-grader Braden Reeves said. "But you still need to learn."
Cindy Reeves said she can't imagine how parents who have to balance work on top of this are doing it.
“I'm hoping everybody can have the attitude of this is different, but it doesn't have to be worse. I just feel bad for the parents who have to still go to work. What are their students doing?" Cindy Reeves said. "I am a lucky one because it's stressful. I mean, just doing homework with your children is stressful. I’m finding this is less stressful because they know they only have maybe two hours of work, as opposed to six or seven, because we kind of do it all in one clump. And then we do PE and we do art and we do music. We have pogo sticks right here. We get up and we'd have to jump 100 times on the pogo stick and then we come back and finish it. Whenever they're getting restless, you just need to let your children get up and go do something else until they have the wiggles out."
"It's way better than regular school. It’s only two hours," Rylie Reeves said. "I don't have to raise my hand, I can just yell “Grandma! I need help’”
In the most unconventional of ways, these homeschool sessions are giving the cousins the opportunity to make this a family affair with Grandma.
"We need to look at this as an opportunity to get really involved in our children's work and school and friends," Cindy Reeves said. "Our cousins have always wanted to go to school together and now they get to go to school together."
“[Grandma's] been helping us a lot. If we didn’t have her, on my paper, everything would be wrong,” Rylie Reeves said.
“Yeah, she’s just really good. Thank you,” Braden Reeves said. "It's just really fun to be here."
Cindy Reeves said teachers deserve kudos for how they’re handling the situation, because many parents might be lost without them.
“I just think this is giving every parent a really good idea of what their teachers go through and I think from now on, when we do resume school, they're going to be a lot more grateful and appreciate the teachers. Maybe not be so critical whenever their child says, 'Oh, Mrs. Jones was mean today.' Maybe they'll understand why Mrs. Jones was mean,” Cindy Reeves said.
Districts around the area are all operating on different schedules. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to this new way of learning. So keep checking in with your students’ teachers to find out the latest information.