Manhattan Beach Schools Reveal New Classroom Layouts
Apr 16, 2021 11:37AM ● By Jeanne FratelloA Mira Costa High School history classroom.
A Look at MBUSD Elementary Classrooms
The kindergarten classrooms are some of the biggest classrooms on MBUSD campuses, so there should be no shortage of space for students.
However, students will mostly be in the desk areas and not, for example, sitting on a rug and working with manipulatives as they might have done in years past, said Murakawa-Leopard.
First through third grade classrooms will take advantage of double desks, with one student per desk to allow for social distancing.
Planners attempted to leave plenty of aisle space and room in the front of the classroom for teachers to move around.
Older elementary grades will use a combination of single desks and double desks. In the example shared by Murakawa-Leopard, this classroom has had a "bulky" HVAC unit installed so planners had to work around that addition to the classroom. The rows are tight, but the teachers do less moving around, said Murakawa-Leopard. (In the photo shown here, the HVAC unit is in the back of the room.)
More Students to Fit at Manhattan Beach Middle School
In middle school, Manhattan Beach has the greatest number of students who are planning to return in person, so the district had to adapt to create enough space for students.
These images of Manhattan Beach Middle School math and English classrooms show single desks spread out across the classroom.
For the middle school orchestra, the class needed more room than the music room would provide so the orchestra has been moved to the gym.
The middle school band and choir will practice outside, and the music room will be available if those classes have non-performing needs.
Middle school art and science classes have students at collaborative or lab tables. It was "a little bit of a puzzle" to put the tables together with three-foot distance, said Murakawa, but now students have three feet apart on each side and diagonally.
"Fine Tuning" at Mira Costa High School
Some of the classrooms at Mira Costa involved "fine tuning" after the movers moved furniture in, said Murakawa-Leopard. In one case, furniture movers left a big aisle on one side of the room, so staff shifted the furniture to allow an aisle down the center. In all of these classrooms, students sit at single desks.
Schedules Will Bring Back All Cohorts
For students returning back to school at the elementary school level, grades TK-2 will attend from 8:15 a.m. to 12:15 p.m., and grades 3-5 will attend from 8:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Elementary students will be divided into four groups and on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, each of the four groups will have a chance to stay for lunch and receive additional enrichment.
MBMS and Mira Costa will proceed with a block schedule that alternates each week. The MBMS bell schedule can be seen here and the Mira Costa bell schedule can be seen here.
Distance learning will remain an option for the rest of the year.