CHAPTER 2 - HELLO, MY NAME IS ________. MY FAVORITE COLOR IS ________. -

 HELLO, MY NAME IS ________. MY FAVORITE COLOR IS ________.

    The first day of class, the grand unveiling, meeting your fellow students, exploring a new place, seeing the bigger world for the first time...began under the bed our son sleeps in. Momtch and I sat with our son (and daughter too) waiting in anticipation for the first ‘meeting’ to begin. Everyone joined, 10 kids, 15 kids, 20 kids...the noise became deafening. Background noise of all sorts poured through the speakers on our son’s computer. Children became visible on-screen, some sitting, some standing, some eating breakfast, some upside-down with their feet in the air - chaos ran supreme. 

    The teacher eventually muted everyone, sadly making it impossible for any child to actually say hello to another; it was not really possible anyhow. She began with a song and then announcements and pledges. Afterwards she welcomed all with a smile and gave us all a little information about herself. After her introduction, she asked each child to introduce themselves and to tell the class their favorite color. Roll call began, each child responding to her questions. The process was slow, interrupted repeatedly, distractions abound. Our son had his chance to speak and he wiggled with anticipation. He spoke for his first time, to his entire online class and was then immediately muted so the process could continue. The opportunity to express himself on this first day, in any way to his classmates, was limited to a brief 10 second window. 

    While it was comical to us, the parents, it was a sad beginning to what should be a more significant day. Perhaps I am just nostalgic or ‘old school’ but the communal grounds of school are sacred in my mind and I felt pain as things progressed. The meeting ended with an opportunity for parents to ask questions and there were plenty, too many actually and with few good answers. 

    Momtch looked to me, happy and sad and confused...”This is going to be terrible”, she said. The next two days were spent on failed attempts at completing assignments or even just simply logging in; we limped into the weekend. The system became overwhelmed, internet outages took out entire counties, thousands of students (and parents) were left without any way to participate. We all did the best we could do with what we had to work with.