EL Specialists Teach a La Cart(e)

Early Learning specialists have redirected their traditional teaching spaces to meet their students’ needs during the school’s response to the global pandemic. In the past, a class might contain 18 to 20 students; this year, each EL cohort is much smaller. The specialists deliver the same lessons to all students, incorporating a steady dose of love and kindness to sustain the traditional connections that teachers in EL are celebrated for maintaining. 

While music specialist Linda Floyd often rolls her materials into classrooms on a mobile cart, she also takes advantage of the fall weather by teaching teach older students how to play the recorder outside. She can also be found instructing online students from a perch in front of a computer in the erstwhile music room. 

The music room has become a shared office and planning space among Mrs. Floyd and the two Spanish teachers, Sandra Leon-Cone and Gissella Diaz-Williamson. The two Spanish teachers share hyflex duties for Kindergarten, first, and third grades. They teach students in second, third, and fourth grades synchronously, meaning there are cohorts of on-campus students and a separate cohort of students who are learning off campus. For these on-screen synchronous Spanish classes, Mrs. Diaz-Williamson “meets” her students in the Portal; Mrs. Leon-Cone sees her students in the science room. 

Kinetic Wellness teacher Barb Stinson has yielded the gym to the ML and UL Kinetic Wellness classes. She meets her elementary students on the playground, in the Next Stage, and on the Upper Fields when they are not in use by ML for lunch and recess.

The Atrium hosts a variety of meetings throughout the day, while librarian Steve Bartl takes his books into individual classrooms for reading instruction. Counselor Lynn Mandelbaum continues her practice of meeting students in their classrooms for SEL lessons, as well. 

Art teacher Carmen Gonzalez utilizes a variety of locales, rolling a cart of materials for younger students into their classrooms at the “top of the hall” and teaching older students in the art classroom. 

Imagine the planning and collaboration that the delivery of the EL specialists’ instruction requires - it is indeed à la cart(e)!