Reopening schools question.

It could be that the relaxation of lockdown is now aiming to bring forward wave 2 into July and August so it doesn’t overlap into the flu season, of course.

That’s probably depressingly close to the truth.

I think we’re all getting a bit frazzled.

I’m seeing loads of kids out and about while fielding questions about work not being set (erm you’re child hasn’t opened it). Then parents saying I must be really enjoying this holiday.
I found out earlier that one of my colleagues was in the park last Thurs afternoon for a picnic getting pissed. One of 100 and that’s the story now in town all teachers are out getting pissed up in the afternoon and doing little work the next day (she was spotted massively hungover queuing outside the supermarket at 11am). Now we’re all tarred with the same brush.

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/seven-staff-members-same-school-18346687

If anyone’s interested, our secondary has just issued it’s guidance, basically:

-years 10 and 12 split into 4 cohorts. For year 10  each cohort in one day a week for 3 lessons (Math, English, Science), finishing the day at 12:45, with a 15 minute morning break. Year 12 similar but a two week cycle, giving them two days one week, next week no classes.

– max 15 kids per class (if everyone turns up), sitting at exam desks in ‘adapted spaces’

– in-class learning is supplementary to online learning which is the main source.

-masks, gloves visors optional.

– avoid public transport if possible, otherwise masks seem to be mandatory while travelling.

https://roundwoodpark.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Plans-for-Face-to-Face-Contact-with-years-10-and-12.pdf

(1/7) The #SARSCoV2 viral load data from Germany has been reanalysed, and continues to suggest no meaningful difference between the viral load of children and adults. There's a lot to discuss in this paper. Read on… #COVID19⁰https://t.co/seB5B8AVGL pic.twitter.com/HOvdhC7bhZ

— Dr Zoë Hyde (@DrZoeHyde) June 3, 2020

Gov rowing back on primary schools opening for all.

Here in Wales, well our school anyway we’re getting the same ‘What the Gov. Say v What the School Say’ discrepancy.

The First Minister schools will reopen on the 29th of June, or as close as possible and parents wouldn’t be fined if they decided not to send their kids in. All years will be returning but they might only be going every 3rd school day, unless either parents are key workers when they’ll be offered full time care.

Our school has responded by saying they’re going to be offering “check in and catch up sessions” for maybe an hour or two maybe weekly. Rather than saying they parents won’t be fined if they decide not to send their kids in it’s “entirely optional”. They’ve sent out 4 surveys for us to fill out which are heavily laced with suggestions it’s probably not going to be worth it.

After a really rough ride in Wales we’re now at a point when Covid deaths (3 yesterday) and new infections (43 yesterday) that fewer people than normal (based on 5 year average) are dying. Yes there’s still the fear of a second wave but it’s just not happened anywhere else on Earth.

It’s not a second wave of Covid I fear, it’s the massive wave of redundancies and poverty that will come when the furlough scheme ends.

Now we’re all tarred with the same brush.

At my wife’s school, two teachers have said they can’t do online lessons as they don’t have a computer. When asked how they could be working from home for the last 8 weeks, they went a bit quiet…

My lads school sets work on his ipad every day. He does it. In 9 weeks there has been no feedback, no marking, no contact outside of work appearing each morning. He has it done within an hour.

Schools now have got themselves in a situation where they don’t have an exit strategy.

What’s going to happen in Sept when the kids have mingled freely for 6 weeks?

Are schools going to go back at all this year?

Schools now have got themselves in a situation where they don’t have an exit strategy.

What’s going to happen in Sept when the kids have mingled freely for 6 weeks?

Are schools going to go back at all this year?

From what I’m seeing Heads and Teachers unions are doing their upmost to avoid schools opening.

It seems to be the way with Teachers unions that whatever is asked of Teachers Unions will always say NO first and argue about why later. I think the only solution they would be happy with is no school until the Virus is completely eradicated globally. Their members are pretty much insulated from the wider economy – yes I know, public sector pay has been all but frozen for a decade, half our family income comes from the NHS, but Teachers rarely, if ever lose their jobs.

There are over 4m Primary and Nursery aged Children in England alone. How many of them are the children of single parents, or have 2 working parents I don’t know – I guess the majority of them would fall into either category. If it’s even half, that’s over 2m people who wouldn’t be able to return to work – maybe for as long as 3 months if Summer childcare isn’t available. That’s going to have a devastating effect on our economy as lock-down measure ease.

With children in Europe and Asia returning to school with various levels of Social Distancing without any more spikes or waves, I’m worried the NUT are going to drag us all into another decade of austerity and poverty.

Schools now have got themselves in a situation where they don’t have an exit strategy.

It seems to be the way with Teachers unions that whatever is asked of Teachers Unions will always say NO first and argue about why later.

Well done for typing the words Cummings wants you to type. Gold star.

I’m just going to sit back and watch the attacks on members of “The Blob” unfold… and be glad I don’t know people as easily spoon fed as you.

…

A quick comment about schools… look into what Cummings did and said while at the DfE and afterwards. The risk to, and damage inflicted on, teaching staff, and the attempts to turn the public against any and all education bodies and unions is deliberate. He hates them, and you.

— Kelvin Owers (@spittingcat) June 9, 2020

From what I’m seeing Heads and Teachers unions are doing their upmost to avoid schools opening.

One assumes your sitting on the parents side of the fence and of course the media drip feed.

Certainly the two schools I have visibility into from family members….and in one case have to sit and listen to meetings for….your wrong.

How ever there are serious practical limitations on the infrastructure existing due to years of cuts and over crowding of facilities. Short of errecting marques on the sports fields the numbers don’t work. – and that’s jus the obvious one. There’s a whole heap of other issues that the head has been doing his utmost to get sorted but is hands tied in many cases by beauracracy and by funding to sort

But of course that’s. Just obstructive. We could stack em rack em and pack em and worry about it later as kids done transmit it anyway …….according to the gov .

With children in Europe and Asia returning to school with various levels of Social Distancing without any more spikes or waves, I’m worried the NUT are going to drag us all into another decade of austerity and poverty.

Point the first: Almost all of the places reopening schools have a lower case load in the community than we do.

Point the second: There definitely have been spikes centred around schools according to the BBC. I’ve seen references to South Korea, France and Germany, post lifting of lockdown restrictions.

I can only speak definitively about my child’s school – they opened on 1st June for R, Y1 and Y6. Were still planning as of yesterday to open on 29th for other years. As far as I see, the union is doing its job, protecting the lives of its members and the safety of the environment they are required to work in.

Wow P-Jay, the Daily Mail got you hook,line and sinker didn’t they!

We have very difficult choices ahead, and they are not binary, they are much more nuanced and detail laden than many of us realise or want.

It is highly unlikely that schools will return to any normality of timetable and provision until October, possibly longer.

This will be decisions made at a level which does not include usual parental engagement and voice. Culturally that is difficult – so many parents in the UK are now ‘consumers’ of childcare and schooling. This will be inflicted.

I’m involved in some small aspect of the planning with Scottish Government.

I have two big concerns at a UK wide level
– there is absolutely no extra money being made available
– that children’s mental and social health and wellbeing is being put at the back of the agenda.

@P-Jay I assume you are aware that when this all started the Teaching Unions met with the Government to offer to keep schools open for the vulnerable children? Ensuring that they went out of their way to feed them and keep them safe? Supporting the families and community whilst other support services had closed down? Keeping open during the holidays without question?

For my dept (science) I can say every pupil has had work, whether they have engaged is another matter, and every piece that has been returned has been marked. I missed a few days when I was in the hub but caught up.
As for return we are looking at 15th for staff but ScotGov and unions agree there needs to be a purpose and a cleaning regime as well as social distancing. In the meantime we’ll keep pumping out work and marking it. Today was tough as it was change of timetable.
We need to know how council want to run the blended learning model and we need to know soon, as holidays start in 3 weeks and communication, not work done, drops off in the holiday period.

that children’s mental and social health and wellbeing is being put at the back of the agenda.

This is the concern for my son. He is 6 but we have spent the last two years gradually building his confidence. Now he may not see any friends for 6 months I am concerned what impact it may have on his social health. My wife and I can cover the teaching but we cant provide him the social interaction with peers that he requires and at the moment Im not sure when or how we can get him any :-(.

He cant even see his Nanny and Grandy FFS (they are a 3 hour drive away – more than I consider reasonable under the guidance) but as long as people can get down the pub.

Well, my kids school and college are setting work and providing feedback. Our two are bright and conscientious, so we’ve no concern as far as remote teaching is concerned.

I don’t believe unions are being deliberately obstructive, but quite how we progress I don’t know. As far as I can tell local schools have done all they can to get as many kids in on any given day, subject to space restrictions.

There needs to be some proper plans in place for September or some kids will really lose a whole year of schooling at this rate, and with parents losing their jobs it will get very hard to unravel.

that children’s mental and social health and wellbeing is being put at the back of the agenda.

Although in our area there is now a focus on trauma and bereavement training to enable the schools to support the kids. Not sure if that is National though.

Well done for typing the words Cummings wants you to type. Gold star.

Do you actually believe that Cummings is behind this? You really are deluded. Same as Spin and his Daily Mail default setting.

If you are a teacher let’s have your master plan for reopening. Or even online lessons. Give us something.

As a parent all I see is teachers hiding behind the unions finding reasons not to do what they should be doing.

I have two big concerns at a UK wide level
– there is absolutely no extra money being made available
– that children’s mental and social health and wellbeing is being put at the back of the agenda.

**** shameful that there’s no extra money when it’s so clearly needed. Hundreds of billions made available to keep the economy running, **** all for education. Tories will Tory 🙁
Why would you say that about the back of the agenda? I thought social aspects of schooling were a big part of the discussion? Am I wrong? At a local level, it was one of the first points from our HT. Robbo, can you get your lad on facetime or similar with friends? We did a movie night last week and my daughter enjoyed that (simultaneous start on Netflix.

My kids school (grammar) has just announced that they wont be opening this side of September (no real surprise there) and even then they are looking at 2 days a week in school maximum – half the school at a time plus closed on Wednesdays for deep cleaning between the two halves.

They say there will be online learning as well, but franbkly so far this has been very minimal – they simply dont have the resources or skills to deliver work online. My son has never taken more than 45 minutes to get the work set done, and like others it is never marked. As he is in year 7 I have a real concern that allowances will be made for those doing A levels / GCSEs next year, and maybe the year after, but his year could easily be forgotten. He has in effect missed 6 months of schooling already, and whilst he is smart, he has the self motivation levels common to most 12 year olds! We have sone our best (whilst working from home and dealing with a whole lead of university/workign abroad issues with our three older kids) but there is only so much we as parents can do.

Moving teaching online is far from simple – having done some high quality online courses (a post graduate qualification with the Open University) and plenty of rubbish e-learning, schools will take some time and investment to get to the required level. I do however think that this is required if we are to avoid a whole generation missing out on an education.

What is needed for some form of proper schooling to occur from September? Funding is definitely part of it, as is a radical rethink if what schooling actually entails – as well as education it provides socialisation and childcare. If online learning is here to stay then schools need massive support to develop this, as well as support (laptops/broadband etc) to those families that havent already got access.

If there is to be some form of face to face teaching (which is essential for the social aspect of schools) then there needs to be investment in buildings, a volunteer army of parents and others who can take some of the strain of managing hundreds of kids, and a rethink of teaching hours and holidays – which in effect means more teachers. It might also make sense to look again at scrapping GCSEs as the requirement to be in school or education/employment until 18 has rendered these slightly obsolete.

Oh and some recognition that in rural areas children are bussed into schools from 30 or more miles away, and any social distancing solution needs to think about 65 kids crammed into an old double decker bus for an hour twice a day with just the driver to keep control…

So quite straightforward really (/sarcasm).

Ok here you are my lessons for the week. Most have booklets and information to work through. I have asked for each to be returned at various times depending on the classes timetable and each is about 2hrs, as that’s what we’ve been told. The lessons are set for the levels so N3 is slightly easier than N4. It took all morning to put these into teams and satche:one and not all are set to start today as not all classes are timetabled for today. I also set the work for the higher Chem class but that was posted by another teacher. I set it as I’m the “expert” on the course.
The whole school work calendar is viewable by all so we can arrange work and avoid clashes.
We don’t know how the blended learning model will look as there is no guidance yet but it is probable that senior classes will get more face to face time and that the school will run Mon/Tues deep clean Thurs/Fri, which gives wed to get the online stuff for various classes up and running for the next week/time out of class. All schools go back 11th August but staff will need some time in school to sort out the classroom. We hope also to get in from the 15th june but how that will work is more of an issue.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CBNvELfDMwD/?igshid=tmckb0962dri

and a rethink of teaching hours and holidays – which in effect means more teachers.

Indeed. A modicum of flexibility would do wonders, I think.

But your Sept suggestion is also circulating at one of my kids school. It’s the usual shortsighted muddle headed nonsense.

Kids will mingle all summer, and then be split up for classes. Why? What is the value of that?

And when kids are doing options and intermingling for each subject, how would that work?

If you are a teacher let’s have your master plan for reopening. Or even online lessons. Give us something.

As a parent all I see is teachers hiding behind the unions finding reasons not to do what they should be doing.

Teachers are not responsible for this, let’s be clear. Equally, I wouldn’t expect my business to demand solutions from the operatives.
Unions are merely asking for a strategy of reopening which is in line with the rest of society, or at least elaborates on why additional risk is acceptable for teachers, students and their families, but unacceptable elsewhere. Seems fair to me. Or are you looking at the elevated death rates of bus drivers, for example, shrugging your shoulders and thinking it goes with the territory? I struggled with front line heightened risks as well, until TJ pointed out potential exposure to infectious diseases goes with the territory.

But your Sept suggestion is also circulating at one of my kids school. It’s the usual shortsighted muddle headed nonsense.

so i see your outraged but instead of apportioning blame – whats your solution ? ive not seen you provide any yet other than that teachers are lazy and need to try harder.

@RichPenny yeh we have done some facetime and stuff but I think the novelty is wearing off. Something we have managed to do in the last couple of days is set up a Minecraft world he can play with his cousins. They facetime each other whilst doing it and have been playing hide and seek and stuff where they have building challenges but is as close as he gets to playing with someone. One of the issues of being an only child I guess. We play with him but I don’t think we are on the same level!

@boomerlives as in every job there are slackers. Yes our unions are strong but that’s good because we need them to be.
You know why you don’t know how it will work. Because no one does…
It’s not a secret we’re waiting to be told then we’ll see how it’ll fit into a real life classroom.
And you know what we want it to be robust because kids and parents will pick holes in it if it isn’t and it’ll be the front line staff that cop the shit. So we want it to work so we don’t look like dicks because in 3 years time when you’ve moved on to the next moan about teachers the “didn’t they mess up covid” will still haunt us.
Have you asked what the school plan is re sending out work and getting feedback? Or does that not allow this ALL teachers through their unions are lazy narrative?

ive not seen you provide any yet other than that teachers are lazy and need to try harder.

Look harder.

I’ve suggested online sessions. I suggested video-ing lessons. I even hinted that marking work done and feedback might be ‘a good thing’

I even pointed out in March that once you shut schools, it’s a real problem to open them again.

And here we are.

At some point, schools’ will have to reopen, fully. The sooner this is accepted and planned for, the better.

Just kicking the problem into the long grass and blaming bogeyman du jour Cummings is just a distraction.

I’ve suggested online sessions. I suggested video-ing lessons. I even hinted that marking work done and feedback might be ‘a good thing’

Suggesting what most of us are doing. (Maybe not in your not statistically relevant experience).

Edit
https://www.gov.scot/publications/covid-19-education-recovery-group-april-2020/

Wow P-Jay, the Daily Mail got you hook,line and sinker didn’t they!

I’ve never read that rag in my life.

No hyperbole on my side, that’s what I’ve encountered and that’s how I feel.

I can’t reply to boomer without setting off the swear filters.

Boomer for education minister.

The answer is obvious. How did they miss it.

Blaming teachers is pretty desperate when the guidance from government is so contradictory & confused

without a track & trace system in place to handle any new cases reopening is risking a lot of deaths

Im sure teachers could be doing more- ours have been helpful, but its been incredibly hard as we try & wfh & keep the kids on top of their work & were lucky enough to have boradband, a printer a table etc so they can do much online.

The fact is that its the government who proposed a policy without first thinking how to work it through whilst holding up countries that have returned kids as an example, but without then adopting the same techniques those countries are using!
eg Denmark using closed museums & libraries as extra teaching space to allow for distancing

hence another embaressing government u-turn that is damaging the lives & prospects of many children

And for information, it is not as simple as that on the continent. At my kids school in France, only 2 days a week, every other week. End of year is 4th July. Basically they have 4 days at school left.
And 8 weeks summer holiday.

The attacks on teachers and school are totally unfair.

I can’t reply to boomer without setting off the swear filters.

You need to work on your vocabulary in that case. If only there was a formal setting for such a venture.

I’ve never read that rag in my life.

Maybe you should start? I think the two of you could be very happy together. 🙂

Schools now have got themselves in a situation where they don’t have an exit strategy.

Schools? We were told to close, we closed, now we are told to reopen following certain guidelines that in many cases are not possible. I cant see how this is the schools fault, maybe you could enlighten me?

Daughter (primary teacher in London) was told she was switching years and to be back in the classroom on Monday. Switching years means a whole lot extra work above what she’s been doing. Then told only 40 kids turning up in the whole school so she’s now on reserve. She’d been in doing risk assessments etc and said the restrictions were such that she expected the 40 to decline by the summer. She has kept her kids working, when I spoke with her yesterday she had just made 23 phone calls. On top of her paid work she has read a bundle of kids’ books on YT. I’m sure she’s not an exception.
In this instance, it’s the parents, not unions, that are challenging government advice.