Winter is here, and that means teachers will be encountering the unpredictable: snow days. 

When a snowstorm hits and schools close, students grab their sleds, put on their snow boots, and head outdoors. But what do teachers do? An article on Dispatch.com looks at how some teachers in Ohio spend their snow days. 

One fifth-grade teacher, Sara Tadak in Westerville invites her students over to play.

“It’s crazy around here,” said Tadak, 37, who teaches language arts in the article. “I texted [some moms] earlier, ‘Do your kids want to come over?’  ”

According to the article, "the neighborhood moms were delighted to send their youngsters over yesterday to play with Tadak’s 5-year-old daughter, Olivia, and 3-year-old son, Miles. Between snowball fights in the backyard and board games at the kitchen table, Tadak planned to catch up on laundry and start dinner early — a welcome change from the family’s more-rushed weekday routine. Though worried about missing a day of instruction with her students so close to state testing in February, she welcomed the time at home."

“It makes the week back a bit shorter,” Tadak said. “It’s not such a long week after being off two weeks.”

Danielle Filas who leads the Language Art Department at Village Academy in Powell, uses online apps to communicate with her students, according to the article.

“Our academic year feels as if we’re trying to fit 100 pounds into a 50-pound box,” Filas said. “When Ohio weather decides to be naughty, we have to find creative solutions."

Filas, :also the school’s technology-integration specialist, used online resources and apps to communicate with and respond to students as if she were teaching them in a classroom," the article said.

"I’m grateful that I have the tools to keep my curriculum moving forward,” she said, “even when the city is frozen in place.”

Read the full story and comment below. 

Article by Kassondra Granata, Education World Contributor