TV School? It's a thing, and it's good. REALLY good.

Public school, nationally broadcast every weekday for kids grades 1-9?
I was skeptical: something thrown together in a month would be either super boring (where I would be hounding the kids to pay attention, sit still, stop picking lint out of their toes), or be glorified educational cartoons, also known as screen time.

I am humbled.

Story Time!
All Portuguese programming is accompanied by sign language (see bottom right on the TV)

Up until the start of mandatory TV school (April 20), the kids were getting daily assignments from their teachers, taking about an hour's worth of time.  If we had questions, we were invited to email or call their teachers. We did not have to hand in assignments. It was quick (aka, relatively painless).

The big, anticipated day arrived.  We were ready in our dining room/living room/classroom/office (only room in the house with a TV and wi-fi). It went something like this:

• Catarina, not interested in the "school work" I made for her, and upset that her siblings were not available to play, cried incessantly for 2 hours.
• Gabi kept yelling that she couldn't hear the TV through her sister's sobs.
• Jonty, working on an assignment waiting for his classes to start, lost 3 erasers in a matter of 3 minutes, then his pencil, then his list of workbook pages...and kept calling me to help.
• Mark sat wincing at his desk, trying to work during the chaos.
• Lunch got burnt because I got distracted.

I cracked a beer at 11:15am.

Doing abstract art together.
See Mark working in the background? So much physical closeness!

But, 2 weeks in, we are in a good place, and seem to have found our groove. Whew.

So what does TV school look like? 

• Broadcast on a public channel available to anyone with a TV, as well as streamed live and on demand online, TV school is flexible. JACKPOT: we sleep in, so our kids do their classes simultaneously a little later, one on the TV and the other on the laptop with headphones.
• There is a schedule of 30 minute classes from 9am-6pm every weekday, with 10 minute breaks in between. 
• Grade specific classes are grouped in twos, e.g. grades 1&2 together, grades 3&4 together, etc.
• My kids each have 3-4 classes a day, depending on the day of the week.
• Subjects specific to their grade grouping are: Portuguese, Math, Reading Hour (literacy), Social Studies, English (I don't make them do this class) and Physical Education.
• Artistic Expression (15 minutes a week each of art, dance, music and theatre) is for all grades.
• Gabi and Jonty also have Portuguese as a Second Language class, as it's not their mother tongue.

Tuesday's TV School Schedule

Grade 1&2 classes centre around one book a week.
E.g. Last week it was a story about animals going to the fly's house for cake.
Portuguese class looked at new vocabulary, masculine/feminine, singular/plural, number of syllables, etc using words from the book; Math worked on "ordinal numbers", based on the order guests arrived in the story and the ingredients added to the cake; Social Studies looked at animal classification; Phys. Ed included moving like the animals and squeezing into the little doorway.

The TV teachers are great--they ask questions and pause for answers, offer ideas for organizing work, and give positive feedback throughout the class. The activities have Gabi using the TV like a smart board, connecting responses with her finger, circling answers, breaking apart words into syllables, etc. It runs at a good pace, and feels like an actual class.  When I don't think she understands, I can pause the program, review with her, or get her items she needs. For her age group, I feel an adult still has to be present, but can multi-task.

TV kinda works like a Smart Board

It works for Math too!

Grade 3&4: Jonty sits on the laptop with headphones, with a notebook and pencil at the ready to participate in class. He is 100% independent with his classes. I hear him yelling out answers, and see him working out math problems or writing things down as directed by the TV teacher.

Jonty occasionally has an audience.

Both kids are engaged in their lessons for the duration, which blows me away.  At the end of each class, TV teachers give optional ideas to reinforce learnings at home. We don't do them.

Doing a science experiment about states of matter, along with the TV teacher

Gym Class: They each have one gym class a week. The TV teachers are sensitive to the space and equipment limitations kids would have at home. Gabi needed a skipping rope and a ball this week; Jonty, toilet paper and a ball. For those without, alternatives were suggested: tie 2 long sleeve shirts together to make a rope, and roll together some socks for a ball.
Both kids pause for water breaks, and get out of breath in our little living room.

Confinement has reduced our fitness level...this kid suddenly needs breaks!

After building the door into the fly's house, the animals crawl inside using different movements.

Artistic Expression is my favourite class. I marvel at how the TV teachers make the content appeal to kids ages 6-14. Catarina and I join the other two for these classes. Last week we clapped out a rhythm while reading "sheet" music, danced to Tchaikovsky with brooms, made abstract art from squiggles, and acted out emotions from a folk tale.

Abstract art to Vivaldi music--very cool.

Dancing with brooms in dance class:
my ceilings and floors were a little less dusty!

So what do their actual teachers do?
I think it's similar to what teachers back in Canada are doing: Every week, I am sent a schedule of work. Its about an hour's worth of work a day, with deadlines for photo submission. Jonty's teacher calls him twice a week on WhatsApp to check in, answer his questions, and give him feedback on his work (he gets so nervous!). Gabi has a one hour Google Classroom meet-up with half her class twice a week. Here, they take turns reading and presenting projects, and today did a craft together. She loves seeing her friends.

Connecting with friends and her teacher - a bi-weekly highlight

On top of this, their favourite teacher, who teaches them Portuguese as a Second Language, has a weekly one-on-one ZOOM call to keep developing their Portuguese.  They miss her--the TV teacher for this class lacks Professora Nani's touch.

What do the kids think?
Hands down, they would rather be at school. But, Jonty says he likes TV school because he gets to decide when to do classes and in what order.
He misses friends, recess with friends and school lunches.

Gabi says she likes TV school because she can sleep in (used to start class at 8:15am).
She misses her friends.

What do I think?
TV school is busy. It takes us from about 10am-2:30pm everyday with a break for lunch. But the kids are doing it, not complaining too much, and still being exposed to and reading/writing/speaking lots of Portuguese. It's a decent alternative and I am thankful.
Now fingers crossed Catarina (in "pre-school") goes back to school June 1 as anticipated!

I think TV school works here (and maybe reasons it is not feasible in Canada) because:

• there is one curriculum for the entire country
• there are national manuals and workbooks for each child (at a cost according to income); we were given a time slot to go to the school to pick them up, as they didn't all come home when schools first closed
• all teachers use the same manuals, similar teaching materials, and workbooks and follow the same order of curriculum concepts (i.e. most children are at about the same place in the curriculum at the start of term 3, which started after Easter break).

If you're curious, check out their TV school: 

https://www.rtp.pt/play/estudoemcasa

A sample page from Gabi's math workbook -
comes in full colour, with stickers at the back to place throughout!

COVID19 Update:

Portugal is considered to be doing well (April 29, 2020): 

• a new case increase rate of 0.7%; 
• 24,000 total cases, 948 deaths 
• in the last 24 hours: 295 new cases and 20 deaths

The State of Emergency has not been renewed; it will be down-graded to a State of Calamity (!) on May 3.  The government announced the "reintegration plan" tonight--a 3-phase plan to be rolled out over the next 6 weeks.  Schools will not reopen. :(
Phase 1 (May 4): Masks are mandatory in all public places (shops, schools, banks, etc). Small shops with entrances to the street open, with limits on #s inside. The beach opens for nautical sports only (Mark will no longer be dodging the police for his swims across the bay!). Children can once again frolic outside.
Funny, how just this feels like SO MUCH freedom right now! 

Canada, comparatively:

• 50,026 total cases, 2,859 deaths
• in the last 24 hours:1,526 new cases and 152 deaths