Teachers reflect on the year of teaching amid COVID-19
Barbie Jones, right, an English teacher at Washington High School, recently discussed the challenges of teaching amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Washington School District, like other Pennsylvania districts, closed on March 13, 2020, due to coronavirus. It now offers in-person and remote learning options.
Katherine Mansfield/For the Observer-Reporter
Washington High School teacher Barbie Jones provides instruction in a socially-distanced classroom.
Fort Cherry Elementary Center sixth-grade teacher Dave Narigon conducts a recent lesson for students who attend in-person, along with their classmates who participate in the class remotely.
Fort Cherry sixth-grade teacher Dave Narigon is nearing the end of his 28th year in education. And other than his first year of teaching, the 2020-21 school year – unfolding during the COVID-19 pandemic – has, without question, been the hardest.
“This has been the most difficult year, and by far the most challenging aspect of teaching during COVID-19 has been the process of instruction for both in-person and remote students,” said Narigon.
Narigon, donning a face mask that frustratingly fogs up the wire-rimmed glasses he wears, spends his school days teaching science and social studies classes to the students who attend in-person, while simultaneously live-streaming the class to students who opted for remote learning and attend Narigon’s classes from home on their laptops.
Instead of students rotating classes, they remain in one spot and Narigon piles his laptops and supplies, including bottles of hand sanitizer, onto a red utility cart and pushes it from classroom to classroom.
“I’m constantly running two or three laptops and a Promethean board. We must reestablish all connections between laptops, Zoom calls, Promethean boards and speakers every time we switch locations,” he said. “It’s time-consuming even plugging in the right cords.”
March 13 marked the one-year anniversary since all schools in Pennsylvania shut down because of COVID-19, upending education for students and teachers in Washington, Greene and Fayette counties’ 27 school districts.
For educators, teaching during the pandemic has been emotionally and physically exhausting – a recent survey by the National Education Association showed nearly a third of educators said the COVID-19 pandemic has made them more likely to retire early or leave teaching.
But teachers, including Narigon, also have found silver linings of teaching during a pandemic – sometimes something as simple as reading a tweet from a parent that says, “I’ve homeschooled my kids for 1 day and I’ve already learned so much, like their teachers need a huge raise and also I should never ever be a teacher.”
Said Barbie Jones, an English teacher at Washington High School who also teaches a program called “Prexie Academy,” an in-house credit recovery program for students who are behind in credits, “I am so proud to say I’m a teacher. I’m so proud of our families and our communities, of how we’re getting through this together.”
Jones, a graduate of Washington High School and the daughter of parents who both were teachers, has taught for 28 years.
She prefers to connect with her students in person, especially because many are struggling to earn a diploma.
“I’m dealing with at-risk kids, some who are coming out of jail in some situations, and they need extra support. I had anxiety, and I had a hard time sleeping at night because I was afraid we were going to lose these kids,” said Jones, who often rides with the school police officer to visit her students. “I’ll knock on doors and say, ‘How are you doing? You didn’t log on, how can I help?’ I went into teaching because I love kids. I miss that hug, that fist bump.”
During the pandemic, teachers have reached out to students in unexpected ways: helping their families connect with food banks, providing comfort to students whose family members lost jobs, and helping students who suffered anxiety, isolation and depression.
And to do that, Jones noted, teachers often place concern for their students above their own self-care.
Teachers are waking up earlier and working longer hours to create lessons for in-person and online students, respond to emails, and address the educational progress students are – or aren’t – making.
It’s also not lost on educators that they are in the classroom during a pandemic that has claimed the lives of more than 525,000 Americans and that, until Gov. Tom Wolf moved teachers into the 1A Phase for COVID-19 vaccine distribution, many of them were not eligible for the vaccine.
Jones, who was hospitalized with suspected COVID last March (a coronavirus test wasn’t available to her then), said she changes out of the clothes she wears to school the minute she gets home and takes a shower.
Other teachers have taken to wearing medical scrubs and face shields.
“I think the concern (about getting COVID) is always lurking in the back of our minds,” said Narigon. “I believe that nearly all, if not all, of our faculty feels that in-person education is the best situation for our students; however, all of us go home each day to families, elderly parents, family members with medical issues, and that is always a source of concern for many people.”
Teachers worry about the interruption the pandemic has caused academically.
One of the biggest challenges Narigon faces as a science teacher is teaching concepts without being able to use the supplies and materials he usually incorporates into his lessons.
For example, he suspended teaching a Legos-based robotics unit because the kits are usually shared between four to six students.
“It’s just not possible to disinfect all the pieces in the kit every day, and it is cost-prohibitive, about $300 per kit, to provide one kit for every student,” Narigon said.
Laurel Highlands Middle School English teacher Jennifer Neill said communication has been a struggle for various reasons, ranging from spotty internet and students logging on late to difficulties engaging students in discussions on-camera.
She pointed out that there are students in her classes that she hasn’t ever met.
“That’s an odd experience,” said Neill.
“I feel like I wasn’t able to adequately communicate, that I wasn’t able to give all of my students, especially remote students, the same experience. Sometimes, you can’t see a student struggling when the camera is off. You’re missing all the face-to-face nuances that, as a teacher, enable you to pick up on things so much better.”
Neill looks for chances to interact with her students during online instruction – she happily listens as they introduce their pets and talk about how they spent their weekends.
“So, I have Lucy the dog who attends class every morning, and I’ve learned a lot about Ryan the orange cat,” said Neill. “I’m just happy to have some interaction with my remote kids. It’s the human connections you make as a teacher that make a difference, and I’m happy to make those connections. It’s more than the academic lesson I’m teaching, it’s the human lesson. These are the things that are getting lost.”
Narigon also laments other experiences students have missed – for his sixth-graders, that includes the sixth-grade graduation and dance, and their final Science Camp Weekend.
Narigon said he recently ran across a story on a COVID-19 teachers page on Facebook. It described a conversation between a mother and her son, who was struggling with remote learning.
“The mom said, ‘No kid in the history of kids has had to learn this way. You are making history,'” Narigon said. “I now use this line with my students and parents. I think education is so much more than book learning at a desk. Students have learned what it means to be resilient. They have learned what it means to do things to help protect others, even if you do not really like doing it. They have learned to be better time managers and to follow schedules independently when an adult cannot be there to look over their shoulder every minute. And some of them have learned to advocate for their needs when it has been difficult to do so in the past. These are powerful life lessons that will not be assessed on any state or national exam this year. But they are lessons that will likely stick with them for a lifetime.”
Neill found a silver lining in technology that, even though there were bumps, made it possible for students to take part in classes.
Students who had to quarantine, or missed the bus, could still sit in on classes remotely.
Jones echoed her colleagues’ thoughts.
“COVID was tragic, and it united us. We are human beings who all suffered through this together. My heart goes out to everyone who has lost a loved one or a job due to the pandemic,” said Jones. “COVID gave us common ground. Every country worried about schools closing, everybody worried about someone they love getting sick or dying. Everyone was out of toilet paper. There are silver linings.”