ELEMENTARY (no MASTER SCHEDULE) AM/PM and HYBRID LEARNING
For schools to open and meet the state’s social distancing requirement, students may be divided into multiple groups with only one group of students onsite at any given time. When a student is not onsite, they will participate in some form of Distance Learning, either Synchronous or Asynchronous.
For the students who will be onsite, there are multiple ways to divide these students into small groups. Some districts have decided to divide their students based on their last name. As an example, all students with a last name A-L will attend school at one time, and students with a last name M-Z will attend school at a different time. This method creates some problems that the district must accept or resolve. The total number of students may be divided evenly, but each grade level may not be divided evenly. Parent requests for specific days/times, and siblings with different last names needs to be considered.
For the students who will be onsite, the procedure outlined below will divide the students evenly by grade level, teacher, and gender. This procedure is a guide to show you the tools that can be used in Aeries to help simplify your task. Modify this procedure to meet the specific requirements that your district/school has to open school.
To group students, this example will use the student User 13 (U13) field, but the student Scheduling Group (SG) field or any blank field on the student demographics page could be used. Your district might select the field for you to use.
The fields used in this example are populated with drop-down lists. These drop-down lists are in the COD table and are usually maintained by district personnel. The values for the User 13 field are stored in STU.U13 and the values for the Scheduling Group field are stored in MST.SG.
In this example, students attending school will be divided into 2 groups. The students attending school in the morning session will be identified with a code of “AM” in the U13 field, and the students attending school in the afternoon session will be identified with a code of “PM” in the U13 field. Two additional groups of students will also be identified: students in Synchronous Distance Learning full-time will have a code of “SL” in the U13 field, and students in Asynchronous Distance Learning full-time will have a code of “AL” in the U13 field.
Instead of morning and afternoon sessions, your district/school could use different days of the week. The process would be the same, but different codes could be used to identify the students.
Students with a code of “SL” in U13 may login to either the morning or the afternoon session. However, the school could use different codes for the Synchronous Distance Learning students to indicate the morning or the afternoon session. For example, the Synchronous Distance Learning students assigned to the morning session could have a code of “SA”, and the Synchronous Distance Learning students assigned to the afternoon session could have a code of “SP”.
Using your procedure for a normal opening of school, assign students to teachers for the 2020-2021 school year. A class roster may assist you to:
1. Identify students who are Synchronous Distance Learning full-time.
2. Identify students who are Asynchronous Distance Learning full-time.
3. Identify students whose parents request a preference for morning or afternoon session.
4. Identify students whose parents request that siblings be in the same or different sessions.
5. Identify students that must be kept together or separated.
There are several ways to enter the codes in the U13 field. The most time-consuming method would be to use the Student Demographic page and update one student at a time. QUERY can be used to simplify the task and save time.
1. Use QUERY to generate a list of students sorted by grade level, teacher, and gender.
LIST STU TCH STU.SN STU.NM STU.GR STU.GN STU.CU TCH.TE STU.U13 BY STU.GR TCH.TE STU.GN
To check one grade level at a time add IF GR = ##.
To check one teacher at a time add IF STU.CU = ###.
2. After the list is displayed, use the CHANGE Button.
3. Lock the columns except USER 13.
4. Change the USER 13 field to “SL” for the Synchronous Distance Learning full-time students.
5. Change the USER 13 field to “AL” for the Asynchronous Distance Learning full-time students.
6. Change the USER 13 field to “AM” or “PM” for school/parent preferences.
7. Then use QUERY to count the number of students assigned to each teacher, sorted by each group. Students not yet assigned to the morning or afternoon session do not have a code in U13.
TOTAL STU TCH STU.GR TCH.TE STU.GN STU.U13 BY STU.GR TCH.TE STU.GN STU.U13
To check one grade level at a time add IF GR = ##.
To check one teacher at a time add IF STU.CU = ###.
8. Use the QUERY TOTAL from above to balance the number of students for each teacher in the AM and PM sessions. For each teacher, you know how many students have been assigned to their AM and PM sessions, and how many students have not been assigned to their AM or PM sessions.
LIST STU TCH STU.SN STU.NM STU.GR STU.GN STU.CU TCH.TE STU.U13 BY STU.GR TCH.TE STU.GN IF STU.U13 = “ “ AND STU.CU = ###
9. After the list is displayed, use the CHANGE Button.
10. Lock the columns except USER 13.
11. Change the USER 13 field to “AM” or “PM” to balance the sessions.
12. Use QUERY to check the balance.
TOTAL STU TCH STU.GR TCH.TE STU.GN STU.U13 BY STU.GR TCH.TE STU.GN STU.U13
To check one grade level at a time add IF GR = ##.
To check one teacher at a time add IF STU.CU = ###.
To check the balance of morning and afternoon sessions add IF STU.U13 = “AM” OR STU.U13 = “PM”.
13. Decide how to notify parents which AM/PM session their student attends school. Parents who requested Synchronous Learning or Asynchronous Learning should have been notified when their request was approved.
a. QUERY may be used to identify students in the AM sections.
LIST STU TCH STU.NM STU.GR STU.GN TCH.TE U13 IF U13 = “AM”
b. QUERY may be used to identify students in the PM sections.
LIST STU TCH STU.NM STU.GR STU.GN TCH.TE U13 IF U13 = “PM”
c. QUERY may be used to identify students in the Synchronous Learning sections.
LIST STU TCH STU.NM STU.GR STU.GN TCH.TE U13 IF U13 = “SL”
d. QUERY may be used to identify students in the Asynchronous Learning sections.
LIST STU TCH STU.NM STU.GR STU.GN TCH.TE U13 IF U13 = “AL”
Glossary
- Hybrid – Some days onsite, some days distance learning
- Distance Learning – Instruction in which the pupil and instructor are in different locations and pupils are under the general supervision of a certified employee of the local educational agency
- Synchronous – two-way, real-time/live, virtual instruction between teachers and student when students are not on campus
- Asynchronous – students at home participating at different times. Instruction may include various forms of digital and online learning, prerecorded video lessons or game-based learning tasks that students complete on their own, and pre-assigned work and formative assessments made available to students on paper
- Independent Study – student enrolled in district’s IS program