Dear WTA Family!
“Joyful Mindset” is one of our core values. We have been truly amazed by our students, parents, and faculty over the past week—finding ways to learn, demonstrating
Ahavat Torah
, and continuing to find joy in light of challenging times.
We now look with gratitude at the foresight our founders had when they established a school with a unique educational model. Our students are well versed in Blended Learning; they are familiar with a variety of online platforms, and are trained to work independently or with a teacher, whether on- or offline. Their versatility with multiple modalities of learning has made the quick launch of the “WTA Virtual Learning” program possible.
Our daily schedules are designed to help students organize their day, and establish a daily routine. Sessions vary in modalities to help students connect with their teachers and classmates, making each day filled with new opportunities and learning.
We recognize that utilizing our WTA Virtual Learning platform may be challenging, as we know that families may have a limited number of devices at home. We also acknowledge the time needed for students and caregivers to adjust to a new way of learning from home. To meet the needs of our learners and our families, we have created a daily schedule with the following principles in mind:
- We will provide a variety of lesson types to engage and motivate students: Zoom (live with a teacher); phone conferencing (for small, differentiated groups of learners); guided video activities (mostly for young students); and online platforms (for JS and GS).
- We created a secure and simple user-friendly website to help streamline all communication with parents. To ensure safety, students will be provided with a password to access their daily learning activities. This password will be sent to you tomorrow morning through text and email.
- Daily learning activities are age-appropriate, varied, and geared towards meeting the intellectual, physical, and emotional needs of our students. As you will notice, there are core curricular activities, as well as specials (music, art, movement). Many of these are designed to distract students from worrying about the reasons they are being quarantined at home.
- We recognize that learning away from friends and teachers can be onerous, and even overwhelming. In such cases, we recommend allowing students to take a break, and when the work seems too overwhelming, we ask parents or caregivers please to get in touch with the teacher/s to discuss alternatives. We also encourage parents to reach out and let us know if their child is ready for more work.
- Finally, we have limited Zoom sessions for Shorashim through 4th Grade (up to 2-4 daily sessions, based on age). These sessions are staggered throughout the day to allow all siblings to attend live sessions, given the limited number of devices per household. Additionally, our experience from the past week has indicated that it is best if we use Zoom for short periods of time throughout the day.
We are writing this letter to you with expressions of gratitude to, and awe for, our teachers who have been working tirelessly to design meaningful daily activities for our students. As a professional community, and in keeping with our core values, they are truly “Committed to Best Self,” as they have embraced this challenge wholeheartedly. The WTA community also is blessed with an amazing, caring, and collaborative parent body; we appreciate your support and feedback. Parents, rabbis, administrators, teachers, and school staff--we are making history. Together, we will overcome this challenge and emerge stronger, more resilient, and wiser. We can do it.
Refuah Sheleimah
to all the חולים, and wishing everyone a פורים שמח!
Deganit Ronen
Principal
