Today, our school system initiated its first “Cyber Day” for students because of inclement weather. Instead of attending school and going to each class, students were able to stay home and do their work online. It’s interesting that many children –and I mean school-aged humans- dislike school. They say learning should be “fun,” not “boring.” “Why can’t we stay home and learn on the internet?” they say. Today, they had that opportunity.
I had my 8th grade Georgia Studies “Cyber Day Assignment” posted by 9:15AM (45 minutes early) for my middle school students. I explained that I would be available via email or they could post questions to the “Cyber Day Questions Discussion Thread.” I shared with them that I would check these locations every hour until 4PM. It’s 4:57 as I write, and no students have posted their work.
Admittedly, I only have 10 students in this particular class. Two of them logged in and reviewed the assignments. One for 1m, 57s and the other for 1m, 8s. Yes, neither student reviewed my online class for more than 2 minutes. ZERO students completed the work as of 4:57PM. Looking forward to discovering the results from my colleagues on my co-taught classes.
Interestingly, my wife is a career & technical education teacher at the local high school. She teaches classes in Teaching as a Profession and Business Law. She has 75 students assigned to her in today’s classes. (Her school has block scheduling so she has a different group tomorrow.) Of those students, 59 actually logged in with 17 of them completing and posting their assignment (28.8% of those who logged in).
So there you go. “Learning on the internet is fun,” they say. “I wish we didn’t have to come to this boring school,” they say. “We’ll never need the stuff we’re learning,” they say. So as you can see, our children have just as much difficulty being motivated to learn at home as they do at school. Let’s be honest. The best thing about school is the teachers. They struggle everyday to motivate and challenge children to become better people and better thinkers. They push them to become successful members of society.
Lesson 1: Teachers have value. Never underestimate the importance of people who challenge and inspire you to become the best version of you. So as they say, “If you can read, thank a teacher.”
Ronald L Gay 