The COVID-19 crisis has caused unprecedented disruption to schools, bringing a fractured landscape of reopened classrooms, distance learning, and hybrid models that combine both.
While it’s tough to find silver linings in the pandemic, I think there may be one for the American education system: an opportunity not only to better leverage digitization to ensure the best outcomes for students, but to reimagine many aspects of pedagogy entirely.
“In chaos, there is fertility,” the author Anais Nin wrote, and I believe COVID-19 could be the impetus for long-overdue changes in everything from teaching methods to school schedules. This could improve education long after the pandemic has subsided.
I’ve been in the education field for 27 years and have traveled to schools all around the world. While digitization is taking hold in many communities, access to and integration of digital resources is thus far inconsistent.
Meanwhile, many cling to traditional teaching models that prevent students from learning in new ways and archaic practices such as allowing athletics and a need for childcare to determine school schedules, which is the main reason the typical school day starts at 8 a.m. when research shows adolescents don’t really wake up until 9.
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