Fear, sadness and disbelief are just some of the emotions impacting most Americans at this time of social distancing and school closures due to the coronavirus pandemic, and young people are not exempt.

Out of a sense of duty and care, many teachers are connecting with their students using technology as a conduit.

Northwestern Lehigh School District Superintendent Jennifer Holman is proud “teachers reached out to students early on and worked on connecting with them.”

“I reached out by posting a couple of times on Google Classroom, just letting the students know I was thinking of them and giving them an opportunity to say ‘hi,’” Spanish teacher Paul Tomlin said. “A few students checked in via email to talk about the activities we had been planning or news stories we had been following before the closure.”

Tomlin isn’t alone.

“I was in touch with my students in the first two weeks,” Language Arts teacher Linda Paist said. “I posted in Google Classroom and asked them to respond with how they’ve been using their time.

“I predicted many would be spending their time on Netflix and playing video games, and there was some of that going on, but many were cleaning out their rooms, closets, baking, and playing board games with their families.

“One girl taught herself to make homemade bagels. Another rode her bike up the rail trail from Cementon to Lehighton and back ... 40 miles round trip. Many of them admitted they missed school.”

Some teachers anticipated the separation and planned some educational activities before school closed.

“I set up classes through Google Classroom and invited my students to join the last day we had class at the high school. Most have joined,” Art teacher Kathy Kehs said. “I posted my samples for their sketchbook assignments, reminded them of their current sketchbook assignment, the next one due and gave them an art challenge.

“The students were asked to share images of what art they had been doing and a few sent pics of their work.

“I also posted a couple of enrichment activities and posted a few websites that the Art Education Association had shared - virtual field trips and activities on the high school’s distance learning page.”

Understandably, teachers are concerned about the welfare of their students.

“I made a short Quick-time movie in which I just checked in with a positive message,” Language Arts teacher Ann Way said.

Keeping positive even in the crisis also weighed on health and physical education teacher Patricia Mengel.

“[Early on] I communicated with all my classes and student council via Google Classroom on a daily basis,” she said. “I kept a journal and shared it with them, as well as writing some inspirational messages daily since the shutdown occurred.”

Mengel isn’t the only one using a journal to help during this crisis.

In Way’s English classes, each student records events in the classroom and in the world on a day-to-day basis.

“It’s been an instrumental part of my daily routine for academic and honors 10th-grade students,” she said. “This semester, students have regularly been providing updates on coronavirus as part of the current events portion of their daily log.

“[In mid February] a student first reported that the virus was named COVID-19, and, in later entries, students wrote about the virus spreading and the first cases in Washington state.”

Students were so concerned that “of the six papers I have at home to grade, five of them made some reference to the coronavirus.

“For example, on Feb. 28, a student wrote, ‘Coronavirus continues to make headline after headline. The devastating disease has claimed over 3,000 lives throughout the world and infected over 90,000.

“On March 4, another student wrote, ‘The coronavirus is now making people panic with more than 160 cases now in the U.S.

“On March 10, a student made a reference to “buying all the toilet paper everywhere.”

“‘March Madness will no longer contain an audience as there have been 15 confirmed cases in PA and many schools have closed or extended spring break,’ another student wrote. “Sadly, within 24 hours of this student’s entry, PA announced the first two-week school closure.”

Educators continue to use various technological tools to stay connected.

“We have been reaching out to students through a variety of methods - phone calls, Zoom meetings, Google Classroom, and emails,” high school counselor David Combs said. “While there certainly are challenges and logistics that need to be worked out, everyone has been really great about keeping in communication as well as being patient when we do not have the answers right away.”

Though no one is exempt from the effects of the coronavirus, the class of 2020 will be particularly impacted and teachers are sensitive to that.

“I only work with juniors but I imagine the seniors are absolutely freaking out,” Paist said. “What about graduation? What about prom to say nothing of the concerns they have about what their colleges are going to do with their senior year grades in terms of course placement.”

In these troubling times, teachers remain important to students.

“I think that attitude will mean a lot,” Paist said. “It’s not only the Northwestern Lehigh School District going through this, it’s nationwide.”