Be kind to yourself and remember this is not how learning should be

 This blog is for anyone attempting to help a child with virtual learning. 

 As part of Birdsall House's mission is to support families and to do what we can to help them be successful.  As part of that mission we offered space and a teacher (me) for our graduates to do virtual learning.

So far it is going well and I am really enjoying seeing just how much they love learning.  It is also exciting to see that even though we didn't teach them anything, they know a lot. 

Today I was given a great example why virtual learning is not really appropriate for kindergarteners. Now I know that it was necessary for schools to start virtually and I am in favor of anything that protects us all from exposer to Covid 19.  That being said, it is still not developmentally appropriate for kindergarten and that can take a tole on both the child and the person helping them.  

Here's what happened this morning. 

The kindergartner I am helping has what is called "WIN" time for math and reading.  What this is is a list of activities or links to online games to support their virtual learning.  

This morning they chose a game that had the children sorting coins. There were pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters on the screen.  The child simply needed to touch on a penny and put it in the box labeled $.01 and do the same for the nickels, dimes and pennies. I thought this would be easy for him to do, I was wrong. He had a hard time telling the pennies, nickels and dimes apart, I got frustrated, he got frustrated. We decided to take a break and have him do something else.  During that break I thought about the game and why he had found it so hard.  

I had to make the mental switch from someone assisting a grade school child to my normal early childhood authentic learning mode.  I realized how difficult it would be to learn about coins from a screen. 

I then got out my coin saving jug and poured out a pile of coins and asked him to sort them.  He picked the coins up, matched the size and also took notice of the designs. He noticed that the quarters had different backs but were easy to recognize due to their size. He explored the coins, noticing all the similarities and all the differences. After about 10 minuets said "Ms Kelly, I'm ready to play the game again and I won't need your help now."  We got the game going again and sure enough, he played for about 15 minutes and were very proud of how well they did by themselves.

I am a professional educator and I find myself struggling with helping on line learning, so please, if you are struggling with the same thing, be kind to yourself.  Also think about ways to bring the learning to life if you come across an issue like I did today.