Black Girl Fly: Embrace Purpose + Build Wealth

Kids Learning Loss

February 27, 2023 Tenisha & Tashaunda Season 5 Episode 4
Black Girl Fly: Embrace Purpose + Build Wealth
Kids Learning Loss
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Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

COVID affected so many people during the last 3 years, but individuals may forget that education also suffered when ill-equipped schools had to become virtual within a month.

On today's episode of BGF, Tashaunda and Ava jump in with a conversation about Covid learning loss. The ladies share their insights on students not performing on grade level, parents taking their power back, and the teacher shortage.

Let us know what you think... let's chat in the comments on instagram- @blackgirlflyofficial!

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS
[:23] Introductions
[:47] Kids Learning Loss
[1:22] Tashaunda's Personal Experience
[2:54] Statistics on Student Learning
[3:45]Covid Didn't happen?
[10:00] Students Not on Grade Level
[11:56] Schools are Not Equipped to Educate Children 
[14:25] Family Time
[17:20] Outro 


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Welcome back to another episode of Blog Night girl flight. | 0:23
I'm your girl, Tanisha. | 0:25
Nicole. | 0:26
And I'm Shauna Dixon. | 0:27
today we're talking about the kids, and they used to actually call this summer learning loss, but we're well. | 0:28
Into the fall, COVID learning loss is. | 0:36
What we call the learning loss. | 0:40
we just want to just touch on this topic. | 0:43
We are nearing the end of Q four. | 0:45
What is quarter or four? | 0:49
I'm sorry? | 0:50
Quarter one. | 0:51
Quarter two for the kids in school. | 0:52
Quarter one. | 0:55
Anyway, towards the end of the year, first semester is going to be over because we clearly can't get together with the quarters because I'm on fiscal quarters. | 0:56
Whatever. | 1:08
Semester one is over for the babies, and they've been in school this is the first full year in school since COVID Yeah. | 1:09
tell us what's going on as a mother of four. | 1:18
Well, I'm just going to save it, save my personal experience, and then I'll tell you what I read. | 1:21
my kids so I'm in the special space, right? | 1:27
Because my kids actually started school in COVID. | 1:31
Yeah. | 1:34
Kindergarten. | 1:35
My oldest yeah, my oldest went to kindergarten in COVID. | 1:35
Fully remote. | 1:39
Yes. | 1:40
And it was terrible. | 1:40
Every day she cried every day. | 1:43
Yes. | 1:45
not only that, but at that young of an age. | 1:46
I hope other mothers who have kids that young can relate, but it is so imperative that they have, like, physical contact that they can see your full face and get emotion and touch one another and all this. | 1:48
It's a lot that goes on at that age group that requires, like, bringing their whole selves. | 2:01
it wasn't just about being fully remote. | 2:07
Like, mind you, for my daughter, I talked about this other podcast, I'm sure, but she didn't know how to work a tablet going into kindergarten. | 2:09
Right? | 2:18
they were like, Mute your mic, come back in five minutes. | 2:18
I'm like, what are you telling these kids? | 2:23
Five minutes. | 2:25
They don't even know how to catch five. | 2:27
They don't even know what a minute is. | 2:29
And then two to look across. | 2:33
Now hindsight's 2020. | 2:36
So now I see two. | 2:37
They did not prepare the parents about what needed to happen in order for your kids to be successful during that time either. | 2:39
so, going into that, I actually recently read a study that said that coming out of COVID after the first year, kids were at least five months behind at the end of the first year. | 2:48
actually, I read a more recent study that said at the end of this last year, there was about a ten month gap and where they should be. | 3:04
basically, all students were a year behind. | 3:11
I'm sure if you I didn't break down the results, but I'm sure if you look at younger kids, it had a greater impact than it did with the older kids because of where they are in their learning. | 3:15
Not only that. | 3:24
even when they did go back in the second year, they had these masks over most of their face and all you can see with their eyes well, expression relation touching. | 3:25
That is huge. | 3:34
In kindergarten, first grade, second grade. | 3:35
I think it had a tremendous impact. | 3:38
quite frankly, this one I want to talk about. | 3:40
I feel like everybody's pretending like it didn't happen. | 3:43
Right? | 3:45
Let's call these people kovacic. | 3:46
Yeah, everyone is pretending that did not happen. | 3:49
I was talking to some college students not too long ago, and they were telling me like juniors and seniors or whatever, they were like, these freshmen are weird. | 3:52
They are so awkward because they spent the last two years of high school not in relation with other kids. | 4:01
Correct. | 4:08
I've met parents I've met a parent who is like my daughter, and I think she is in high school now. | 4:10
She's probably in her senior year in high school. | 4:16
She grew anxiety to be around people in colvit, and so they literally had to put her in a special program when they came back from COVID because she didn't want to be around other kids. | 4:19
Right. | 4:29
you have other kids who were dropped out. | 4:29
I had to come in another parent last week and they were like, even though she was their nephew, that they even though my nephew was a straight A student, he doesn't want to go back to school. | 4:31
He's dropping out. | 4:40
He's like, I don't need this thing. | 4:41
I don't need school. | 4:43
I even developed a lot more anxiety. | 4:46
Like, now, actually, I take holistic medicine for anxiety. | 4:49
I'm like, I did not have anxiety before COVID It's the real thing. | 4:54
My concern, though, is that a lot of things happened during COVID Right? | 4:59
Think about it. | 5:03
This was a pandemic, guys. | 5:04
People were sick. | 5:07
A ton of people died. | 5:08
Like and now we like pandemic. | 5:10
What? | 5:12
Yeah, COVID. | 5:12
I feel like no one in society, especially in the school area, is actually addressing what happened. | 5:14
No. | 5:22
Yeah, I used to work with schools quite a bit, and I still kind of tapped into that community. | 5:22
we started to see lots of funding coming down from the federal government for particular initiatives around COVID. | 5:30
So, I mean, when the school shut down, there was a lot of fundings to get the devices out, get the food out to the kids, wherever they were. | 5:40
you saw resurgence around getting PPP into schools and getting testing set up. | 5:48
you saw as kids were returning to school, there was a lot of funding around learning loss. | 5:55
lots of programs stood up to supplement what the schools were doing. | 6:02
that just happened to be over summer. | 6:08
that was last summer, so I'm like last summer. | 6:12
I really haven't heard much of these funding streams, and I'm not to say that they're not out there, I just haven't been hearing about them. | 6:16
I just wonder, have we all forgotten about this, the impact that it's had? | 6:25
this is going to be a lasting impact on these young people. | 6:31
This was almost half their lives. | 6:35
This is the most of what they remember from their lives. | 6:38
Yeah, I've talked to now, I'm actually in a parent group now, so I talked to people who at least in my area, in Charlotte area, everyone's saying that they're not doing anything. | 6:41
I talked to someone who was at a Catholic school and they're like, oh, well, that school didn't actually let out. | 6:53
if your kids behind, it's on you essentially that's what the message was. | 6:59
I talked to someone else who actually goes in school in my school district and they were like, yeah, so what they're experiencing is kids are behind. | 7:04
The particular parent that I talked to said my kid wasn't behind, but now because everyone else is behind her doing fine is not really that great, right? | 7:15
that she's being drugged down because there are a lot of kids who are behind because of what happened. | 7:29
So what do you do? | 7:35
What I'm experiencing though, is my daughter, a daughter who I would say is just where she's supposed to be. | 7:38
And she just happened to sweep through. | 7:45
I think the only reason she's where she's supposed to be is because when I did at home stuff, I put both them together. | 7:46
she was able to learn what her older sister was learning, who was a year ahead of her. | 7:51
I think that now she's in line because of that. | 7:55
But my older daughter is tremendously behind. | 7:58
now I'm trying to scramble to figure out what to do to support her, right? | 8:00
I think that honestly, there was really in my personal experience, there was super poor communication about how behind she was. | 8:05
Essentially how I found out how behind she was is they took a standardized test and I happened to look at the score and I was like, wait a minute, what's going on here? | 8:13
they're like, oh yeah, we're putting her in a group with other kids who are at her level, and we're trying to work with them during the same school days that she has no extended hours or anything, but that's her plan, to work with them. | 8:23
I'm like, so what should I be doing at home? | 8:36
And they're like, oh, here's some apps. | 8:39
Yes. | 8:44
And I'm like, okay, that's not enough. | 8:45
So what do I need to do? | 8:46
Right? | 8:47
I think though, one I'm going to say is guys, if you guys are community leaders and whatnot, I actually talked to my pastor about it, but I'm gonna actually head up tutoring at my church and what we're doing. | 8:49
I paired with another parent who was saying that her daughter was actually where she's supposed to be. | 9:03
she said her struggle was when she asked her something that she felt like she should be able to do. | 9:07
She wasn't capable of doing it. | 9:12
she's getting all these excellent grades in school, right? | 9:13
you're like, what are you really grading her on? | 9:15
Yes. | 9:18
Yes. | 9:18
we actually decided that were going to actually create a tutoring environment, and we would either with parents and we're actually talking to some students as well, to come in and help tutor certain days of the week. | 9:19
what I'm saying, though, is we got to get out there and we got to do it ourselves. | 9:33
That you have got to acknowledge that there was a learning loss. | 9:37
On average, by the way, kids are ten months behind. | 9:41
This is nationally that I saw this. | 9:45
other states may be a little different, either above or below, but kids are behind guys, and they're behind for a reason. | 9:47
It's not their fault, and we need to take the time to help them to get to where they need to be. | 9:55
Where they need to be. | 10:00
I'll just say, when I used to work heavy in schools, it was not uncommon for this pre COVID. | 10:02
It was not uncommon for schools to be at 30% proficiency for an entire grade. | 10:10
Really? | 10:17
And that's normal. | 10:17
I would go into these schools, and I'm like, this is a crisis. | 10:19
it not a crisis to you that 70% of your students do not read on grade level? | 10:22
Like, is this okay? | 10:28
yes, it had become such a norm. | 10:30
Okay, I have to fill this out here, too. | 10:32
in the state of North Carolina right now, there is a teacher shortage. | 10:36
they are actually pulling in teachers who are not certified, do not have the education requirements, do not have tenure, and in these situations, if you don't have at least three years of experience, you're really walking into it, not having the skills that the kids need to be successful. | 10:41
Right. | 11:01
On top of COVID on top of all that's going on, I think that there's a huge challenge here, and we have to step up and do something about it. | 11:02
Yeah. | 11:10
I just say that to say it's worse than that. | 11:10
It was already bad. | 11:17
so what you're saying is just compounded. | 11:18
There was already a teacher shortage, there was already significant people behind, and now just layer on the effect of the pandemic, which really, again, in most cases, has just exacerbated things that we already knew or things that we had just become desensitized to. | 11:22
Ten months might actually be two years with the existing information. | 11:42
this brings me to my other point of a little diatribe. | 11:49
Schools are not designed to educate your children. | 11:56
They never were. | 12:00
Home is where children get educated. | 12:02
I think that what you're doing now with the tutoring program is a great example of parents taking back the power and the responsibility to educate their children. | 12:05
I'm like, I think you're good if your kid can read, learn how to read from school. | 12:18
if we're really talking about critical thinking, how we want our kids to view the world, how we want their values to be formed, that is the responsibility of parents. | 12:23
I think that it's just a reality check of our duties and the role that we have to play in our families. | 12:34
That's probably a very unpopular opinion, but I've seen many schools, and I wouldn't trust them to raise my kids. | 12:45
I mean, I wouldn't trust them to educate my kids to the level. | 12:51
would you say that even teaching to the test? | 12:54
the reason I'm bringing this up is because one parent even said to me, they said that one of the findings from their school was that they needed to have family time once they made it home. | 12:59
And so they're not doing homework anymore. | 13:09
The entire elementary school is not doing homework. | 13:12
Many schools are like that. | 13:14
They don't do homework anymore. | 13:16
Many schools what the heck? | 13:17
Many schools do not do homework. | 13:19
when you also think about our homework. | 13:21
When were kids, I had homework. | 13:24
Mom couldn't help me with my homework. | 13:28
I'm at home struggling, and I'm like how weren't as reliant on the Internet as we are now, or you could actually figure it out. | 13:30
But I'm struggling. | 13:40
My mom is like, what the heck is that? | 13:41
I am struggling with this new math while we edit. | 13:43
I think I confused. | 13:46
My kid trying to help her. | 13:46
That's also happening. | 13:49
do you want your kid to come back to school even more confused when you left him the day before? | 13:50
But also, family time is very important. | 13:55
But I think it is. | 13:58
I think that there's an extreme case. | 13:59
I told you my daughter's test scores are horrible, right? | 14:03
I think family time needs to be us figuring out how to get her back to where she needs to be. | 14:07
This is our family time right now. | 14:14
I think that they're trying to make it seem like learning is a segmented thing. | 14:19
that's where I want to go with this, is that learning can be family time. | 14:24
I told you that one of the things I developed doing is practicing sight words on a family walk, right? | 14:29
We are together. | 14:35
We are working out together. | 14:36
We're also learning together. | 14:37
Learning doesn't have to be the segmented thing that is structured in this nine to five window. | 14:39
And you guys believe in affluent communities. | 14:45
It's not segmented. | 14:48
It is a part of your daily life. | 14:50
And I think, again, it's just not. | 14:52
Whose communities know this stuff already? | 14:56
Just because homework is gone doesn't mean learning stops. | 14:59
I was going to tell you, a woman who I was speaking to about this, she was like, she is not a native speaking English person. | 15:05
she was like, I can't teach my kid reading because my pronunciation is not correct. | 15:15
she goes back and sees it, she's like, mom, that's not right. | 15:22
You don't know what you're talking about. | 15:29
you have to acknowledge, though, that a certain segment of the population is. | 15:31
Not going to benefit because of other disadvantage, disproportionately, disadvantaged. | 15:39
Right. | 15:45
I'm just like, who knows, too. | 15:48
I think when I say the families need to take back the owners, but I think it's exactly the way that you're doing it is to me, a good way for communities to approach it. | 15:54
Like this woman, I'm assuming it was a woman, the parent whose English is not her first language, she's now partnered with you, and now you all are coming together. | 16:06
She knows that new math. | 16:17
I don't know that new math, but she's going to work on English. | 16:18
I'm going to work in English. | 16:21
She's going to do the new math. | 16:22
So, look, partnering up, I don't think that it's fair for us to know the whole curriculum. | 16:23
We have lives, full time jobs, house responsibilities and other kids. | 16:29
making it a community approach and effort, I think, is the way to go. | 16:34
Yeah, definitely. | 16:39
I'm excited about it, but largely I was actually happy that I could have the discussion because you do feel isolated. | 16:40
You just do feel alone. | 16:47
I think that in a prior episode, guys, so check it out. | 16:48
I was talking about how people don't talk about the things that they're struggling with. | 16:51
Right. | 16:55
Everyone goes about, oh, my child's ahead, they're superstar. | 16:55
that mother who's struggling with the kid who's behind, no one says, you. | 16:58
Never hear about her. | 17:02
Yeah, you never hear about that kid. | 17:03
I just think it's important, like we always say here by girlfriend, have the conversation because other people are in the situation that you're in, and you can probably find a way to leverage each other and your experiences to make a better circumstance. | 17:06
Yeah. | 17:20
I think that this is a lot to talk about, but I think that's enough for now. | 17:21
Until next time, I'm your girlfriend sick and I'm tempted. | 17:27
And we are black girlfriend. | 17:31

Introduction
Kids Learning Loss
Tashaunda's Personal Experience
Statistics on Student Learning
Covid Didn't happen?
Students Not on Grade Level
Schools are Not Equipped to Educate Children
Family Time
Outro