Asheville, Monday — Teachers in Buncombe County are reporting that students — having missed more than a week of school in February due to snow days — have regressed academically and returned to a feral, unteachable state.
“My classroom instruction now centers around pointing at an object and slowly, clearly repeating the name of the object,” said one Asheville elementary school teacher. “I ask parents to take time to hold a book in front of their children and provide positive reinforcement if they correctly guess that it is a book.”
School administrators have brought televisions and video games into classrooms so that their sudden absence from the students’ lives during school hours doesn’t throw them into a state of shock.
The lost classroom time wasn’t a total loss, however.
“The time spent at home during the snow days was itself an educational experience,” said one middle school teacher, “teaching children to stay out of Mommy’s way and to not bother Daddy when he is looking at his phone.”
