Jaclyn McKay’s classroom is fun and spirited — a class of around twenty-five 9th grade English students, it isn’t challenging to overhear their rather strong opinions on the characters in their stories, even if they turn shy when asked questions by the teacher herself.  It’s often easy to see the lingering effects of Covid, as they spend much of their work time chatting amongst their groups, or even peers on the other side of the room.

The pandemic hangover is obvious in these scattered moments.  The kids seem to be as chatty as expected, but there are the little presences of Covid isolation and hindrances on development that can’t be overlooked.  On my first day, one of the students hadn’t had the chance to come to school yet – she had been in quarantine for the first week, missing out on the first of all her classes.  Nobody was Zoomed in; she has had to acclimate to high school after the initial period of interaction and social settling.  After class had started on my first day, one of the students who had also been absent for nearly a week entered late with a slip from the front office; my teacher later informed me that this was this student’s first day back following his suspension.  His crime: stealing an NHS soap dispenser to gain clout from TikTok’s “Devious licks” challenge.  Other thefts by students included fire extinguishers and an exit sign.  After over a year of their middle school education and socialization completed in their own homes, some of the new students seem to need to learn the hard way that in-person high school doesn’t tolerate misbehavior.  The October TikTok trend which NHS briefed the school on is dubbed the rather alarming “Slap a teacher day” challenge; students will face possible expulsion in a threat serious enough to grab their attention and make responsible decisions.

Jaclyn has addressed the students not only about these “challenges,” but about the rigor of her class compared to the previous year.  “There have been a number of ghosts this last year,” she said, “students who have Zoom on, but they’re not even in the room.  I hope none of those were you, but if they are, then you have buckling down to do.”

Making the rounds around the room as a TA, it’s obvious that not all students are ready to part with the ability to play video games unimpeded in class.  However, many students still demonstrate enthusiastic engagement with the work.  We have been reading O’Flaherty’s The Sniper and Trifles by Glaspell, early 20th century works which the 9th graders have some challenges parsing.  They have been filling out organizers for paragraphs designed to help them isolate themes and symbolism and a central claim to their writing.  They haven’t quite graduated to writing “theses” yet, but looking over their papers, about half seem to understand the distinction between summary and analysis.

Developmentally, this group of students is in Piaget’s “formal operational” stage.  If they are fourteen years old and have spent more than the last year deprived of a proper social education (starting when some of them were ~12), then some of the challenges I have been observing might be struggles with continuing to clear the concrete operational stage.

Students now seem comfortable enough with me to actively seek me out to ask questions about the stories, which has led to some close looks at which concepts of their stories and essays they have trouble with.  A lot of them have primarily had trouble with the themes of the story, with what represents what and how the story achieves its impact on a textular level.  Some students have trouble keeping the story straight (as with the current Trifles lesson, where the meaning lies in a layer of subtext).  Jaclyn took the time to write these points out in big lettering on the whiteboard, and walk them through each one.  Students seem remarkably hesitant to ask questions or answer Jaclyn’s during these minutes of the class period, but Jaclyn encourages them anyway whenever one ventures to share their thoughts.  So far, they seem to be improving every week.

I’ve learned just what a challenge it is for Covid-era transitional students to make the jump from middle to high school, from concrete operational children to something in between that and formal operational.  I’m honored to be given a chance to work with Jaclyn and her class, and look forward to the next several weeks.