So this is not a popular opinion, but it is mine. I’m currently enjoying distance teaching.

Not all the admin led PD. Nor the endless admin led zoom meetings, countless emails that shouldn’t exist and the reply-alls that follow. Nor the struggles with zoom, connectivity, unpredictable wifi connections, and the added complications of green screens…But the hidden treasures.

In the old world, if I wanted to start the day with a hot cup of coffee, enjoyed in the quiet calm of the morning, I’d have to get up before 6 o’clock and rush (so almost never). Now I rise at 7, casually brew a pot (because I can now drink more than 1 cup) and snuggle in on the couch joined for quiet reading time by my youngest, almost daily.

In the old world, I’d have to wait until dinner time to see the smiling faces of my children. I’d rush home at lunch time (when I got a lunch break) to walk my dog so she wasn’t stuck in her crate for 10 hours straight. And at the end of my day, I felt dead on on my feet trying to throw together dinner. Now, I see my children several times a day (we are in our individual zooms all day after all); I can serve us hot lunch (and actually eat it) and my dog has rarely been stuck in her crate in 8 months! I can walk her unhurried between zooms (and lesson planning and report writing and all the other ‘virtual’ paperwork that is part of teaching)!

Another silver lining, my colleagues and I have never been closer. We are a rock solid team! We do our own things but we collaborate way more then we use to. In the old world, we would chat, exchange small talk, offer advice and resources when asked, but we un-noticingly spent our days holed up between our own classroom walls. Now that our classroom walls are relocated in our homes, we chat via zoom, texts, and emails (we actually want to read) multiple times daily. We’ve traveled down rabbit holes exploring new technology, new apps, just plain newness and learned from each other. It’s refreshing and is keeping us all sane.

There is a lot of negative out there right now. And not everything about remote learning/remote teaching is rainbows and unicorns, but there is some good. I only highlighted a few of the silver linings I’m grateful for and I will continue to be grateful for while we navigate this new, temporary world. 10 years from now this will only be a memory, and I hope to remember more good then bad.

So as the sun sets on another Rona caused wacky day, I pour a big glass of red wine and reflect on silver linings ❤️