Caroline Skeen is an English as a Second Language teacher at Porter Ridge Middle School. On Wednesday, she stepped inside her mobile classroom for the first time to prepare it for her students. It’s a change from her traditional classroom last year, she notes, and there’s a lot of work to be done.
But she’s prepared, with bags of the nature-themed decorations like mushrooms and cacti her students have come to expect – and that she believes helps create a no-pressure learning environment.
“Kids are inside all day in classes, so I think having and appreciating the outdoors kind of feels like something different for them,” Skeen said.
Like many school districts across the state, Union County Schools starts class again on Monday. And a new classroom isn’t the only change Skeen is expecting. As an ESL teacher, she’s preparing to adapt to new state laws restricting cell phone use in class.
“ A lot of students do have translators on their phone, which is a big part of, you know, adjusting and learning the English language, which is really hard. So we're just gonna have to find new, like, online Chromebook tools in order to have that reliable translation.”
Skeen says she’s looking forward to reconnecting with her old students – and forging connections with her new ones.
