Tonight, I’m at the peak of a roller coaster. I’ve had all of spring break to crank up this hill of anticipation, to gather myself and think about what’s coming next, but now I can see the rest of the ride sprawling in front of me. My stomach is already in zero gravity, and I have those “first-ride-of-the-year” nerves.

Even though I’m used to being online while teaching, I’ve never truly taught online. I’ve always been able to connect in person either before or after communicating through the Internet — and you all know me, and that I hate being the person in the room talking for too long. I’m so much more comfortable being part of the conversation in a classroom, instead of being THE conversation. It’s just my style. That makes this new distance learning experiment that much tougher on me: it’s going to take me out of my normal comfort zone and toss me through a few corkscrews and loop-the-loops. (Figuratively. Hopefully.)

While we’re on this ride together, I want myself to stay focused on the track ahead. (This always keeps me from getting sick on coasters, and will keep me productive while teaching.) I want to remember these key things:

• Patience. All of us are new at this — you’re new, I’m new, baby O. is new, all the administrators and superintendents and parents are new. None of us have had to learn like this before, which means it’s going to take all of us time to get comfy. No point in stressing about it — better to give all of us time to sort things out.
• Simplicity. Ugh, this one is so hard for me. I love to do the extra things…but until I know what is actually useful for all of us, that’s just extra time that isn’t constructive. Especially at the start, I have to limit the “new & shiny” things I want us to try, so that we can focus on the time with each other.
• Connection. Another English teacher described our last day before break perfectly: “It feels like the last day of summer camp. See you when I see you, have a good life until then.” I wanted nothing more than to sit and have conversations with you, to enjoy our moments together in person. After a week of social distancing, I miss you all even more. Saving time to be with each other–through text responses, images, video, conversations — is one of  the most important things we can do.
• Freedom. Along with all of the sad disruptions of spring sports, Prom, travel, and our normal lives, there are also a lot of changes in “business as usual.” We can’t do school the same way right now. The way I’m choosing to look at this is as freedom. We get space to experiment, to read something different, to try different ways of working together. That can be fun, if we let it.
• Grace. Beyond the pressures of keeping up with learning and school, there is so much anxiety in the world right now over the very real, very scary spread of COVID-19. If an assignment isn’t perfect, I will forgive you; and if my teaching isn’t perfect, I hope you’ll forgive me.

Sending love and wishes of good health to you all! See you in “class” tomorrow,

Melly