McLuhan's Tetrad is a framework used to analyze the full effect of an artifact such as an innovation or disruption. Originally used to understand the impact of new media, the framework helps me understand the broad and deep impact of the pandemic on childhood and education. The tetrad examines the impact of artifacts by asking four key questions:

• What does it enhance?

• What does it make obsolete?

• What does it retrieve that had been obsolesced earlier?

• What does it flip into when pushed to extremes?

As I watch the first three weeks of in-person education, it is the third question that has captured my attention. What elements of education and childhood--elements recently rendered obsolete by technology or social media—have been retrieved since we shut down? As I walk the halls and look out on our front lawn, I see several "retrievals," including the reemergence of low-tech play and face-to-face conversation, and it takes me back to my own school days in a particular way.

In 1978, the highlight of my sixth grade was our daily kickball game at recess. This uber-competitive event was not only fodder for great storytelling and hyperbole; it also presented us with an unending supply of situations in need of conflict resolution. Further, particularly close plays provided us with an opportunity to hone nascent rhetorical skills, which eventually taught us a bit about compromise. In hindsight, I am sure we probably argued more than we played, but that too was a form of play and we learned from it. Then, inexplicably, all that wondrous interplay began to fade away as did other semi-organized interactions in the form of group games.

Fast forward to the most disruptive event of our lifetimes and, lo-and-behold, kickball is back! Kickball is again the focal point of the day for some of our sixth-grade students, and more a topic of conversation in Mr. KJ's class than any video games or social media app. Kristy McGiffert sent a photo around today featuring a brand new game invented by her eighth grade physical education class involving tennis balls and swim noodles. And games are hardly the only "old school activity" on campus.

Last week, I listened as the fourth graders conversed during lunch on the front lawn. A student, holding her sandwich in one hand, pointed to the sky and said, "Look, it's an eagle." Her friend asked if she was sure it was an eagle and not a hawk. "Oh, it's an eagle," she assured her friend. "You can tell by the way that it flies."

It sure is nice to have our kids back on campus.