On April 6th, the morning of the day I was to get my first shot, Ellie went back to school! Owen was next, on April 8th! Their return was both scary… and exciting. I was very nervous about it ahead of time – afraid of exposure, afraid of infection, especially as we are so close to getting vaccinated. It seemed silly to take risks now, when the vaccine is almost here. And it was also a lot of disruption for just two months of school, before summer vacation. But the state of California was putting pressure on the schools to re-open, and schools would have to pay for every day past April 1st that they remained closed. So, as the teachers and staff were all getting vaccinated, and kids were at low risk, and with masking and social distancing and exposure tracking in place at the school, the schools began to re-open. But… Ellie came home beaming after her first in-person day back at school! She’d had a great day. She reported that there were just 8 kids there, with their desks 6 feet apart, each with a Plexiglass shield, and all with iPads. The teacher sat up front with a plexiglass shield and a laptop, so that the teacher could teach to both the 8 students in the classroom and the other 24 who were attending on the laptop. She had social studies, science, and her jewelry elective, and had a GREAT time. She was so happy to be back, to see people in person, and to FINALLY get to meet her teachers in person. She reported that the social studies teacher was really on top of things, but the science teacher had them watch a video. Ellie got to make beads in jewelry class and she was absolutely delighted. So for Ellie, going back was a very positive experience. Just seeing other people in person, and being at the school, and seeing other students was great for her, even if the other student’s didn’t include her particular friends. Owen’s first day back was the very next day. His day was also good, though he enthused about it less than Ellie. He was quite bemused to finally see the teacher in person. He said, “I can see her feet!” and “she’s so tall!” which was a reminder of how disembodied the teachers had become during distance learning. The schools started with a hybrid model first: at the elementary school, half the students came on Monday and Tuesday (group A), while the other half (group B) did simultaneous distance learning. Group B came on Thursday and Friday while Group A did distance learning. Everybody stayed home on Wednesdays. Two kids in Owen’s class opted to continue with full-time distance learning, including Owen’s good friend Jake (which was understandable as his mom is battling breast cancer right now). But the rest of the class, about 30 students, returned in person, with about 15 in Group A and 15 in Group B. The classes were divided like this for a week or two, then the two groups were combined and they went to a full four days in person after Spring Break. Ellie’s class had a similar plan, with Group A (Mon-Tue), Group B (Th-Fr), and Group C (full-time distance learning). Groups A and B were combined in early May so that there were only two groups of students: one group attending in person four days a week (M, T, Th, Fr), and one group doing full-time remote learning. Ellie’s school was split pretty evenly, with about half returning to in-person school while the other half continued with distance learning. Her own friends had almost all opted to stay home. Lela, meanwhile, had opted to stay in full-time distance learning. She liked her setup at home, with her desk and garden nook, and she had a routine going that she was happy with. Unfortunately, Lela’s experience being a full distance student while the other half of the class returned in person was only okay. It was not as good as before the return, when everybody was in distance learning. For one, the teachers were now wearing masks, and that meant that they were harder to understand on the screen. For another, many of the students who also chose to remain home were not the most engaged students, and most of them chose to keep their cameras off, which was really off-putting. It’s hard to engage with a blank screen. So that is where we were in April, 2020. I started volunteering at the elementary school for lunch duty, so I got a peek into the return to school at Montclaire. The lunch setup was radically different from what it had been before the pandemic. Before the pandemic, the students ate in two shifts (grades 1-3, then grades 4-5) at a set of open air lunch tables under a roof. Each classroom got two or three tables, depending on classroom size. The kids either brought a lunch from home or got a hot lunch from the kitchen, then sat at their designated classroom table. When lunch break started, the younger students ate right away while the upper graders played, then halfway through they switched, and the younger students played will the upper graders ate. Then everyone went back to glass. The lunch duty volunteers’ jobs were to walk up and down the tables, opening juice boxes and containers, making sure the kids stayed seated and obeyed a basic set of civilized rules, like not throwing food or hitting each other. After school resumed, however, lunch looked very different. The entire blacktop was divided into groups using colored cones. There was one class per section. The lunch tables had been rearranged so that there were pairs of tables pressed together, and three seats were marked with blue masking tape 6 feet apart showing the kids where they could sit. There were three kids per table block, on one side only (nobody would be facing them). And because the students were so spread out, there was only room for one class at the coveted lunch tables. The rest of the school had to sit in the designated areas on the blacktop. Their lunch positions changed every week so that no class was stuck with a particularly good or bad spot, but they all got to experience all the spots. The lunch duty volunteers’ jobs how included making sure that the kids stayed masked unless they were actively eating, and that everybody stayed 6 feet apart. Then, once lunch was over, the volunteers circulated through the playground making sure each class stayed within its designated area, and kept their masks on. Lunch itself was much quieter than during normal times, because there were so few students eating close to each other. They were also better behaved because they were further apart – pushing and shoving was impossible. Recess continued to be a chore. That was my least favorite part, because it meant dealing with bad behaviors and complaints, which I found quite stressful. But I did it, and watched them like a hawk, and as a parent who had been at the school for ten years, I was quite confident and able to come down on problematic behavior quickly and firmly. I also had a pretty good nose for when trouble was afoot. And I learned very quickly, within a day, who the troublemakers were. So while I didn’t really enjoy it I was still quite effective at keeping the peace, settling disputes, and breaking up bad behavior. I also got to see Owen after his return to school. The first week or two were bumpy for him. Owen loved to play four square, but many of the kids cheated, or refused to follow the rules, and Owen had a hard time managing their bad behavior. He would lose his temper when kids cut into line or didn’t leave their square after a foul. On one occasion, one of the troublemakers broke the stick of another boy, and Owen went ballistic, yelling at the perpetrator that this stick was special to this kid and the bully had no right to break it. I was there for this, and after Owen stormed off I caught up to him and heard him out. I contacted the principal, explained the situation to her, and then left Owen to tell her what happened. I knew it could be socially damaging to Owen to have his mom closely involved. The situation worked out, though, as the principal talked to each of the boys involved. Owen later told me that me might have overreacted, and I agreed that he might have, but also praised him for reporting the incident to the adults so we could come in and help. It’s very important to build faith in the systm like this, so that Owen and other kids who speak up against bullying know that adults have their backs, and the bullies know that the adults will come down on them. Another day, one of the boys at four square just grabbed the ball and ran away with it. Owen roared and sped after this boy. I’d never seen him run so fast. He ran low to the ground and was very, very fast. He caught up to the perpetrator and that kid, seeing something in Owen’s face, decided to fold: he threw the ball to Owen, who caught it and without breaking stride he ran in a big curve and brought the ball back to the four square group. I was very proud of him – he had managed a badly-behaved kid by doing an end run, solving the problem himself, and restoring order and fairness to the group, without fighting with this kid or losing his cool. He just did what he thought was right without making anything worse. I was very proud of him. In other lunch duty observations, the first graders were particularly dependent over lunch. It took me a while to realize that it was because they’d left kindergarten in the spring, and were only coming back to school now, a year later. They’d never finished kindergarten and had ‘missed’ the first half of first grade, so that they were indeed less experienced and less independent than most kids at the end of first grade. I explained things to them, and listened to them, and helped them follow the rules. I circulated through the entire blacktop during lunch, walking through the different classes seated on the pavement, opening things, telling kids to sit further apart. The kids were generally pretty good, though there were a few troublemakers, with their associated fans, who tended to edge closer to each other and do other things they weren’t supposed to do. They could be openly defiant, too, so I had to engage and pick my battles carefully to make sure that I had the authority to make them back down. On the whole I was successful, and calling the principal in helped as well. The kids were all remarkably good at staying in their designated class areas and keeping their masks on. There were two boys, out of about 250, who routinely pulled their masks down, and I spent a fair amount of time telling them to pull their masks back up. But the other 248 complied quite well.