I have also seen/heard of children being too sad to Zoom. I have been on furlough but have chosen to attend my class Zoom meetings to still connect with my students, even though I am not the one leading the meeting, so I don't really have any control of the content, number of meetings, etc. I have talked to a couple of other furloughed teachers at our school and one of them told me their 4 year old told her she was too sad to attend. During the first couple of weeks of zoom, there was one little girl who cried the whole time. She was seeing kids in the classroom and was wondering why she couldn't be there. We had originally had 2 Pre-K classrooms but due to most students choosing distance learning, there was only one class needed. She didn't like that some of the kids that would normally have been in my class were now in her classroom. She would cry and say, "You aren't in the right class." To me it seemed that covid-19 had turned her life upside down and seeing things different at school was just too much for this particular child. It seems totally understandable to me. As an adult, it has been hard to deal with all the changes, so I think we really have to try to understand what children are going through. I am very sad myself after a Zoom call. There is another furloughed teacher that I have talked with and we have similar emotions. It is hard for us to hear the kids say, "I love you. Can you come back today?" We do it to stay connected to the kids because that is so important even though it is hard emotionally. I have found that they love to receive emails and pictures about what I have been doing at home. That gives us something to talk about. My school is in the DFW area of Texas. During the quarantine, I have been with family in East Texas. Our school focuses a lot on outdoor learning. I have taken lots of pictures to send them to show them that things are much different in East Texas. At school we had talked about the difference between the city and the country. I have taken pictures from the front yard to show them that there are no neighbors to be seen, unlike their neighborhoods. I have been doing activities with my nephews and niece outdoors and sent pictures and videos of those. For example, last week we went fishing, horseback riding, walking in woods and hunting for tadpoles. The kids loved hearing and seeing about these adventures. They wanted to see the barn and arena for the horses, so I sent pictures of that. They met my nephews and niece on zoom. I could tell that this all helped. They may not understand why I am not at school but at least they can see that I am ok and not sick. So some may not be ready for zoom, but there are other ways to connect and maybe once they feel more comfortable they may choose to join again.
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Amy Bowman
Euless TX
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-15-2020 08:48 PM
From: Karen Ballou
Subject: Preschoolers too sad to Zoom
Hi all!
Has anyone had the experience where some of their 4 and 5 year olds do not want to go on Zoom because it makes them too sad? We have Zoom 4 times a week with a mixture of "morning meeting," "lunch bunch," and music class. Many of our parents are reporting that their kiddos do not want to come on because they are getting to sad.
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Karen Ballou
Preschool teacher
Child''s Play
W Greenwich RI
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