The Montclair School District celebrated its first day of virtual classes with a community celebration on Thursday, including a virtual learning block party and parade on Marquette Avenue.

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"We wanted them to see that the parents have obviously gone through a lot over the last couple of months, but the kids also are about to go through it, if we can't show them that we can make lemonade out of lemons, how can we expect them to?" says Shelby Moser, who is a parent.

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The party wrapped up, and kids began their remote learning for the day.

"I'm anxious about virtual learning," says Moser. "You have a bunch of kids sitting on a screen and not connected to each other, so it's not the same affect. My hope for virtual learning is that all the kinks are worked out in the first couple of weeks."

Montclair district leaders hope to move to a hybrid school model later in the year, including classroom and virtual learning similar to districts such as Westfield and Jersey City, who kicked off their school year today as well.