8/19/2023 0 Comments Lausd virtual academy"It's different here because you get one-on-one, and in a school there are many kids and you don't understand sometimes," said Diaz.Ħ50 students are enrolled in the academy. Instead of sitting in a classroom with his peers, David Diaz, a ninth grader, wants to attend Coava. The laptops are on their way - but Beutner said Friday that the district has not secured a deal for more hotspots.LOS ANGELES This year, the Los Angeles Unified School District is offering the entire ninth and tenth grade curriculum through Coava, the City of Angels Virtual Academy. Zwiers isn't certain how many of his students will have difficulty, but LAUSD officials have estimated that one in four students lack internet access at home.īeutner had pleaded with state officials for emergency funding to help pay for more laptops and hotspots from mobile internet providers that students could take home. "Most students," Zwiers said, "have a phone with some internet access where they can access Schoology and Schoology assignments."īut OneNote, he said, could quickly max out a student's data plan if they don't have a solid internet connection at home. The one flaw in Zwiers' plans? Internet access. But in a distance-learning scenario, that chat feature will be invaluable, Zwiers said. Under normal circumstances, OneNote's chat feature is a liability when used in classrooms middle schoolers, after all, aren't always on-task. On that platform, Zwiers said he can convene students for large group discussions while also tracking their progress on individual assignments. With the closure, he's now going to ramp up his use of an app called Microsoft OneNote. This year, Zwiers is already piloting a new curriculum that's already entirely digital. We want to keep things going remotely so that we can keep them motivated." "What I don't want to do is give them a big stack of papers and say, 'Start working on this until we come back,'" he said, "because I think a lot of students would get stuck and frustrated. Zwiers hopes to come as close as he can to recreating the structure of a classroom environment in a virtual setting. "We're going to be taxing the bandwidth of the systems we used in a way that was never intended," he said. He's worried less about kids failing to master Schoology, and more that Schoology might break down on teachers or students during the closure. Smiley said his class materials, including textbooks, have been "completely digital" for the last few years. "The vast majority of students throughout the district are in that position where they are using that every day in at least some of their classes." " is what we use every day," said Smiley. Already, many students and parents regularly log on to the secure website to check grades and download assignments. LAUSD has been ramping up its use of a "learning management system" called Schoology for the last five years. For them to be told, 'Look guys, I don't know what's going to happen, so prepare for the worst,' it was really disappointing." Lemos worries a closure longer than two weeks will hurt these projects. They're expected to film these projects - using professional actors and high-end production equipment - over spring break. Kennedy High School in Granada Hills are assigned to complete a 20-minute film. Other teachers are bracing for more-detrimental disruptions.Īaron Lemos' seniors in the film program at John F. "We have to do something different because of a crisis," said Zwiers, "but this is an opportunity to try something that might work." He's treating the shutdown as an unexpected golden opportunity for LAUSD to experiment with online learning platforms. One of those teachers - Smiley, an eighth-grade social studies teacher at Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies - said his principal asked well before Friday morning's announcement for teachers to be ready with their distance learning materials by week's end.Ī second teacher, Walter Reed Middle School math instructor John Zwiers, got similar "be-prepared-just-in-case" instructions from his principal. Three teachers from across LAUSD told KPCC/LAist they received directives from their principals to be ready - just in case of a coronavirus-related closure - to either deliver lessons online or send printed course materials home with students. Schools have been preparing for the switch as well.
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