This year started like no other. When I last saw my students in March it was a blur of checkouts and packing. Students thought we were having an extended spring break.They brought home packets of work they would return in three weeks when we were back in class. The pandemic had other plans. The remainder of our school year was spent remote without Zoom calls, video taped instruction, and inadequate closure. 5 1/2 months later students return to different classrooms, different teachers, complicated routines focused on distancing, hand hygiene, and masks. Each child processed the time apart differently. For some, they relished learning from home and were disappointed to return to the classroom. For others, parents had filled the time with trips, outdoor play dates, and home enrichment. They were ready to come back in a mindset similar to every fall. For yet a third group, parents had been quite restrictive and months passed seeing only siblings and occasionally the grocery store clerk. They were hungry for contact, fresh faces, and some sense of normalcy. My job, as a librarian who sees every student in the building is to help rebuild a community out of disparity.
Historically, I connect with students through read alouds, readers advisory, and check out. In a typical year I would start with a shared reading experience. This year I struggled to recreate the intimacy of the story rug in a socially distanced classroom. I saw some students in half-populated homerooms. Others were in extension spaces with up to 120 bodies socially distanced in a gym or cafeteria. About 15% of my students are logging into learn virtually from home. In every place and space I needed my students to feel welcomed. Adding to the challenge, my administration closed the library, decided no print items would be permitted to circulate, and that I would teach library from a cart, or more precisely a red radio flyer wagon.
To try to rebuild community among my middle and upper grades, my students in grades 3 through 8 shared a common read aloud. I selected Jacqueline Woodson and Rafael Lopez 2018 book The Day You Begin. Because I was reading to students in a variety of spaces and in groups of different sizes, I chose to record myself reading the book and inserted photos of select illustrations into the video using WeVideo software. Depending on the size of the group, I projected my reading or used a shared screen on Zoom. A brief note here: I am not a lawyer, and I am not advising you use my method of sharing. I tried to balance Fair Use with the logistical needs of my setting. I did not post my video publicly. Our school owned the copy of the book I read from. I stored it on my school Google Drive account. The link was only shared with my remote learners. The video will be removed from my drive at the conclusion of this unit. I was present with the students viewing at school. Penguin Random House has extended use for the prerecording of their materials through December 31, 2020 for virtual story time.
Prior to beginning to read, I provided a brief introduction or reintroduction to the concept of symbolism. I told students we would be looking for symbols in the story and to think about them as we encountered art that might be symbolic. I also did a 30 second refresher for middle school on the terms motif, rising action, climax, and falling action. I also told them that when they shared observations I would be looking for text evidence, and that their answers could in in the form of the words or the art. I did not read the book straight through, rather, I built in pauses in my recording at critical intervals for discussion. Everything we talked about started with this classic visual thinking strategy question “What do you notice in this illustration?”
The students just wowed me with their insights. Our discussions ranged from background colors, body language, when and why the illustrator crossed the gutter of the book with the art, what might have happened to the boy who looked at his reflection in the water (part of the class believes he is the student we see on the rug later, the remainder do not), why were not only three different objects rulers , but why did each one use a different unit of measure. Why is not only the climax a double page spread but also the falling action.The symbolism of the ruler alone had at least 6 different explanations students came up with that reverberated with me as true. Some small details stood out to students such as the books with flowers pouring form them are both purple.
I followed up the reading by creating a character trait web for Angelina using the example from Sara K Ahmed’s book Being the Change as my inspiration. If students did not insert race in their characteristics, I did and explained that race is something we are allowed to talk about together adding that we will always do so respectfully honoring the wonderful uniqueness of each person. We then went around the room sharing what we each had in common with Angelina. I used my shared traits of Angelina as the starting point for creating a character trait web of myself as a model. Students could ask follow up questions or share what they had in common with me. This also allowed me to model model language that says I would not like to answer that question about myself right now but I would talk to them later when it felt like a better time or setting. Grades 6-8 are creating character trait webs of themselves which we will incorporate into a word cloud and a writing activity. I truly believe our shared read aloud and webs of experience, ethnicity and interests will help form a new school culture of community in this most unusually distanced year.