Tech Savvy: Persisting and Making a Difference, Virtually
Reading Specialist Mary
Anne Gilles will tell you
that teachers needed
one quality to make it through
2020: persistence.
A teacher at Washington Middle
School, she helped students adjust
to remote instruction in March, but
expected they would encounter
pandemic fatigue by the fall. She
and her counterpart, Algebra 1
Teacher/Math Improvement
Specialist Josh Wilson, knew the
increased potential for students to
slip through the cracks following a
long summer.
“At the beginning of the school
year, we identified students who
would need consistent help and
worked with parents to process
requests for assistance for their
children,” noted Gilles.
Many of these students had
connectivity issues, were at
home alone, or tasked to care
for their younger siblings while
their parents worked. “We had
concerns about their ability to
connect and commit to school.
There’s only so much you can
control as a teacher in this
situation,” said Wilson, who also
serves as the coordinator of
13 ACCESS ACM / Engaging Ideas
Washington Middle’s After School
Program.
They reached out to ACM
Associate Professors Robin Seddon
and Kate Tummino. Seddon, chair
of the college’s Teacher Education
program, and Tummino, assistant
program chair and a former
Allegany County Public Schools
(ACPS) teacher, had placed student
interns at Washington Middle for
at least twelve years and were
familiar faces at the school. “ACM
tutors and Kate Tummino are
typically in our school twice a week
during co-curricular period to
help students who are struggling
academically,” explained Wilson.
“While we originally started
tutoring as part of the After School
program, we moved to working
with students during the school
day to reach more students in
need,” said Seddon. “Teaching and
tutoring online is not a perfect way
to provide support for children, but
with Kate’s leadership, I think both
the Washington Middle students
as well as our ACM students have
benefitted tremendously.”
Seddon and Tummino took their
own students to remote instruction
last spring. Not wanting them to
miss an opportunity to help ACPS
students and their families, they
quickly organized thirty student
interns who were enrolled in
assistantships and literacy courses
to record short YouTube videos. The
videos focused on wellness-focus
activities like nature walks, games
and physical activities as well as
skills practice behaviors like reading
aloud, playing math games, and
visiting online reading sites.
The ACM professors reimagined
student internship experiences for
the fall 2020 semester. Beginning
in September, ten students
enrolled in assistantships created
weekly literacy activity videos
through a platform called Loom, a
video messaging tool. The students
read books to elementary students
and offered related skill building
activity ideas. The videos were
shared with teachers at John
Humbird, Parkside, and Cash Valley
elementary schools.
To help middle school students
at Washington Middle, ACM’s
students were presented with a
tougher challenge: virtual tutoring.
Seddon and Tummino arranged
for eleven virtual interns to be
available daily for Gilles and
Wilson’s students. Tutors chose
their own tutoring locations (an
improvised home office, a private
room in the College Library, or
an empty classroom) where they
would be virtually monitored and
supported by their instructor.
“After connecting to the platform,
a larger ‘room’ was created online,
and we created breakout rooms for
each tutor and student. Sometimes
a pair of tutors would partner
together. I listened in for the safety
of all the students and tutors. I was
also there to offer help if tutors
got stuck on a certain problem or
issue,” said Tummino.
The tutors met with the middle
school students (grades 6 to 8)
in one or two-hour sessions. It
wasn’t a perfect process. Although
parents requested tutoring for their