Our BOLD Approach to Teaching and Learning

feature STORIES

Our B.O.L.D Approach to Teaching & Learning

By Mrs. Allison DeFrancesco Castro '02, Assistant Head of School Ms. Kerry Martin, Dean of Studies

We take great pride in our mascot, the Pioneers. Our mascot calls us to channel the pioneering spirit of our foundresses and all the Sisters of Providence. In 1856, Mother Joseph of the Sacred Heart traveled from Montreal, Canada to the Pacific Northwest with four other sisters to meet the growing need for education and healthcare. With deep faith in Divine Providence, the Sisters were faced with the deadly typhus and cholera epidemics and a world facing rapid change. One of the guiding principles of the Sisters of Providence is to respond to the signs of the times to meet the needs in front of us. Responding to the Signs of the Times was our focused theme for this past school year with our faculty and staff. In March of this year, our community was called to respond in new and bold ways as the global COVID-19 pandemic required us to act quickly in advance of L.A. County’s stay-at-home orders.

On Monday, March 16, our community began teaching, learning, and working from home, introducing what we appropriately dubbed our B.O.L.D. (Block Online Learning Day) schedule. The transition, although wildly unexpected, was one that we now look back on with pride. In a matter of days, our community mobilized in our communication, collaboration, and innovation. In fact, Providence High School did not miss a single instructional day in this transition. And when the decision had to be made to continue remote learning for the entirety of the school year, we were fully prepared to continue with our plan in place. Here are some aspects of our response which made our transition most successful.

ADJUSTING & MODIFYING AS NEEDED It became vitally important to recognize the fact that what we were now doing was not simply teaching and learning online. We were teaching and learning online during a global crisis. In the midst of that crisis, our students deserved and benefited from flexibility, clear expectations, and responsive support and guidance. Recognizing that our concepts of time and space were now being challenged in extraordinary and unfamiliar ways, it was important for us to adjust our daily schedule, student expectations, and supports for our parents and guardians.

We adjusted our daily rotating block schedule by shortening class meeting time and balancing asynchronous and synchronous use of class time to minimize screen time and support a healthier balance.* We also made the intentional choice to maintain letter grades rather than resorting to a pass/fail alternative, and we adjusted our expectations within that system. In addition to eliminating our traditional final exams, we used "tiered" expectations and encouraged teachers, students, parents, and counselors to work closely together to develop plans to ensure students could maintain their average, improve it, or simply demonstrate proficiency before the end of

the school year. We adjusted the expectations and pacing to specifically address how the mental load of physical distancing and individual family circumstances were affecting students' ability to stay focused and motivated. This approach allowed for radical differentiation and personalization.

We also introduced weekly virtual parent education opportunities called Parent/Guardian Meet-Ups. The weekly meet-ups featured various professionals on requested topics. Our guest presenters included medical professionals from Providence St. Joseph Health; John Bwarie, a disaster response expert; Larissa May, founder of #HalftheStory with guidance for how to maintain human connection in the digital space; as well as our own Technology Integration Specialist; and our Academic and Personal Counselors. Led and facilitated by our Head of School, Scott McLarty, these meet-ups invited more engagement and support for parents, helping us to more fully realize our relationship with parents as partners in their child’s education.

All of these adjustments and supports were motivated by how we answered the question, “What is the healthiest approach for our students and adult community?”

PRIOR YEARS BUILT A FOUNDATION Much of our transition was accomplished more smoothly because we intentionally spent recent years creating structures for online teaching and learning, and we familiarized our teachers and students with the online tools. In 2018, we made a bold and fortuitous move to introduce Online Learning Days (O.L.D.’s) to provide faculty and staff with dedicated professional development together and to familiarize students with online learning. We knew accessing online resources and courses would be an inevitable aspect of our students’ future education and career training. What we could not predict was how soon that would come!

During Online Learning Days, students learn from home, accessing their online class sites and coursework asynchronously via our learning management system, Schoology. Our O.L.D.’s helped prepare our students to successfully engage in online learning, to structure their own time, and to become more independent by taking greater ownership of their own learning process. O.L.D.’s also helped develop our faculty in their approach to designing lessons and content for online engagement. It was, as we often say, providential!

A RESPONSIVE FACULTY & STAFF Most significantly, our plan depended heavily on the pioneering spirit of our faculty and staff. Our efforts to transition to a fully remote teaching and learning experience were led by our Technology Integration Specialist, Annie Matthews '93, who designed a plan for professional development and provided ongoing support for all faculty. Additionally, our IT Department, specifically Robert Parmele '02 (IT Director) and Michael Jagosz '09 (Infrastructure Engineer) helped eliminate all barriers for students and teachers who needed additional support, devices, or hardware.

Our faculty, including our robust counseling department, and staff responded to meet the needs in front of them. Long before the pandemic challenged our ability

to connect physically, our faculty and staff were called to focus on prioritizing relationships over content. As a ministry of Providence St. Joseph Health, our promise is to “know me, care for me, ease my way.” And it is only when we truly know our students that we can care for them and help ease their way. Because our teachers get to know our students as whole people, in our transition online, it enabled our faculty to better recognize the needs of our students and respond with necessary adjustments.

In addition to a response that met the teaching and learning needs, many of our program directors and leaders transformed and even reinvigorated some of our traditional events and ceremonies. Rather than simply translating our typical events into digital formats, several events were completely re-imagined.

Traditional ceremonies for awards and recognitions, including our High Arts Finale and Senior Academic Awards, were transformed in profound ways to include new opportunities. We hosted Masses and prayer services as well which creatively incorporated so many student voices, including those of our choir members. There were moments when we noted that our new virtual translations highlighted even better ways of doing things. These new challenges became incredible opportunities due to the pioneering spirit and creative perspective of our faculty and staff.

At a time when physical distancing required us to be apart, it was important for us to avoid being socially or spiritually distanced from our community. Spring semester of 2020 demonstrated that we can be at our best, even during the most difficult times. The world changed significantly in the 2019-2020 school year and although a part of us hopes that school will return to a “normal” we once knew, this new reality calls us to explore how we have begun a movement for change in education that better meets the needs of our students.

During the height of the COVID-19 crisis, our Pioneer community was challenged to become an even better version of ourselves through B.O.L.D. instruction. Though we are all living in uncertain times, our commitment to honoring our heritage and “seeking what they sought” is unshakable. We must continue to make bold commitments to live out our mission, values, and priorities. And we are invigorated by the opportunities we know we will discover.

* Decision based on research from https://www.edutopia.org/ article/pediatricians-balancing-screen-time-sleep-and-family-duringcoronavirus.