As we near the end of the first semester, students share their experiences of what it’s been like to learn online.

BUST A MOVE: Sophomore Sofia Ramon works on smoothing the face of her latest clay project, a bust. Although she hadn’t worked with clay before this year she’s used videos made by her teacher to understand the basics of sculpting. “I think the hardest part is all the little micro-adjustments that need to be made as I work,” Ramon said.

TIME TO CHILL: After completing a strenuous two and a half-hour project, Manu Iyer takes a nap only to find his dog wanting to join in as she jumps up and sits on his lap. His sister thought it was a great idea to capture the moment, and she did with a whole lot of pride after. “At this moment one could only assume to work hard and sleep hard too,” Iyer said. 

ROW YOUR BOAT: Martina del Blanco puts her oar in the boat, preparing for a long and intense practice. The second eight-person boat on the water that day was coached by guest coach Tracy, who is a world champion rower. Tensions were high, as this is a new lineup for all of the rowers. Tracy was here to teach, but all of the rowers wanted to be on their best game around her. “When you’re in an eight, you’re sweep rowing. Sweep rowing is when everyone has one oar, instead of two. The boat is likely going to be tippy and a bit chaotic, as we haven’t sweep rowed much. We’ll see, though. We may do amazing,” del Blanco said.

PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT: Poppy Grimsley-Ridenour practices an F chord for guitar class while they practice Hey Jude by The Beatles. They have been taking guitar class in school since sixth grade and this is their fourth year. This year they’ve been playing on a classical guitar they inherited from family. “I’ve struggled a bit with this chord since I’m not used to bar chords but it’s getting easier,” Grimsley-Ridenour said. 

COLOR MY WORLD: Ayden Haines does research for his art project, which was the color splash assignment for Drawing 1.  Haines said it was hard to work with things like paint at home. He worked on the project over a couple of weeks. It took a long time, and he had to look up many of the different aspects of it. “I had to move my entire set up off of my desk to be able to work, and it happened many more times than I would’ve liked,” Haines said. 

ON REPEAT: Gigi Kahlor sits outside on McCallum’s campus jotting down notes for their ELA class. They needed to write down notes to complete the timeline for the class, but felt like everything was repetitive. “I have written down three pages of notes, and I’ve written down the same event like three times,” Kahlor said. 

STRIKE A CHORD: Oliver Bennett works on his music theory book pages to learn what the new chords they are playing look like. He wrote C, F and G7 chords in the empty boxes above the chords. Bennett takes extra precautions to make sure online learning goes smoothly.  “’Hi, my name is Oliver Bennett. I’m in second period first piano’ that’s what I say every time I start recording to avoid any confusion if I turn it in wrong,” Bennett said. 

A NEW PERSPECTIVE: On her patio, Mary Hendrix works on her foreshortening project asynchronously in Design 1 on Oct. 22. Mary’s mother captured her focusing on her work from above. Some of the materials Mary used were purchased from the school to be utilized during distance learning. “You were being particular about the way you wanted this shot to look, so I just hope you’ll put the same effort into finishing the painting,” her mom, Marsha Hendrix, said.

IS THIS THING ON? Freshman Jack McCaskill sets up his tripod for recording his film project. For this shot, he set up the camera so it would get all the different pieces in one shot. “Angling this tripod can be difficult, but it’s a fun project overall,” he said.  

AT ALL HOURS: In her kitchen, Freja Ljungqvist uses a tool called a rib to expand and smooth out the walls of her pot. It was essential to do this to get the right rounded shape she was going for. This was taken late at night because she had to let it sit to dry for a while, something she would not be doing if I was at school. “Do what you need to do whenever you have time to do it,” ceramics teacher Carey West told her. 

GEARING UP: Early one morning, August Steadman inspects a toy car at his desk. Engineering students completed this assignment to learn about gears. “It’s really interesting to see the inside of a toy car,” Steadman said. 

VIRTUAL-LIFE EXPERIENCE: Christopher Sheppard jumps into the world of VR and speaks Japanese with native speakers to practice. He did this often to try and get a better understanding of the language. “I like to do this. I want to learn this language as best as I can,” Sheppard said.

AS WEIRD AS IT GETS: Mick Southwick does his required exercises while attending his P.E. class virtually. This was one of the more awkward activities Southwick found himself doing while learning from home. “2020 couldn’t get any weirder than doing push-ups in zoom P.E.,” Mick Southwick said. 

RELAX WITH US: Oscar, Cosimo and Trevi relax in Bella Wydeven’s favorite homework spot. They were very curious about what she was doing. “My dogs really like to sleep next to me as I do my work,” Wydeven said.