When I was kid growing up in Chicago, snow days were hard to come by. These days, the snow day may be an endangered species.

Warrensburg Region-6 schools won't be in session today and Friday. The region is taking two AMI days. AMI stands for Alternate Method of Instruction.

Essentially, Missouri law allows schools to count days off as in-class days by having teachers give their students assignments to complete. These assignments, when completed by the students, are counted as the student being present for class.

As a kid there was something special about looking out the window and seeing a pile of snow. Then turning on the radio and waiting for the DJ to give the school closings. And hoping that your school would be one of the schools that he or she mentioned. And then when hearing your school's name, that feeling of unexpected freedom.

That feeling of unexpected freedom was short lived though. And for me, usually turned out to be a day in front of the television. "The Bozo Show" and cartoons in the morning. Followed by mid morning game shows like "The Price Is Right" and "Tattletales" and then some show like "Chips" or "Emergency" in the afternoon. I was usually bored by dinner time.

These days lots of schools have internal ways of letting their families know if kids have to go to school or not. And many kids have laptops or tablets, school email addresses, and some type of digital portal they can access so they can continue to learn. Making the snow day an endangered species.

Kids lives' these days are so structured with school, sports and activities. I'm left to wonder, what's wrong with the occasional unexpected snow day? Maybe an unstructured day in front of the flat screen watching their favorite cartoons on Netflix and playing video games is really what the kids need now and then.

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