BY DUNA STRACHAN, M.Ed. Our Pandemic Story
The sunshine filters across the glistening beads as a
student carefully counts them. Another student is on the patio
applying strokes of paint to a new design. Two more children
work in the garden, and several sit at separate tables, intent on
their work. It is a typical day in an Early Childhood class, except
that these children are wearing face masks. It is July 2020, and we
are in the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Our school in Park City, Utah, was shut down for ten weeks
through the spring. Teachers worked industriously to provide
work for students at home during the shutdown, but we weren’t
sure that our students, who are mostly under the age of 6, got as
much out of the packets, emails, slide shows, video links, Zoom
meetings, and Google Classrooms as we had hoped. So, we
were determined to offer what they needed most – time in our
prepared environment.
Our school in Park City, Utah, was shut down
for ten weeks through the spring.
Our whole faculty spent the ten weeks of shutdown carefully
planning. Through a series of emails, Zoom meetings, phone
calls, Google docs, and texts, we began to sort out the best
way to proceed. Not only were there new protocols to adopt,
but also new employment considerations, government hoops
to jump through, and all the discussions on how to maintain
Montessori philosophy and pedagogy under such dire
circumstances. Our local and global Montessori communities
provided a daily influx of support and ideas. Our task was to sort
out the useful items between our small faculty and administration
team and determine how best to apply them.
Our School Director, Leah Linebarger, got right to work
with the local health department on a task force focused on
establishing new protocols during the pandemic. This provided
the groundwork for how we would proceed. Our Administrator,
Bruce King, found sorting the details of employment law a
full-time job as he diligently searched for the best ways to support
our faculty. Our Utah Montessori Council (UMC) shared
precious documents, websites, and platforms as each school
crafted our path forward. UMC Administrator Teas moved
from once-a-month elegant tea parties to twice-per-month
VOLUME 22 ISSUE 4 • 2020 | WWW.MONTESSORI.ORG/IMC | ©MONTESSORI LEADERSHIP ��
/IMC
