Monthly Archives: March 2021

A Typical Day of School for a Distance-Learning Middle-Schooler

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Distance-learning became a household term in 2020 during the pandemic. Kids and college students across the world learned at home in their bedrooms or at their kitchen tables. For some, distance learning was a nightmare but for others it worked out. My daughter, Molly, thrived safe at home where she continues to learn long after most have returned to the classroom. I asked Molly about her typical school day and this is what she said:

 

  • At 8:30am I wake up to Alexa. First, I check my phone, and then I use the bathroom and brush my teeth. Back in my bedroom I make my bed but I like to stay in my PJs until about 10:00am.
  • Next, I have Student Advisory (SA) at 8:50am and I call in on Zoom with the other distance learners and my SA teacher, Mr. Grote. We talk about updates and do fun homeroom activities. SA is not a core class and Mr. Grote is a Gym teacher. Including me there are approximately 25 seventh grade distance learners at the moment; however, five kids are transferring to in-person when the quarter starts in early April. Sometimes I sleep during this class.
  • At 9:15am I have my first class, which is my favorite, Science. My science teacher Mr. Braun does the labs and I write down data along with the other students. I don’t like it that he does all the fun science activities like the labs and I just write down the data, but I guess that is one of the disadvantages to distance learning. Right now, I am learning about the digestive system. Earlier this year I learned about bones and muscles. Next quarter Mr. Braun is dissecting a frog. I am okay that I don’t have to do that in person. This is one of my core classes and I have it all year long.
  • American Studies, also known as Social Studies, is my least favorite class. It is another core class and I have Mr. Gunderson. I think if I had this class in person, I would enjoy it more. Right now, I am learning about World War I and before that I learned about slavery. Class is at 10:10am.
  • Then at 11:05am I have Language Arts with Mrs. Lewis. I like writing essays but I do not like reading books for class. It takes a lot of motivation for me and I struggle to keep up with the long books. I liked doing a persuasive speech a few weeks ago and I did mine on Why the Ocean Should Be Explored More. I just finished the Survivor unit and I had to read articles and books, watch movies, and do an abstract art project about the topic of surviving. The Survival unit was okay since [my mom] helped me with it, and it was fun watching Alive with the whole family.
Molly's Survival Abstract Art

Molly’ Survival Unit Abstract Art Project

  • My lunch break is at 11:55am – 12:25pm. I usually ask for PB & J, mac & cheese, or leftovers. If [my mom] has a meeting, I will make my own lunch. I normally skip breakfast and lunch is the first meal of the day for me so I am pretty hungry. I like to watch YouTube during my break while I eat lunch.
  • After lunch at 12:30pm I have my Specialist class time. Right now, I am in Project Lead the Way, which is a robotics and technology class. Next quarter, in early April, I have art which I think will be my favorite Specialist class. Earlier this year I had Gym and Spanish. When I did Gym at home, I did workout videos, jumped on the trampoline, biked, did yoga, and played basketball. In Spanish, I did Kahoots and Gimkits with the class, which are online games to help learn Spanish basics like vocabulary words. In Project Lead the Way, I recently made a Rube Goldberg machine with [my brother] Sam’s help. Now in class I play online games, I am learning to code, and in Solve-a-Problem I made desk dividers for my markers in my desk drawer.

Molly’s Rube Goldberg Machine Video

  • I really like my Pre-Algebra teacher, Miss Ritter, who is my favorite teacher. Class is at 1:45pm. I think Math is getting harder this month because I am learning percentages and how to measure circumference.
  • Finally, at 2:20pm I have Band. I play percussion, and I have a piano and a marimba at home to practice on. I also have a rubber practice pad to do my snare drum. I think Band at home is a little boring. I liked it better when everyone was distance learning because then I would get to see everyone from school over Zoom, and not just the distance learners.
  • School ends at 2:55pm. I feel lucky that I have the equipment and space to learn at home during the pandemic. I like being at home with [my mom] while [she] works. Sometimes we go pick up lunch and once [she] brought me to my favorite store Mind Body & Spirit to get some lucky bamboo. My days are filled with learning and for the most part I like to distance learn but I am starting to miss my friends and teachers and I am looking forward to returning to school in the fall.

Molly’s Reality

On Monday, April 5, 2021, students who are distance learning in Sartell can return to school for the final quarter of this academic year. As a family we made the tough decision to keep Molly at home for the remainder of the year. She would have liked to return to school and her friends but the reality of having to be in class all day with kids and teachers who may not take the pandemic as seriously as our family does could be distressing for Molly, not to mention dangerous. She is doing well at home and this is hopefully only one year. We have every intention for Molly to return to school in the fall for eighth grade; however, we cannot predict the future and what kind of situation we will be in due to the pandemic. Time will tell.

How Our 13-Year-Old Sister Is Surviving the Pandemic: Interview With Teddy & Sam

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Audio & Video Recording (16:15 minutes)

Sam, Teddy, Molly, Polly

Polly: Hi, I’m Polly and I am doing a blog on adolescent resilience for my English 537 class, Social Media for Professional Communicators. My blog is mostly about my daughter Molly, who is 13, and how she has handled being a kid during the pandemic. Today I am interviewing my sons, Molly’s brother’s Teddy and Sam. Teddy is 27 and he’s a PhD student who lives in Philly with his fiancé Kaitlyn and their Chiweenie Lucy. Sam is 24 and he’s a cook who is heading back to Germany next Sunday after spending four months at home unemployed because Germany shut down their economy and Sam was sent home. As you can see Teddy and Sam are quite a bit older than Molly and I want to hear from them how they think Molly is doing social distancing, distance learning for 7th grade, and just generally during the pandemic.

Teddy, you’ve spent about four months during the summer and over Christmas with Molly at home in Minnesota. What do you think her greatest strength is in how she has handled life during the pandemic? Can you give me some examples?

Teddy: Sure. I think her greatest strength is flexibility. I think, obviously, not only do you have to be flexible to adapt to the new circumstances and everything, but I think it’s flexibility mixed with some optimism too. Because I think that as much as the pandemic means giving up a lot of things, and you cannot do things, it also means that you do have some new opportunities like spending lots of time with your family. Well, obviously, sometimes that can be a bad thing, but I think she has made the best of it. Then it means also doing school from home. It means you have a more flexible routine and I think she appreciates that for the most part. You have more freedom when you’re doing school from home. So, I would say her flexibility mixed with seeing her being optimistic enough to see this not just as these are the things I can’t do, but these are the things that, actually, because things have changed, I can enjoy and I think that it’s very mature of her and kind of almost adult-like because, well, not all adults behave this way, unfortunately. But I think I feel this way having worked from home the entire pandemic, and having Kaitlyn work from home as well, that you have to give up things but it can come with some advantages to balance those out. Having a positive outlook, I think, is important and that’s what I think is Molly’s biggest strength.

Polly: Thank you. Sam, you have lived most of Molly’s life with her except for a summer when you lived in Philly with Teddy and then you were gone from December 2019 for about a year returning home at the end of November 2020. What was the first difference you noticed about Molly from what you remembered about her before you left? Do you think she changed a lot? In what ways?

Sam: Yes. Definitely she’s changed a lot. That was a big surprise my first time seeing her. Like how much she had grown, I’d say, I swear she’s at least six or seven inches taller than when I left for Germany. It’s crazy because when I left, she was still like a little kid to me. She was playing with dolls and I came home and she’s into doing makeup now and she’s really into computer games, and it’s great seeing her do all her online classes. It’s kind of crazy how fast she grew up. I think having the pandemic helped her with some of that. It’s forced her to get more into it and it’s good seeing her—even though she can’t see her friends directly—play video games with them. It’s cool to see how much more grown-up she is. She is a human being and she’s got more of an attitude than she used to.

Polly: You can say that again.  Continue reading →

A Rocky Passion: Collecting Crystals

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Molly talks about how she got interested in collecting crystals.

“I’ve always collected crystals as long as I can remember but my interest piqued over the past year while I’ve been isolating. I wanted to make my room beautiful with plants and rocks and other objects that make me happy. I can remember going to rock shops in Duluth, summers years ago, and I would pick out a few crystals and rocks that I liked and I kept them in a little clear container in my closet. One day I was cleaning out my closet and I came across the crystals and I saw them in a different light. I wanted to use them around my room as objects of art.”

Molly handled the crystals with love, turning them around in her hands while she seemed to be thinking about her history with the rocks. She keeps the crystals in a glass heart bowl. The crystals vary in size, shape, and color and most of them are shiny and colorful, and it almost looks like a bowl of hard candy.

I asked Molly about her favorite crystals.

“I don’t really have any favorites but I have three rocks that I like to sleep with under my pillow because they make me feel good. They are rose quartz, black obsidian, and malachite. The malachite is the newest crystal I have and I really like it. I have a really big amethyst that I use as a decoration on my shelf. Next to that I have pyrite or fool’s gold. Sam gave this one to me. [Sam is her brother.] This one is a smoky quartz that Frances [a friend] gave to me. It has little pieces of dirt inside the clusters.”

Molly listed the names of the crystals she has and she explained some of the properties and why she liked them individually:

  • “Lapis—I like the dark blue color,
  • Clear quartz—I really like the shape of this whitish clear crystal,
  • Sillénite—I also like the shape of this one and my cat loves it too,
  • Tiger’s eye—these are orangish brown and they have stripes,
  • Amethyst—this is purplish and it is a protecting stone,
  • Rose quartz—I like the color of this love stone,
  • Smoky quartz—these are fun to collect but I don’t know a lot about the properties,
  • Black obsidian—this is a production stone and it is good for unwanted negativity,
  • Red agate—these are common in Lake Superior and they are orangish red in color,
  • Citrine—I like this money stone and it is goldish whitish,
  • Garnet—this dark red crystal is my birthstone,
  • Onyx—this black stone is similar to black obsidian in appearance and it is also a good protection stone,
  • Fluorite—I like how this bluish turquoise crystal looks,
  • Moon stone—I don’t know what the properties are, maybe energy, but I like this whitish crystal that has blue highlights,
  • Pyrite—this one is called fool’s gold and you can see specks of gold in it,
  • Green malachite—like I mentioned I got this recently and I like how it looks.”

During the pandemic Molly’s interest in the crystals grew and collecting them provided her with a special hobby. As she handles them and decorates with the crystals she feels connected to each and every one. Most of the crystals she has acquired recently are from Mind Body & Spirit, a gift shop in downtown St. Cloud. Molly hopes to grow her collection slowly so that she can cherish each one. This is a hobby she thinks she can continue after the pandemic is over. She showed me three stones that looked pretty average except that they had holes in them. She explained that she found these special stones in Iceland with her dad. They plan to display them using wire.

How have the crystals helped you during the pandemic?

“They provided me a sense of peace and they also provided me entertainment as I decided how and where to display them. Learning about the stones and the properties has been interesting and I have a newfound appreciation for earth’s beauty. Even my cat Poppy loves the crystals!”

After we talked about the crystals, Molly agreed to make a video where she discusses some of the information in this blog. The video is posted on Facebook.