Tutoring in viral times

Greetings from Florida, once again.

I've received quite a few inquiries from tutors wondering how to proceed given all that's happening with COVID-19.

At this time, the national goal is to "flatten the curve," which means finding ways to prevent the spread of the virus or having more cases come up. The latest research is showing that there are a lot of asymptomatic people who are carrying and spreading the virus unknowingly. Furthermore, it is now estimated that the incubation period may be as long as a month in some people.

There are a lot of unknowns in play as this is a "novel" virus--meaning no one has experienced this strain before, so anyone can get it and no one has inherent immunity.

Given all of that information, I recommend that you follow all of the guidelines that Governor Polis and the Colorado Department of Health and Environment announced last week. In addition, keep in mind that your student's children are home, and although you might be able to control your own exposure and hand washing, you have no way to know what kind of exposure is happening with your students.

Do not feel guilty suspending tutoring! I'm in a super-stressful situation right now, but a few days ago, someone reminded me that "you don't need to set yourself on fire to keep somebody else warm." Something that is very much a known in this whole thing is that social distancing and self-isolating are effective measures. If you wish to go ahead and continue seeing your student, that is your prerogative (but maybe sit six feet apart!), however, the scientists in charge of mapping out the best defense to COVID-19 do not recommend that any of us spend time with other people at this time, if possible.

Please take care of yourselves, wash your hands, don't touch your face (OMG, I touch my face so much--I never realized!), don't hoard all the toilet paper, check in on friends and neighbors who are vulnerable, and maybe use this time to plan lots of great lessons and language-learning activities to use when you resume tutoring. Mostly, please take whatever precautions you can so you stay as safe as possible.

I hope we're all back to our normal routines sooner rather than later, but beating the spread of this virus is going to take a massive cooperative community effort.

Please take care, everyone!