The Ontario government launched its new website to keep kids learning over the next two weeks, while also preparing for the possibility of a much longer school shutdown due to the coronavirus outbreak.

“I know many parents and young people feel anxious about the road ahead,” Education Minister Stephen Lecce said Friday at Queen’s Park.

“This is the first phase of ‘Learn at Home’ that will help mitigate learning loss,” he said of the government’s online portal to course materials and activities for elementary and secondary students.

For now, he added, “our government is focused on the immediate goal of preventing learning loss over the two weeks following the spring break” when all schools are shuttered.

“If Ontario’s chief medical officer of health recommends closing schools beyond April 5, the government will unveil a second phase of learning at home” and is currently looking into different virtual learning environments, Lecce also said.

Ontario is among several provinces to temporarily shut down schools, though governments in British Columbia and Alberta have done so indefinitely.

At Friday’s announcement, Premier Doug Ford said the new site has “interactive tools in both English and French and is in line with our grades K-to-12 curriculum.”

He said it focuses “on the basics so kids can practise their reading and writing and learn math and science skills.”

The province is also beefing up real-time tutoring available through public broadcaster TVO. The network is also boosting educational programming during the day for younger kids.

“We are supporting families through this situation to make sure our kids can continue to learn,” Ford said. “This online portal is just one more way we are giving parents some piece of mind during this difficult time.”

Cathy Abraham, president of the Ontario Public School Boards Association, said boards are working with the province to figure out how to ensure students who don’t have access to a computer or the internet can also continue their learning — no matter how long the shutdown.

“We are looking at finding some creative ways to provide them paper lessons,” she said. “We need to figure out who they are, those students that we need to be reaching that way and how we are going to be doing it.”

Lecce said all students who are eligible to graduate will and Grade 12 students’ post-secondary applications won’t be delayed.

“We do not want to see impediments for graduation, nor do we want to further frustrate students who are dealing with a very anxious circumstance in their lives,” he said.

Sally Meseret, president of the Ontario Student Trustees’ Association, said it’s tough to predict how many students, even those with computers and access, will make use of the resources.

Younger students “may not be exceptionally motivated,” or may lack the skills and self-discipline to sit in front of a computer, said Meseret, whose association represents the province’s two million students.

Sarah Chun, also a student trustee, worries about schools reopening in late spring, with students having to write exams after missing so much class time.

“That would be detrimental to student health,” said the Grade 12 student from London, Ont. “If teachers were forced to give us a final grade based upon the previous marking scheme, teachers will have to cram weeks’ worth of lessons and classes into a few mere weeks.”

NDP Education Critic Marit Stiles urged the government to let students — especially those in Grade 12 — know “how the school year will be completed and how final grades will be assessed if students can’t return to classrooms in the coming weeks.”

For the next two weeks, teachers are expected to be available to their board and students.

Liz Stuart, president of the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association, said “as further plans are developed and evaluated, we expect the perspectives of Catholic teachers and other front-line workers in the publicly funded education system to be considered before any decisions are made.”

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Charles Pascal, a professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto, says some of what Lecce unveiled seems promising but teachers need to be involved.

He called it “very short-sighted” to wait on advice from the province’s chief medical officer about whether schools will reopen after April 5, noting “he seems to always be behind the curve he is trying flatten.”

“There is little doubt that schools will be physically closed for several months,” says Pascal, a former deputy minister of education.