Today, was a difficult day in the teacher mine. 8 out of 21 students were absent and the students had a lot of energy. I don't know if it's the pandemic or if the students at this school are absent frequently, but having almost the half the class out for almost 1 week is very hard. It almost feels like I am planning curriculum separately for each of the absent students. Each day they don't return, I take out more and more of the missing assignments they must complete because it's just too much for one student to complete on top of all the other work they must complete.
Because there's limited time in the general studies classroom (about 2.5 hours per day not including recess), I had already created a white folder for each student that I use to pass out all copies for the day and for each student to turn in their work. Now, I have a red folder for unfinished assignments. So now, each day that a student is absent, I simply remove the daily copies from the white folder and put them in the student's red folder. 
This new system seems to be working well, although I don't ever remember working this hard to keep on top of assignments being turned in! My current school is technology free. (I used to think that Google Classroom took away something important from the learning, but now I miss it so much!)

Teaching during the week between Christmas and the New Year, driving home in the rain, the thought occurred to me again that teaching at an Orthodox Jewish school is not that different from other schools. While the focus of life may be different in a religious instituition, what draws my sphere close to theirs is that we all have that thing in our lives we hold most important, most sacred. For me, it is books in general. For them, it is their faith. But are we really that different when at the end of the day, we go home to our families and share with them what is most important to us?