Even for parents like myself that are really, really trying to make it work, it's a nonstarter. I have a 7 year old, and his computer is right next to mine where I am working remote, and I can supervise, except I'm in meetings often and it's hard to keep him on track. There's no peer pressure from other students to behave, the teacher has poor equipment and is barely intelligible sometimes, and there's every incentive to just goof off if I am not on top of him in a ridiculous way that would never have been the case in conventional schooling or even in traditional homeschooling.

I'm distracted and my productivity suffers also.

> Another is to design a remote learning system that actually works

I don't know what that would look like, because at the end of the day it'll just be a TV yelling at you, and kids will tune out. There's lots of interactive educational material, but unfortunately it's either way too much "fun and games" and not deep enough, or it's just boring worksheets slapped on a screen.

The teachers are honestly trying their best with the materials they have, but it doesn't work, and it seems like really we're stuck between wasting formative years, or risking that we get sick with a disease which honestly has a pretty low mortality rate in otherwise healthy people. I hate the decision, I hate the dichotomy, I wish there was another option, but I don't see it.

And this is with a private school outside of America; so I can only imagine how it would be in a more impoverished American inner-city setup, or how it is for people who can't work remote.

I think they have to go back and we just have to accept the health risk. I hate that this is where I've landed.