Brewster Schools begins Distance Learning Wednesday March 25th

On Wednesday, March 25th, Brewster Schools will begin Digital Distance Learning. Pending School Board approval at their meeting this evening here is what you and your student may expect.

---

 

Digital distance learning will be different from a typical school day/experience.  This new format cannot replicate what takes place between an educator and students who share the same physical space, both in terms of quality and quantity of interaction.  With that said however, teachers have been preparing for developmentally-appropriate and engaging learning experiences for our students beginning on March 25th.

We are approaching this preparation and implementation in phases: 

• The pre-phase of professional learning, identification of a learning platform by each teacher (Google Classroom or Schoology) and preparation for digital distance learning; 

• Phase I of initial implementation, which begins on Wednesday, March 25th and lasts five ‘school’ days.  The goals for this phase are to get students and teachers comfortable with the identification of where to find the content, become proficient in interacting with the learning platform and to begin to have content and tech-based student-teacher asynchronous interactions;

• Phase II will begin on Wednesday, April 1st (if we are still unable to return to school).  In this phase we should see an increased proficiency with Phase I activities, as well as increased small group or individual student-teacher contact time and teacher feedback (for classroom teachers).  Depending on your son/daughter’s grade-level, you may see an increase in the amount of work assigned as well.

Here is what you can expect (pending Memorandum of Agreement approval by our Board of Education at our March 24th, 2020 Board Meeting):

• Weekly communications from each teacher generally outlining the learning for the week.

• Office hours in which staff can be contacted for questions and individual or small group assistance.  These hours will be shared with you and your son/daughter. Staff will do their best to respond within 24 hours.  Please know that there is work that staff will be doing outside of their designated office hours, such as working to prepare and create postings, assessing students' work and revising content for a digital environment. 

• Developmentally-appropriate assignments that strike a balance between academic rigor, social-emotional health and screen time.

In the survey that was sent out over this past weekend, many parents asked for some sort of schedule for their son/daughter.  While we are not following a schedule the way we typically would in a school day (i.e.- period 1 is Chemistry from 7:45 to 8:30 or Reading/Writing Workshop from 9:15 - 10:45 etc.), we will follow a schedule for which courses work will be posted for.  All work will be posted by 9:00am:

JFK Elementary School and CV Starr Intermediate School 

Below is an example of how an elementary schedule could look. Teachers will share their individual schedules with their classes.

We are asking teachers to adhere to the following guidelines for core instruction:

Please know that in addition to this time allocation, there will also be activities provided by the special area teachers as well as enrichment activities provided by the classroom teacher.

Wells Middle School and Brewster High School 

Wednesday, March 25th is Day 1.  Students will receive and be responsible for courses that they would otherwise attend on their Day 1 schedule.  Again, this will not happen following the time slots in Day 1, but instead work will be assigned based on courses students have scheduled for Day 1.  In grades 6-8, we are asking that work for phase I not exceed 20-30 minutes per subject area and for phase II, not to exceed 35 minutes per subject area.  In grades 9-12, phase I work should not exceed 30 minutes per subject area and in phase II, not to exceed 40-45 minutes. 

We will be collecting feedback from students, staff and parents as we implement the various phases of digital distance learning.  Thank you for your patience as we work to continually improve in this new, unprecedented learning format and environment.  

I would also like to take a moment to thank all members of our Brewster team who helped us get to this point, including our building-level Instructional Technology Specialists, our Technology and Innovation team, especially our Director Mr. Jim Treloar, and all of our teachers and staff who are working hard to adjust and support our students in this new environment.

We have gathered and created some resources to assist with digital distance learning.  First, this is a link to our eLearning site (please see ‘Parent Resources’).  We will be adding to this site as we progress in this process.   Based on recommendations from those of you who completed the survey this past weekend, we compiled a list of Tips for Navigating Digital Distance Learning.

We know that this is a challenging time for all of us.  As always, we ask you for your partnership and understanding as we navigate these new waters.