In Ontario, we are three weeks into the school year. Those who work in elementary schools are glad to be with students and colleagues, but there is a weariness too. We have a feeling it is going to be a long year. It’s been several long years in a row already. There are two main…
Tag: pandemic
Election polls for Ontario’s government are making me scared.
The Ontario election is in just a couple of days, and the polls are predicting another majority win for the Conservatives. I’m honestly afraid of this result. Not just for the next four years, but for the future of Ontario in general. This is because children are the people who will populate this province in…
Worrying about my unvaccinated friends
Since mass vaccinations against Covid-19 began this past spring, I’ve become aware of a small number of friends and family who remain unvaccinated by choice. Some I suspected would be, and some I was surprised about. At this point, I’m aware that the number of such folks might be considerably higher than I’d realized. Covid…
Bill Wurtz: a prophet helping us through the pandemic
You know how humans turn to music to keep them going during tough times? That has been very true for our family during the pandemic. In our house, Bill Wurtz is one musician in particular who has helped us the most in this long, stressful year. Last spring, our son E (who was ten at…
New Year’s Questionnaire for 2020: The Year The World Stood Still
It’s always fun to post a piece so late that it’s basically irrelevant… Sigh. (And this piece would still be waiting to be finished if it weren’t for the long dentist appointment the kids and I had last week that gave me an hour in which I couldn’t work on report cards.) At least I…
14 Nice Things I’ll Remember About Shutdown
School is upon us. Students, parents, and teachers are, I believe, universally unsettled about back-to-school. Whatever the normal preparations, uncertainties, anxieties, and excitements would be, they’re different and more intense this year. I’ll be honest: after three days of training last week, discussing with my colleagues ways to deal with all the million tiny details…
7 Things This White Person Has Learned About Racism
On November 9th, 2016, the day after the US election, when even my elementary students were freaking out about Trump, I pictured chaos in the United States. Society – which may never have truly earned the term “civil” – crumbling. Now, I feel like that moment has arrived. Pandemic, hospitals overflowing. Unemployment and poverty off…
Pandemic + Nova Scotia Shooter = nobody’s okay.
It’s Day 41 of pandemic distancing. I began an innocent little check-in post about two weeks ago. I wanted to ask how you are, and to write about what life is like during these “trying times” for posterity. It was difficult, though, because how one is doing keeps changing. The post has morphed several times…