Happy New School Year, 2021-22: My Reflections, Thoughts, and Musings

 Happy New School Year, 2021-22!

 

Every year, it still amazes me how quickly “the change” occurs—from feeling summer rested to school exhausted. Even though I am always super excited to head back into the classroom with kids, there is still no exhaustion—physical, mental, and emotional—like beginning of the school year exhausted! It usually takes me three to four weeks into the school year to reacclimate. Teaching within a pandemic has added a whole new layer to my beginning of the school year exhaustion. As I reflect on the first three weeks of this school year, my mind is overloaded—What has gone well? What would I do differently? There is SO much to consider about what is happening in the field of education and its impact in my classroom. One thing that immediately stands out to me is the sheer volume of interruptions that occur every day in a classroom and the effects of those interruptions on building relationships, routines, and learning.

 

It might help for me to provide a little more context as to why the volume of interruptions really stands out to me this year. Last year, due to the pandemic, our district began the school year utilizing a fully remote instructional model. Our instructional day with kids was approximately five hours long with a 45-minute lunch break in the middle of the learning day. By the end of October, we had begun making the transition to a hybrid learning schedule. Some students attended school in-person for three hours in the morning and completed independent work in the afternoon. Then we had a 45-minute lunch break. After completing independent work in the morning, the remainder of the students received virtual instruction in the afternoon—a repeat of the lessons taught to the in-person students in the morning. What I now realize I took for granted last year was that within our pandemic instructional model there were almost no interruptions, so we were able to get “in flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1997)” and maximize our learning time.

 

This year began with fully in-person learning. Although I recognize that in-person learning is better and necessary, we are still living in a pandemic. The delta variant causing multiple kids to miss large chunks of instruction. I also recognize that the beginning of a school year includes more interruptions because the schedule and routines are still being created and revised. But, I have been taken aback at the sheer volume of interruptions and the impact they have already had on building relationships, establishing routines, and beginning our learning. I have been taken aback by how that speaks to our priorities in education. I already feel “behind.” After experiencing more than a year of disruption to “normal” learning, it seems particularly important this year to minimize the number of interruptions—our relationship building, and learning, depend on minimal interruptions. 

 

After rereading the ASCD article “The Hidden Cost of Classroom Interruptions” by Matthew A. Kraft published on June 1, 2020, I feel more validated in my concerns. Based on his research, Kraft states, “Small interruptions and the disruptions they cause can add up to a considerable amount of lost learning time. … Scaling these estimates [of lost learning time] by 5.5 hours per day and 180 school days per year suggests that students will lose between 10 and 20 days of instructional time over the course of the year. This is enough time to categorize every student in the district as truant or even chronically absent—all while they are in school.” And, this does not even account for the amount of time teachers are then expected to reteach material missed due to the interruptions. I also found it interesting that Kraft found most administrators did not see the volume of interruptions as a significant problem when he states, “administrators estimated 58 percent fewer interruptions per day than actually occurred.”

 

So, I am following Kraft’s advice and conducting my own mini-inquiry into the types of interruptions occurring in my classroom and documenting the effects they are having on our relationship building and learning experiences with the hopes of sharing my findings here and with my principal. I tend to think big picture and then operationalize my thinking. I believe creating some school-wide systems, and also making some classroom adjustments, can address this issue and maximize our much needed educational time—particularly this year!