The sounds of caroling, muffled by face masks, echoed through the halls of Dora Erickson Elementary School on Thursday morning.
Instead of having a school assembly or individual visits from Santa Claus to each classroom, the holiday program was held entirely online. Students from Dora Erickson, Westside Elementary School and the districtâs online elementary program all connected to the video call at the same time. They sang in their classrooms or alone in their bedrooms as the school prepared for Santa to step into the office and greet them.
Bobbi Rooneyâs sixth-grade class only had half the number of students she taught in past years. Sheâs spent the last four months working around the inability to read her studentâs facial expressions or getting them to participate in online work. But for subjects that directly related to the coronavirus pandemic, her students were as engaged as they had ever been.