Online learning has robbed the young of snow days off

WHEN you are a kid (or just a big kid), one of the few things that can make you excited at opening the curtains in winter is being met with a white blanket of snow which has fallen the night before.

It’s far more than just the sudden change of scenery which lifts you, or the ethereal brightness in a time of dark and gloom.

It is – or it was – the prospect of a day off. And not just any day off, but a day careening through the streets, forming snowballs with gloved hands and chucking them at anyone or anything which is considered a suitable target.

If you were extremely lucky, you lived in an area with a grassy hill and owned a sledge.

In which case it was even better as, on top of having endless snowball fights, you could hurtle down slopes with glee.

It was as if Mother Nature had visited and provided a new slide for everyone – one which didn’t hurt if you fell off.

Staying outside all day in snow is one of those rites of passage that every child deserves; the feeling of your cheeks turning red with cold and your hands going slightly numb, but not caring as you were still hot in your coat from tearing around from one game to another.

And getting a day off school only made it that much more special, from the very moment your school’s closure was announced on the radio station you never usually heeded.

So it was with a heavy heart that I heard the news that, while some schools were forced to close recently due to snowfall, instead of giving pupils a day off, they switched to online learning.

One of the effects of the pandemic was that systems were set up so that being in a physical classroom was not necessary any more.

With fears that sending children into a school setting could spread the virus around, teachers broadcast lessons via Zoom meetings or video conferences, with children then submitting work via email.

At a stroke, Covid-19 ushered in a technologically-driven separation which seemed more like something out of a dystopian science-fiction story.

Forget rushing out collectively into the playground at break time; children were instead ‘logging off’ for a bit and playing alone.

Although things have thankfully gone back to some kind of normality and children get the valuable social setting of a school to learn in, there is always the threat of online learning which can be fallen back upon if something disrupts the ability to be there in person.

All of which makes the idea of a snow day more and more like something from the past.

I suppose that, in an era of climate change, we should see less snow in any case. Yet the recent flurries in the first few days of winter showed that our topsy-turvy weather patterns mean we still might end up with some snow – at least on the higher ground.

While we seem destined to see higher temperatures, those higher highs usually are accompanied by lower lows, as nature tries to find a balance.

So it would be hoped that those days of hunting around for anything which could be used as a sledge – ideally flat-bottomed, smooth, sturdy enough to be sat on without breaking – are not entirely over.

But, just as those of us working from home don’t get a free day off if we can’t get to the office (if you still have one), children will no longer get the a free pass from school because the building has closed.

That seems a shame to me – as not everything you learn about which has value can be done online, or via a computer.