School has been closed since March 13th, 2020 and Governor Gavin Newsom ordered a Shelter-in-Place on March 17th, 2020. Despite other pandemics in recent decades (H1N1, SARS, Ebola, etc.) there hasn’t been a global pandemic or even state-wide shutdown during those times. And in accordance to SFUSD’s Continuity of Learning Protocol, all assignments at this point are optional. I’ve noticed that many students are overwhelmed, even myself with the sheer number of emails with teachers confused or frustrated on which online tool to use or how they’ll continue teaching during this time.
Although my students have a calendar to keep track of which chapter they should be annotating, I decided to assign an optional “Quaranteen Journal“. I was inspired by my blogs and an assignment my Aunt shared with me from another teacher, so I decided to adapt it to be more personal and a space of reflection for my students during this time. I’m not sure what will come of it, and I anticipated we would return to school at some point to discuss students’ experiences or journals as well.
Maybe 1/5th of my students have begun writing in their online journals. Some have shared photos, some videos, most are writing a lot more than I anticipated. It’s been very refreshing to read some of their journals because I haven’t shared even a digital space (like zoom or a conference call) with any of them.
This is an unprecedented time in history where all of us, especially youth, are being affected in a way no one has experienced. I found it important that we begin to document these narratives in the lack of hope the world is currently missing. If you or any teachers are looking to do an assignment like this, I highly suggest it and will link it on my website and here.
Once “Distance Learning” commences for my students I offered extra credit to those who have been writing and will ask students to write at least 1 journal a week for a grade during the semester. Here are some snapshots from some of the journals:
Balasbas Says 