By Alanna LaDeaux
Edmond Santa Fe High School
On an average day, most students wake up and get ready to go to school, but COVID-19 changed all that, leaving students at home with parents and making online learning the norm. Students had to adapt quickly, and the average day turned into opening a laptop for class instead of going to school.
Oklahoma teachers and students were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic when the school year was interrupted by school closures followed by mask mandates and social distancing. Beginning in 2020, the pandemic interrupted three school semesters, affecting school in spring and fall 2020 and carrying into spring 2021.
While some schools had the resources to adapt immediately, others struggled to accommodate students with technology and learning styles. The different methods schools used to accommodate students ranged from totally online learning to hybrid classes and A/B schedules where only half the students at a time were in the school building.
Abbey Kupec, a geometry and algebra teacher at Norman High School, said she realized early that teaching math online would be difficult.
“Geometry in particular is a subject that my students struggle to comprehend,” Kupec said. “I changed a lot of hands-on stuff (such as) activity, group work (and) partner work, so that they would bounce their knowledge off of a peer. Sometimes that helps them understand it a little better, and we didn’t get to do that.”
While teachers struggled to figure out activities and ways to keep students engaged, students had similar challenges.
Jaisa Gardner, a sophomore at Deer Creek High School, had to adapt to in-person and online instruction where she said her biggest problem was motivation and staying on task.
“I’m a pretty visual learner,” Gardner said. “I ask a lot of questions for a new topic, so I think having to be at home limited me to the resource of my teacher.”
As the pandemic dragged on, both teachers and students found ways to succeed in the new learning environment.
Although students struggled with the change to online learning, many teachers found ways to accommodate students so they wouldn’t fall behind. For Gardner, that meant reaching out in ways she might not have before.
“There was a time when I wasn’t at school for a little bit,” Gardner said. “That was a very negative thing that happened for my learning ability. I had emailed teachers and . . . a lot of them set up one-on-one Zoom classes to go over what we had been learning.”
Olivia Abdalla is a junior at Holland Hall, a private school in Tulsa. She had a different experience than most students during the pandemic.
“Holland Hall is very privileged in the sense that it had the resources to do what it wanted to do,” Abdalla said.
Abdalla said Holland Hall provided resources to make sure students were well-equipped for the pandemic. The school provided MacBooks, outdoor classrooms and accommodated students who were unable to be in class.
“Our school’s policy this year was that if you were being quarantined, you had to go online,” Abdalla said. “Even if you had COVID, you were still going to join via Google Meet.”
Though Abdalla’s school was well equipped in terms of continuing instruction without interruption, the students still craved human interaction.
“As humans it is our nature to be involved and to interact with each other,” Abdalla said. “So, when that is taken away from you, I feel like when you get it back you don’t ever want it to go away.”
As students and teachers look to the 2021-22 school year, some are apprehensive, but nearly all are certain that a better school year is ahead.
“I am feeling excited going into next year,” Kupec said. “I am very optimistic and looking forward to a more ‘normal’ year. I am hopeful that my classroom will look and feel like it did before the pandemic.”
