Teachers put together combinations that they believe won’t hinder student learning

When Sherise Thompson goes back to the classroom this fall, she plans to wear a face shield and a mask to help her students learn.

She teaches students whose first language is something other than English at Hilliard Memorial Middle School. Originally she planned to wear just a face shield so her students would be able to see her face, but the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention does not recommend using face shields as a substitute for masks during the coronavirus pandemic, so she is going to wear both.

“A lot of time they need to hear and see what I’m saying,” she said. “It helps them learn, so I am worried about that aspect.”

Teachers and other school staff members will be required to wear face coverings when classes resume, Ohio Gov. Mike Dewine said during a news conference last month.

That was before the Ohio Department of Health issued a news release on Saturday saying it “is following federal guidance and prohibiting the schoolwide use of face shields as a substitute for facial coverings/masks.” The department also noted that the use of face shields does not comply with its director’s order requiring facial coverings in schools.

Cloth masks are not always ideal in classrooms, so teachers and other educators are coming up with creative ways for students to see more of their faces in the classroom while still staying safe.

“Cloth face coverings can present challenges for students with special health care or educational needs where they need to see the teachers’ or speech therapist’s facial expressions and movements of their mouths; therefore, in some situations a face shield is called for to make sure those children are receiving the instruction that is adequate for them,” said Dr. Mary Kate Francis, interim medical director at the Ohio Department of Health.

The COVID-19 Health and Prevention Guidance for Ohio K-12 Schools says face shields that wrap around the face and extend below the chin can be an alternative when cloth face coverings would hinder the learning process, such as when interacting with Englishlanguage

learners.

Thompson said she plans to wear a Zshield, a face shield that attaches around the neck. Zverse, a South Carolina-based digital manufacturing company, is among several companies making face shields.

“If I do come across a point where I need to enunciate or say something a little clearer for (my students), I can move my mask down for just a second so that they can see my mouth and then put my mask back on,” she said.

It’s unknown at this time what level of protection a face shield provides to nearby people from the spray of droplets, according to the CDC.

“Cloth face coverings are still the gold standard because covering your nose and mouth is well known to reduce the spread of COVID-19,” Francis said. “The trouble with the face shield … is there’s an opening. What the cloth mask does is it contains that person’s germs, essentially, rather than allowing them to drop out of a face shield.”

A 2014 study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene showed the effectiveness of face shields in stopping the transmission of the flu. Ninety-six percent of the large cough droplets were stopped but smaller particles were able to get past the face shield and accumulate over time.

Cloth masks have especially been difficult for the hearing-impaired and deaf community. Many people who are deaf rely on lip reading, so a clear mask or one with a clear window would be helpful to deaf students, said Irene Tunanidas, interim president of the Ohio Association of the Deaf.

“Deaf people rely on facial expressions,” Tunanidas said.

Matt Hott, a speech pathologist at Sycamore Community School District near Cincinnati, plans to flip back between a mask with a clear window and the N95 respirator, depending on the student.

He said he plans to wear an N95 mask, which is able to filter out at least 95% of very small particles, including droplets containing the coronavirus, when he is working with a “more medically fragile student.”

“Some of our students, when we are teaching social skills or the nonverbal skills that are required when you read someone’s facial expressions, a clear mask would be important in that situation so that we can model the appropriate reaction,” said Hott, the schools professional practice representative for Ohio Speech-language-hearing Association.

Hott said he anticipates that cloth masks are going to make it hard for teachers to build rapport with students since most of their face will be covered.

“For some of our kids we’re working with articulation on, the clear mask would be important for appropriate modeling of letter sound and facial placement, like tongue and lip placement,” he said. mhenry@dispatch.com @megankhenry