How Teachers, Parents, and Students Are Adapting for Teaching During the Pandemic
This school year is going to look different for Arkansas students, parents, and teachers. Due to the global health crisis, students in Arkansas have had inconsistent learning opportunities since March.
To move toward a solution, teachers have spent their summers working on new types of learning environments that encourage exploration both in and out of the classroom.
At the Arkansas Center for Research in Economics (ACRE), we work with university faculty to develop educational materials for Arkansas teachers. As we proceed into the school year, we are considering many of the same things parents and teachers have been thinking about for the past few months:
How to help students catch up on lost instructional time
How to work with parents who are uncomfortable sending their kids back to classrooms in the fall
How to support teachers facing new challenges in effectively teaching students
A new focus on Alternative Method Instruction (AMI) will help teachers continue to meet each student’s needs. Teachers use AMI when students are unable to regularly attend traditional classroom sessions. AMI materials often consist of learning packets, videos, and read-and-respond activities. High-quality AMI materials also include guiding questions and learning objectives so that students understand what their teachers expect them to learn.
A Plan of Action for Arkansas Students
Luckily for Arkansans, many people who live and work in the state are able to offer educational materials and support to teachers and students.
Organizations like Economics Arkansas and the Arkansas Center for Research in Economics provide teachers with resources to teach successfully both in and out of the classroom. These resources include state-tailored lesson plans, video series, and hands-on digital games and activities that promote active learning and student collaboration. Arkansas’s education partners also offer teachers professional development training opportunities throughout the academic year.
Materials from these organizations are tied to Arkansas’s educational requirements for social studies. Social studies teachers in Arkansas are able to teach many different subjects: history, civics, economics, geography, and more. These materials can be used in several of those classes and help students understand the connections between those subjects and the social studies discipline more broadly.
School districts across Arkansas have developed a variety of strategies to teach their student populations this year, taking into account the unique needs of the families in their districts. This means that teachers need educational materials that are multi-purpose and driven by independent learning. They need additional guided learning activities for students. They need flexibility to use materials and content in multiple ways. Arkansas’s education partners are here to help.
