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I Said, Hey... What's Going On?


Dolfan in NYC
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12 hours ago, Southside Jim said:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost.com/2020/05/16/people-flock-to-nyc-area-bars-beaches-as-quarantine-fatigue-intensifies/amp/

 

Not sure why some of you insist on turning this into a political issue. 

 

Seems to me like EVERYBODY is tired of "shelter in place," regardless of their beliefs.

I'm tired of it but I understand it and will continue to stay the fuck home.  There's a difference.  You know who just can't deal with being unable to do something enjoyable that they want to do and ends up throwing a shitfit when faced with disappointment?  Children.  And honestly, that's speaking ill of children, because these people are far worse.  I have a five year old who will chill the fuck out once I explain why she can't have something she wants right away.

Honestly, part of me doesn't care and just wants to see Darwinism do its thing.  The only problem with that is that these morons go out to restaurants, movies, protests, circle jerks, whatever, then go back to their communities and end up getting smart people sick.

Edited by Technico Support
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Just mixed up my text message conversations and sent my boss an anecdote about Bette Davis hating Larry Cohen, and that, “Barbara Carrera and Colleen Camp were grade A 80s foxes.”

 

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I see things are going well in here so everyone settle down so you can consider that the only warning

Meanwhile - because I am not posting it in like 5 threads.

New York, California and Texas all basically opened their doors to pro sports resuming within the next few weeks (usual caveats were in place with all of their announcements)

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So the 7 year old has been remote schooling (second grade) for maybe a month now, probably just a little less. For English she's had this infernal poetry unit where they have to write a different poem every week and it's like pulling teeth. It's brutal. No one in the household has much use for poetry in the first and as a two week unit, it would have been fine but it just went on and on. So today, we knew she had to do one, but she's just sitting on the couch after finishing all the other work, and I ask her "Hey? What's up with the poem?" and she responds "I sent a message to my teacher so I don't have to do it." So this has me suspicious on just what the message was. She finally tells us that she told her teacher that we didn't like the unit so she didn't have to do it. 

I logged in to see what she wrote and here it is:

Quote

"poem about a food

My family and me couldn't think of a poem to wright. They don't like how long this is going on for. Sincerely Cassandra" 

We've been playing damage control since.

Edited by Matt D
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I feel you @Matt D

The remote schooling can be fucking brutal. For my older son it's been kinda hands off, but for my kindergartener it's requiring a bit of effort. All of his worksheets are done on a site where the child has to make a text box MSPaint style every time they want to fill in an answer. The text box always appears in the center of the browser, so you have to click to open it. Move it to the line you want to answer. Resize it because it's so big that you wouldn't be able to fit other answers that are near by, and then write your answer. Now ask a 5 year old to do this. For a few weeks I had to sit there and do it for him because all he was using was a laptop with no mouse. My wife finally buckled and gave up her mouse for work so he could do it a little faster.

Yesterday it was a grid sheet that had boxes 1-100, with dozens of numbers of missing. the point was to fill in the boxes in order. I didn't realize he was doing this until he was almost finished. I would have just copied the sheet on a piece of paper and had him fill it in - then take a picture of that. That process would have been quicker than the one I just described above.

We still have about 20 days left.

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I feel for y'all whose kids still have that many days to go. Thankfully my daughter (4th grade, just turned 10) is done tomorrow. She normally would be going until the first week of June. Still, it has sucked at times. I don't feel that the curriculum has been that great for math, obviously music and arts is almost nonexistent, but at least for English they did a unit on The Westing Game. She was initially very excited because we read the Westing Game with her around a year ago and she liked it a lot. Then all of the COVID shit hit and discussions wound up happening via Zoom. It still wasn't all that bad.

What was bad were the things my daughter had to write about and she would sit there locked up not knowing what to write. I work from home so I would go up and help her from time to time, but it's tough because I can't just tell her what to write or how to write it. She's not going to learn anything that way. I also have control issues because I come from an editing background at my work and I want to edit everything. So I just sit there and see what she wrote and tell myself to not take control, don't edit, see if she does it, and then talk it over afterwards. The problem is that my daughter is so incredibly hard on herself whenever she doesn't immediately know the right answer or have the best thing to write out and it sucks watching her struggle. We made it through some tough times, but it hasn't been fun. Thankfully my boss is more than understanding because she has one kid in college, another in middle school, and a younger one that goes to my daughter's school and so we're all juggling work/life balance.

I will say that if nothing else, I've been incredibly proud of how much my daughter has been a self-starter with elearning. She gets up between 7 and 8, opens up her laptop, gets to work, stops at around 9 to make a smoothie for herself, has breakfast, gets back to schoolwork, and so on. I kinda wish she would also take a shower and get dressed first thing in the morning, but I'll let that slide for how much she has been independent since elearning started.

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3 hours ago, Craig H said:

I will say that if nothing else, I've been incredibly proud of how much my daughter has been a self-starter with elearning.

Same here. My kids wake up, work out, do their school work and then try not to drive themselves, eachother or their parents crazy doing the same shit every day. Really proud of them for trooping through this. My 5 year old is the biggest extrovert in the family so he's dying not being able to play with his friends. 

One cute story is his Kindergartner Teacher came by our house and left a note taped to a tree outside. So he was able to see her from the balcony and go out and read it. Thought that was super sweet. You can definitely see the toll on some of these teachers who really take this personally, and feel like they're letting the kids down by not being able to work with them directly. 

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Our 4 year old is handling this way fucking better than I am, to be perfectly frank. Every couple of days he lets me know "When coronavirus is done going around, we should have a party and invite..." and then he lists basically every family member he can remember. Meanwhile, I am losing my shit because there seems to be no end in sight, and the only things I hear are about "reopening society", except people keep fucking dying, so maybe we back off all that horseshit for a while, eh? And fuck, I live in California, where I thought more folks would be of my same mind!! Whatever, I just need to be more like the little one. Read less news, smoke more dope, that has been my coping mechanism. It hella works, everyone should try it.

His school is going really well, although he goes to a private preschool, so we aren't getting the same kind of support that we would from a school district, his teacher is the shit, and has been banging out circle time videos every day for him to do, and she hooked us up with a bunch of sensory-type projects and whatnot like a month ago. Between those things, and our internet searches to find workbooks and learning projects and whatnot, we feel like the education is happening just like it should, but we feel bad that the social aspect of going to school and seeing your friends every day is gone.

I feel like our oldest (almost 11, finishing 5th grade) is really lacking in support from his teacher. I have had a few conversations with other parents, and their experience is vastly different with their children's educators. Lots of contact via videoconferencing, emails to go over what is being learned. We don't really have any issue with it because he is such fantastic student and a voracious reader and learner in other ways, but it is disheartening to see this person tasked with the bulk of my child's book-y type education have so little concern for the people in her class.

I have been bad about the PE thing for the last few days, because every time the boys and I would go outside so we could play catch, or skate or ride bikes, every kid on the block is looking out the window to try to be out and about together. I have made my feelings known to the parents of these children, but no one seems to give a fuck that I want to keep our households as distant as possible.  So to combat that fact, I've been slacking on just letting them go out front. We will take walks at night so the dogs can also get out, but I feel like I'm being a tyrant because I keep on stopping them from good times with their buddies in the neighborhood. However, my wife is a straight up gangster that knew how bothered I am by all that, and she ordered a 14 foot trampoline for our backyard. So we got that setup on Saturday, and the kids have gotten to be outside and active in a way that keeps people the fuck away from us. Thank fuck I have a partner that understands my dumb brain and how to help it be less twisted into knots.

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5 hours ago, Matt D said:

So the 7 year old has been remote schooling (second grade) for maybe a month now, probably just a little less. For English she's had this infernal poetry unit where they have to write a different poem every week and it's like pulling teeth. It's brutal. No one in the household has much use for poetry in the first and as a two week unit, it would have been fine but it just went on and on. So today, we knew she had to do one, but she's just sitting on the couch after finishing all the other work, and I ask her "Hey? What's up with the poem?" and she responds "I sent a message to my teacher so I don't have to do it." So this has me suspicious on just what the message was. She finally tells us that she told her teacher that we didn't like the unit so she didn't have to do it. 

I logged in to see what she wrote and here it is:

We've been playing damage control since.

Just have her write whatever and then tell the teacher it's Vogon poetry.

Any teacher worth their salt will know what she's talking about.

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I graduated on the 5th. Ironically its the only graduation I actually cared about(I did my high school for mom, ditto my BA) so of course we didn't have it). There's the option to do the winter or next year, so I'll do one of those. So I'm officially a double alumni of Idaho State, with a BA in history, and a MAT(masters of arts; teaching). I've been "teaching" my classes online, which since most of my kids lack internet access, consisted of brief meetings(mainly for checking in and moral purposes) and me giving out worksheets and word searches. I'm looking for another job, but this one is at least looking like I might get a pay raise this next year. My principal gave me a good end of year review, with an average of 2.5( out of 4), with 2 being "basic" and 3 being proficient. Not bad for the landmine I stepped in taking it. I know I'm very lucky to have the job and be in here in south east Idaho, where we have basically missed the COVID thing.They have all precautions in place, but Idaho is in the process of reopening. . . .

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On 5/18/2020 at 3:08 PM, RIPPA said:

I see things are going well in here so everyone settle down so you can consider that the only warning

Meanwhile - because I am not posting it in like 5 threads.

New York, California and Texas all basically opened their doors to pro sports resuming within the next few weeks (usual caveats were in place with all of their announcements)

I just can't see any pro leagues starting without safe guards in place, and I'm not sure that's possible right now.(Is that too political? Don't mean it to be)

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18 hours ago, jaedmc said:

 You can definitely see the toll on some of these teachers who really take this personally, and feel like they're letting the kids down by not being able to work with them directly. 

Thank you for saying that. I was going to comment on your previous post because when I saw what they were setting up your kg'er with, it made me upset. Then I realised I don't know what that teacher is going through, how much support they're getting in assigning age-appropriate, relevant homework, nor what they're juggling in terms of student numbers or workload.

Because it is draining....I spend 3-4 hours prepping for and running my live classes, another hour or so creating/assigning work, couple hours on individual feedback and grading, and then recording/planning for the next day's lesson. The whole time I'm second guessing myself, wondering if what I am doing is worth the time I'm putting in to it. It's demoralising and frustrating and I think I'm coping better than a lot of my peers. I know teachers who absolutely kill it in the classroom and dedicate so much of their life to their students that are just struggling in the current situation. 

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1 minute ago, Setsuna said:

Thank you for saying that. I was going to comment on your previous post because when I saw what they were setting up your kg'er with, it made me upset. Then I realised I don't know what that teacher is going through, how much support they're getting in assigning age-appropriate, relevant homework, nor what they're juggling in terms of student numbers or workload.

Because it is draining....I spend 3-4 hours prepping for and running my live classes, another hour or so creating/assigning work, couple hours on individual feedback and grading, and then recording/planning for the next day's lesson. The whole time I'm second guessing myself, wondering if what I am doing is worth the time I'm putting in to it. It's demoralising and frustrating and I think I'm coping better than a lot of my peers. I know teachers who absolutely kill it in the classroom and dedicate so much of their life to their students that are just struggling in the current situation. 

His teacher is really really trying. I don't think the set up is her fault. They're using a site called SeeSaw, and it just leaves a lot to be desired for younger kids. But she checks in, she's leaves personalized video messages. She makes videos doing the daily rituals(good morning songs, what's today's date, etc.) just like they did before all this, and she does it every day. But you can tell there's still this massive disconnect between "doing the work" and "Is this even working?" I feel bad for her. The set up, I believe is a school decision to keep it streamlined for the younger kids, but I think they just choose poorly or the teachers don't have enough time to learn it in order to implement it better(if there is a "better"). I don't blame the teachers for that at all.

He's in a zoom meeting with her and his classmates as I type this. People make fun of old people on zoom, but if you want to make a horror movie - make it about a teacher trying to corral a large group 5-6 year olds on a conference call.

My older son, 6th grade, he's in google class room and it's really like whatever. He's had two video conferences the whole time with his homeroom, and I think he looks at it like a hassle. He just wants to sit down, do the assignments and be done. I only push for the meetings so that he can see people, but he's an introvert like me and his mom so I don't push that hard. He starts working after he exercises around 10am and is done with it by Noon. Then he works on the coding/typing stuff I have for him. But he's done with school stuff in 2 hours easy. Today he was done in about an hour. I'm not worried that he's not doing it right or that he's in trouble. My kid is pretty smart. But it's a little weird that he seemingly has less work than his 5 year old brother. And really, it doesn't even matter. All he had to do was turn some work in for this quarter and he passes. He could quit right now and pass every class.

I just realized it's May 20th, and we've been doing this since mid-March.

I don't look at people in other states going to bars and shit with hatred or anger. I look at them with jealousy.

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My brother is a kindergarten teacher. He starts his day around 8am and due to everyone’s schedule being different (parents in essential worker positions) he gets emails and video calls until around 8pm. Understandably, parents are worried about their kids not getting individual treatment and worry they’re getting lost in the mess of it all which leads to more emails and video calls. He’s the most upbeat guy and a great teacher, even winning district awards, and loves his job. Everyone seems to really appreciate him. But when he’s done for the day he is strung out and stressed. 

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My sister teaches third grade.  She's seems just as stressed out while teleworking as she does on any other day.  Conferences, planning, scheduling, giving a shit about kids whose parents don't seem to give a shit about.  

Politicians eager to slash education budgets really have their fucking priorities mixed up.

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This is mental health week in the UK. Look out for you and those around you. Be kind. Care is crucial. I wasn't sure whether to talk about mine here as there's still the stigma of mental health issues but I trusted in the DVDVR MB family so took the plunge. Few know about them so please that info private to here. Thank you xxx.

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Washington state school leaders are talking about weird shit like rotating kids into certain school buildings that can be easily disinfected for a few weeks of classroom study, than rotating them out for a few weeks of remote learning while another group of kids rotates into the buildings.

 

Most parent groups are all "fuck that shit" becuase they won't be able to babysit their kids if they are back at work, and lots of the poorer, rural districts couldn't afford it, or their students couldn't afford high-speed Interent or iPads.

 

In the end, I think it'll probably end up with kids going back to school as normal.  

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On 5/7/2020 at 8:02 AM, Control said:

Thanks. Very similar story here. The rest of the litter is spoken for, unfortunately. There should be a new litter (different mother, obviously) born in a couple of weeks, so the end result is probably just a delay of a month or so. However, everything happening while on lockdown is making it harder. We’re currently in the process of cancelling all of our reservations for our 10-year anniversary trip, which would have had us in France and Spain for three weeks. 

Aaaand that litter is way overdue and the breeder is suggesting it’s probably a false pregnancy. This news comes right after my wife started to turn the corner on her depression. Fuck this absolute dogshit year.

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I hope you get your pet sooner rather than later @Control.

Side note, fucking dog shit will not make depression go away. I assume. This has been a PSA.

 

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