Anti Dementors picnic at the Loch.

[TheGreatWave]

Starting a new one.

@Mascotte I know you have a P7 too - just managed to get into the full doc which says :

" There should be a particular focus on
supporting children at key transition points (e.g.
due to start P1 or S1) which may include some
in-school experience in late June, where possible
and safe to implement, so that they are supported
to take the next steps in their education"

Key words being "may" and "where possible".

Yikes
Even Professor Karol Sikora

.,.has been censored by YouTube.

Frightening.

On looking at the full document, they are defining "blended learning" as 50% of time in school. Not so bad as my kids are at secondary (or will all be in August) and can come and go as they please.

But what do you do if your employer is trying to get round working again and school is saying your 6 year old is in school Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday morning one week, and Wednesday afternoon, Thursday and Friday the next?

Can't see even English schools being back and functional in September if that's the way Scotland are going. May as well drop outta uni now!

Hello everyone, hope you're all doing okay! Sorry, I kind of dropped off here for a while as my chemo knocked it out of me a bit. But I am better now!

I just posted a thread about shielding dilemmas on the Corona board and I'm fearful that dementors may be all over it...

Hope you're all doing okay

I'm surprised that schools are not more resistant to the idea that education is a luxury service and the state can stop providing it if it has other priorities.

I would have thought any union worth it's salt would be doing EVERYTHING to get schools back.

How many teachers do we really need if our kids don't go to school?

The thing about handwashing is interesting. It's actually surprisingly hard to get into the habit of washing hands all the time, but I got a good routine going before lockdown. But now that I see nobody and go nowhere, I have no reason for any additional handwashing. So once I do go somewhere after we are allowed to, I know I'll forget!!

12.30 Welsh speech was the head of NHS Dr Andrew Goodall. Unlike politicians he can be honest. in Wales 55 ICU beds in use, many not covid just normal icu. As for the spike in North Wales (cue the sky is falling in around here) it is because they started testing care homes for the first time. (Which is what I said all along). In Wales all along the NHS has not wanted care home residents moved to hospital or if they were shuffled back to care homes asap. This is what has spiked our numbers. Wales took the attitude that they were already in gods waiting room I believe. There may or maybe not a backlash legally from this.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-52738526

@LilacTree1 unherd.com/thepost/professor-karol-sikora-fear-is-more-dangerous-than-the-virus/
(for anyone who hasn't seen it)

@mascotte my son has just started 3rd year and now have no clue as to how he will receive enough education to pass his exams. The at home learning experience to date is not exactly great, a few bits of work given each day - maybe an hour or two and that's it. That doesn't replace 6 hours in school per day. Add in we all share 1 laptop (which is a work one, so might not have it long) so it's hard to do adequate school work.

How will teachers cope with blended learning? They will be in school all week with students physically there so how are they expected to also do online learning??

If I am lucky enough to be back at work by August then I can't physically get him to school apart from using the school bus, which seems to defeat the point of socially distancing at school.

I do really feel for these transitioning to either p1 or s1 as that's a big enough step under normal circumstances.

Great to see you back and to hear you're feeling better @Jourdain11

@justasking111 I really don’t understand why we’re not celebrating our success driving down the community rate in wales, whilst providing as much protection to people in care homes and hospitals as we can. I’m so happy to see the rate dropping, but angry that the government haven’t used this time to put additional protection in place whilst beginning the great unlocking. Instead they’ve moved the goalposts and whipped up the dementors to cover up their inaction

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-52738526 At least people are starting to ask questions about the lack of protection in cars homes

@Nihiloxica this has been a massive miscalculation by the unions.

They have taken the issue as a health and safety one and hung their hat on it as their core raison d'etre like the old days before the 74 H&S act largely removed their usefulness in this regard.

They have not been able to see beyond this that if apparently face to face teaching is not required like now/before the profession will be required to change at such a rapid pace that huge job losses will be inevitable.

If they want to maintain the status quo then they need to get the schools open. As soon as practicable.

Unfortunately too many unions still remember their glory days of the 50s and 60s to make this jump.

English people:

Are your playparks open?

PaulHollywoodsSexGut no, not around here (midlands)

How many teachers do we really need if our kids don't go to school?

I've wondered this - I assume they think we won't make any redundant especially as there are already teacher shortages in many subjects.

Unfortunately the shortages tend to be more in schools like my children go to.

Nope. Park is shut but some people have taken to climbing over the gates to go in anyway.

The Facebook dementors are about to implode over it.

Are your playparks open?

The one near me wasn’t at the weekend. I haven’t seen any announcements from the council to say they’ve re-opened so I assume they’re still closed

If they want to maintain the status quo thenthey need to get the schools open. As soon as practicable.

Absolutely. How it hasn't occurred to unions that the dept of education can produce e-learning materials at a fraction of the cost of employing teachers is beyond me. School budgets were already squeezed. Now we have a brave new world of blended learning being created, lots of people are predicting a rise in working from home, so why not axe a few thousand teachers and have schools finish teaching at lunchtime (save some money there too, no need to feed all those kids / run school kitchens) and then continue their education at home online in the afternoon?

I don't want this to happen. But I can easily see it, or something like it, coming in off the back of this. The unions are not protecting teachers in the long run.

Nope - not allowed to open the playparks yet. Only the middle class adults can have fun with their tennis and golf - kids must be seen and not heard, or preferably not seen either.

Kids can just stay inside as clearly they don’t need friends or an education.

What e learning has the government provided?

Just released 9 deaths in Wales... what the hell is Drakeford playing at.

Posted at14:00
BREAKINGNine more deaths in Wales with coronavirus
A further nine people have died with coronavirus in Wales, Public Health Wales (PHW) has said.

It brings the total number of confirmed deaths with Covid-19 in Wales to 1,247.

PHW figures also show there were 166 new cases, meaning as of Thursday 12,846 people have tested positive with coronavirus.

The true figure is likely to be higher as not everyone is tested.