FYI from BSF, 5.29.20
Some things we have read through recently...
COVID-19: School Matters
The next installment in our study of schools and organizations solving problems for and with Boston kids and families...
This Week: Supporting Social and Emotional Needs
Mission Grammar is a Catholic school at the base of Mission Hill, aside the Basilica. With an enrollment of 235 students, growing to 300, Mission Grammar was the first school in the city of Boston to offer an infant, toddler, and elementary program under one roof. At Mission Grammar, the road to college starts at 3 months!
As an urban Catholic school, Mission Grammar enrolls its students primarily from Dorchester and Roxbury; many Mission Grammar families work in the Longwood Medical area. Over 90% of children at school are students of color, and over 70% of students come from low-income families.
We interviewed Ali Dutson, Mission Grammar’s principal, along with Beth Looney (Principal Fellow) and Zuleika Andrade (Director of Scholar and Family Services). In addition to the school’s move to remote learning, we wanted to learn more about social and emotional supports, particularly in the context of being a faith-based school.
Transition to Remote Learning
We have had two major phases of our remote learning plan. In the first phase, which took place over the first several weeks of remote learning, we prioritized family communication and need. We took an inventory of who needed various resources (technology being the most in demand) and made sure families and scholars had what they needed to learn remotely. We brought close to 70 chromebooks and iPads to scholars in our community. We then met as a faculty and mapped out three major expectations: (1) a Morning Message needs to be sent out to every family in the morning; this ties to a school practice at MG and allowed for a consistent touch point from the school to families; (2) a daily video needs to be sent out by every teacher every day; this varied from class to class depending on what was developmentally appropriate for the age group, but allowed for, in the early childhood classrooms, scholars to at least see their teachers faces each day, and in the older classes allowed for some intentional direct instruction academic work; and (3) a family communication touch point at least once a week; recognizing remote learning as an opportunity to push our family engagement even further, we wanted to be intentional and explicit that every family was checked in on each week (and most of our teachers went above and beyond, providing daily family check in’s).
In this first phase of remote learning, we really grew as a community - teachers got a more authentic look into their scholars’ lives by being able to see them in their homes, and families understood the academic work more explicitly having to step into the role of teaching alongside the teachers and the provided videos. Phase 1 was successful because our whole community jumped right in, dedicated themselves fully to making sure learning was still happening for all scholars, and truly embraced family engagement in a fuller way.
As quarantine and remote learning became the permanent norm for the rest of the school year, we evaluated our current systems and made adjustments for two major reasons: (1) because we had ensured that families had the technology needed for remote learning, we wanted to make sure that the learning we were providing was continuing to provide a high quality academic experience that families and scholars are used to, and (2) the Phase 1 model did not provide a system that was an adequately effective or sustainable use of teacher time. So in Phase 2, we switched over to having every class have some live instruction every day. This, again, looked different based off of what is developmentally appropriate; our early childhood classrooms enjoy Circle Time with their teachers or a live read aloud or group craft and our older grades are continuing with grade level work. Our teachers have consistently met in their Professional Learning Communities and have collaborated together to identify priority standards that are being taught in remote learning, noting which of the standards are most critical to master in each grade level so the scholars will be ready for the next academic year. To view more information on our remote learning and see our weekly wrap up videos click here!
Social and Emotional Supports
Our Mission Grammar community is so much more than a building - it is a family and our social and emotional learning is an essential part of our day to day interactions and growth. Our routines and implementation of Responsive Classroom and Pyramid Model are major components of our approach. The value of a handshake, a hug and personal check in is high at Mission Grammar and a primary part of our Culture of Achievement in all classes.
In addition to our robust school wide approaches, we offer a variety of services and interventions for our scholars. Our on-site Social Worker/Director or Scholar & Family Services provides ongoing individual counseling and social skills groups for scholars. She serves as our City Connects Coordinator through partnership with Boston College. BC’s City Connects model allows us to holistically assess every scholar's strengths and needs in the domains of family, academic, health, social/emotional/behavioral. As part of this model, the Whole Class Review allows for each scholar to be discussed and assessed in each domain. As a result of the Whole Class Review, scholars are tiered based on their needs and strengths which determines the level of needed intervention and support. The Individual Student Review allows for consultation and planning with caregivers, staff, and teachers to best support scholar needs. Scholars and families are linked to community partners/resources or on-site supportive services as needed.
During COVID-19, the Director of Scholar & Family Services is continuing daily social skills groups known as lunch bunch and once weekly individual counseling for scholars who have been referred by parents and teachers. Referral to community partners and resource navigation with families has continued on an as needed basis and as flagged by school administrators, parents and teachers. Services continue virtually through Zoom, Google Meet, and FaceTime. Appointment reminders and scheduling of individual and group services take place via phone calls and text messages. Morning prayer and meeting, weekly family coffee hour, school newsletters and social media posts all allow for reminders and promotion of supportive services available for scholars.
Throughout this time, families and teachers have been able to connect more deeply as partners in truly sharing in the empathy of roles and getting through this together. 100% of families were connected with weekly and engaged with teachers and staff - this was monitored on a tracker. Any contact from request for supplies to check in to homework help - anything- was captured in our tracker.
We have also been able to build relationships through our weekly coffee hours, sharing practices and discussing weekly topics. These sessions are attended by both families and teachers. Most recently, families have been weighing in and sharing thoughts as we prepare reopening plans. In these discussions, mental health has arisen as a major priority where we’ve been able to discuss strategies and ideas to support our scholars during re-entry.
With each class having live sessions of learning daily (even our infants and toddlers!), we have been able to implement new norms and embrace new ways to approach social and emotional learning through song, screen shares, games, and increased peer/teacher feedback. Incorporating the live sessions with our youngest learners has also relied a bit more on family participation in those interactions and that has been a wonderful benefit for us. Although these sessions are very short for our youngest scholars, having time to sing and interact with both your care-giver and your teacher is such a supportive developmental piece.
The challenges are real, but we are committed to our students to develop not just as learners, but as children and young adults.
Notes in the Margin
Double feature in open meetings this week:
The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education met Tuesday. Helpful Twitter thread. Lots of talk about how to reopen in September and funding. And MCAS is coming back next year.
Boston School Committee met Wednesday. Implementation of new high school standards (“MassCore”) was discussed, as well as a plan for high school redesign. This plan emphasizes adding grades and students to 5 schools that rank, on average, in the 4th percentile in the state.
A report that over 20% of Boston Public Schools students are not engaging in learning prompted questions and a response from the Superintendent. The story kept going with this op-ed.
You think the Globe’s profile of what it would take to reopen schools was sobering? Try reading through the 91 questions a New Jersey superintendent thought he would need to answer to “get started.” Or how LAUSD is already planning.
Assuming schools do reopen as one city councilor recommended, you can expect a lot of kids and teachers to still be absent, based on this poll.
Two BPS students will graduate with two diplomas this month.
A profile of teaching parents and remote learning, and, another.
A beloved Boston school leader passed away from cancer.
Remote learning is not just an issue in Boston - it is even harder in Gateway Cities.