The subject of my last few blogs have dug into emotional support for our children. Please remember, our children will be tired both physically and emotionally! We need to give our children grace as they transition. Going back to school should not just be a relief for caregivers but an opportunity for our children to grow.

Back to school 2021 is quickly approaching, bringing conflicting emotions for each one of us. Putting aside the unknown about whether or not our children will be in-person, hybrid, remote or even focusing on masked or unmasked, what do you want to see out of this year?

How do we prepare?

We’ve been asked to accept a tremendous amount of change over the last eighteen months. At first, many of us rolled with it, but it has worn thin on many with a general sentiment of anger. I tend to believe a lot of us have been asked to accept change when we think about school for our children.

Even the students who are very attentive and respond promptly with every request may be responding this way as a learned response from trauma. You may be very pleased with these types of students but you may not be aware of the anxiety or fear they are harboring based on a traumatic experience in their life. This child could be conditioned to make the adults around them happy because they may live with an alcoholic parent who becomes verbally and/or physically aggressive when they don’t comply.

Let’s imagine how different the experience for our students would have been last March if schools would have already had a robust remote learning plan in place that accounted for a device, internet, and trained staff. Believe it or not, some schools were able to make this transition a reality as they had planned well before the pandemic began.

It’s okay to acknowledge that life is hard and different right now and we are all trying to find our way through daily. Perhaps we could focus on grace and understanding instead of judgement. Maybe, instead of rushing to push our students back to what used to be, we embrace the different, focusing less on what we are missing out on and more on being change-makers.

All this talk across the country about “reopening schools” has me wondering, what does “reopen” really mean? Depending on where you live it means different things. Maybe it’s reopening schools to pre-pandemic standards or having students back full time but with the current safeguards in place?