The first time I heard the term "asynchronous online learning" was Friday the 13th. Looking back, that seems grimly appropriate.
My principal asked me to step in and teach three junior English classes for a colleague who’d suddenly gone on leave. "Only until we come back," he said. He assured me a long-term sub was ready to step in just as soon as things went back to normal.
The next day, my husband and I un-invited friends and extended family from our son’s fifth birthday party. It was just us, his brother, and his grandparents. On a video call, we learned that my sister, who lives in another state, was pregnant with her first baby.
And on March 15th, 2020, I sat down with the Sunday New York Times.
On that Sunday, there were a lot of things I didn’t know yet. For instance, I didn't know I wouldn’t be able to hold my baby nephew until he was five months old. I didn't know I'd set foot in the school where I work for the last time that year. My husband and I didn't know that, in addition to our jobs as educators, we were also about to become full-time facilitators of our two sons’ online educations that would last the rest of the school year.
But I could still sit down with a mug of tea and the Times, and there was comfort in that ritual. Sometimes, the stars align and the thing you need to read appears for you at the very moment you need it. And so I opened the opinion section to Jon Mooallem’s essay “This is How You Live When the World Falls Apart.” It began: The earthquake overwhelmed people the way the strongest emotions do. It was pure sensation, coming on faster than the intellect’s ability to register it. My tea went cold as I lost myself in his description of the devastating Alaskan earthquake of 1964. I read of the destruction, terror, and uncertainty that the disaster wreaked in this relatively new state in the shadow of the Cold War. And I read of the incredible perseverance and compassion Anchorage residents showed.
Learning Together, Apart
One thing I did know on that day was that 65 high school juniors were counting on me. We transitioned into asynchronous online learning that stretched from March into April and then all the way through June. I went from being a placeholder for my students to being their official, permanent English teacher. My colleagues and I raced to turn all our lessons into deliverables packaged and accessed via Google Classroom. My students lost nearly half of their normal eleventh grade year. They had no prom, no sports, no hanging out with their friends.
We stayed home. Our friends and relatives in health care went out. COVID raged. Mooallem’s essay continued to resonate.
As the library media specialist, I regularly co-teach with my classroom teacher colleagues. The students and I knew each other. Wanting to both help them with academic skills and avoid overwhelming them, I asked them for input: what do you want our lessons to look like? What do you want me to help you with? They surprised me when, overwhelmingly, they responded that they wanted to work on essay writing.
Three Decisions
We had no access to physical school materials such as books. I knew everyone’s nerves were at the fraying point. I decided three things very quickly:
- I would use short texts that we could all access easily online to provide material to think and write about.
- I would build in options and flexibility.
- I would make the process of drafting, feedback, and revision feel as personal as possible.
It seemed appropriate to anchor the unit on the moving story from Anchorage that remained lodged in my heart and brain.
And so I began the process of designing a unit unlike any I had ever done before—and yet, in some ways, not all that different. Drawing on my training in Understanding by Design, I began with the end in mind. I wanted students to construct a thoughtful essay incorporating analysis of multiple texts. In order to get them to that point, I wanted them to identify “big ideas” from the texts.I planned out our learning experiences to include reading Mooallem’s essay, examining two poems, and watching a TED talk. “Invictus” by William Ernest Henley was short, accessible, and inspiring. A professor had shared Auden's "September 1, 1939" with my class the day after the September 11th attacks; I'd been unable to forget it. Grace Lin's “The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child’s Bookshelf” presents a powerful message about representation.
I realized that the overarching theme of this unit was all about finding courage through vulnerability. It was hard for me to imagine a more potent, relevant topic, and so that’s how I framed it for the students.
"We Hate Being Alone"
I spread our study of these texts out over several weeks. Students shared quick written reflections in shared discussion boards on Google Classroom. I then asked them to share some “big idea” takeaways. Their responses blew me away. One student wrote, “We hate being alone. We need it, but we fear it.” Some students ruminated on the nature of fate and individualism. Others marveled at how sometimes the worst experiences can bring out the best in people.
I created a slideshow featuring some of the most interesting “big ideas” and recorded myself sharing them aloud. Then, I turned the students loose to free-write about any big idea of their choosing. I encouraged them to reference at least two of the texts to explain their thoughts. I called this phase “word vomit” to help it seem less formal and stressful.
A Pleasure to Read
Their responses didn't disappoint me.
I was determined to mimic the feeling of sitting next to them in a classroom and sharing feedback about their writing. Two colleagues and I tested out multiple add-ons that allowed teachers to give recorded verbal feedback on Google Docs. Our favorite was Mote. I could share my thoughts using my voice rather than by leaving written comments on students’ drafts. They crafted essays that were thoughtful, insightful, and well-constructed—a pleasure to read.
Sometimes, the relationship between teacher and student can be tense; the teacher holds the power, while the students toil at the teacher’s whim, scrambling to earn points on a rubric and get enough credits to pass a class and earn a diploma.
Other times, the stars align. The way you need to teach--and learn--appears for you at the very moment you need it. In a small way, even though we were all physically separated from each other, we embodied the spirit of cooperation Mooallem marveled at in his essay.
It was far from ideal. It wasn't what any of us asked for. But when the world fell apart, we were in it together.
