to be annoyed BJ was so vague about year 10s and 12s

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What did he mean when he said they may at least get some times with their teachers before schools break up? TBH it was so wishy washy I missed it the first time I listened to his plan. What do you think he meant?

My sister in laws school are preparing for some Y10 and Y12 from June 1st. Might be later but they are expecting some to return then.

The relevant bit in the 50 page document suggests they are hoping for some face to face time to complement the remote learning. So it doesn’t sound as though they’re expecting them to be back in full time. But I think it’s probably too early to really know what’s achievable.

The briefing said July 1st but the DofE document says June 1st for 10 and 12. It’s not massively clear what they want.

I think it's accepting secondary schools cannot run a full timetable for all pupils who are in school.

It's also allowing secondaries some flexibility of interpretation. If a school can only offer a once a week 121 meeting with tutor, so be it, that fits with guidelines. If another school can offer full time in school for all Y10/12 but core subjects only - fine. Maybe they can do part-time in school and core subjects only - that's also ok. Other (private?) schools may have the ability to give a full timetable, so they can if they want.

I think the vagueness is to allow individual schools to decide.

I’d be so happy if my ds could see his teachers even once a week. I think it would be hugely beneficial for his motivation and mood in general.

My thought was that they aren't pushing yr 10/12's back in because they know they're going to have to do something about the exams ( change the way they're assessed ?) and feel it wouldn't be fair to have some children able to go in and some others not - in the event their school isn't big enough for social distancing / lack of teachers/shielding children ? So it's better to limit them going back until sept etc when there's more of a chance of a fairer chance for an education?

I dunno really, that was just my thought!

I was confused as well because BJ said from 1st July but the Guidance document says from 1st June. I’m not entirely sure what the point is of my Year 10 going in if he isn’t actually going to be taught. He is desperate to go back but a 1-1 meeting with a teacher is his idea of hell. What would be useful is for a PE teacher to explain how on earth he is supposed to do his PE practicals when they aren’t at school and can’t do sport!

It sounded to me like 'face to face time' would be meetings to discuss exam choices etc

Our indie has scheduled 1:1 online meetings with the students for these discussions, they may move to face to face if the guidelines change, which I think would benefit the kids, but I think it's an unnecessary risk for the teachers

Maybe they're thinking some schools would like to do some very specific teaching of some pupils/some lessons?

It's quite a H&S process to open up a school (well, it is for the state infants & juniors I'm involved with) when it's been properly closed down & hopefully they'll leave it up to the school to decide what's best.

I certainly don't think he meant back to full timetable.

@namechangenumber2 that makes sense too. Don’t know what on earth will happen with exams next year it’s such a mess

More relevant to the infants/juniors, but 🤣🤣

What I think he meant was what he said. Of course they don't have a detailed plan of what that will look like. Things are changing every week and we're still in early May. How is anyone supposed to predict what will be appropriate in June or July? And how is he supposed to come up with a detailed plan of how that can be applied in every school in the country?

FFS.

We don't know what exactly it will mean for your children, OP, because no one knows that yet.

Yes I thought it was a very vague turn of phrase. Surely if some year 10 and 12s go back to school full time and others only see their tutor once a week then that will make the disparity between schools provisions even bigger.
I did think that by sending back the primary schools first it might be an indication that the plan is to change the 2021 gcses and a levels in some major way. Surely if it was business as usual with next years exams they would send the year 10s and 13s back asap.

@Amelie - thanks for the laugh

*year 12s

We don't know what exactly it will mean for your children, OP, because no one knows that yet.

Absolutely. People will moan about everything. Boris doesn't have a crystal ball, FFS.

I think everyone is confused by this OP. As I said in another thread, I took it to mean that primary years, reception, 1 and 6 are going back in the first wave on June 1st (now they’re saying 15 max per class). Would they have to then wait about 2 weeks to track the impact of this on infection rates? If the “R” number stays stable, they then hope to have all primary children back in schools for a month prior to the end of term. I think most schools finish on about 20th July in the state sector, so they would be looking at primary schools back by mid June?

I got the impression (though could be wrong) the Year 10s and 12s are seen as the “third wave” of returners, pending the results if opening primary schools on the “R” number. They seem to be taking one small step at a time,

Also, when it says, “some face-to-face time to support online learning”, this could mean anything

Plus the schools mine are in finish in early July anyway.

Nobody is moaning. Just would like to support my son who is extremely stressed and worried about the fact he is missing a huge amount of work. Yes everyone is in the same boat but it doesn’t stop him being upset and worried.

Our school has contacted us to say they are working on contact for Maths, Science and English, but with social distancing, they have worked out that would require 35 groupings of children and classrooms to be used in yr 10 alone per subject. I imagine it would only be a quick face to face check in and the logistics are pretty near impossible.

People conveniently forget when it comes to politics that their are usually bigger things in play - like the unions - Boris cant say for certain when schools will Be back and which year groups because the Unions are digging their heels in. But it's easier to criticise the government.

The unions are not 'digging their heels in'. They are protecting their staff from dangerous working conditions. Jesus Christ. I love how people criticise teachers when there's not a chance they could do the job themselves.

(waits to be told that, in fact, you are a headteacher with 65 yrs experience of teaching in the modern era ).

Johnson has confused everyone with his contradictory messages on everything so far. What he should not do is set hares running - yet that is exactly what he has done.

It should be noted that his statement (contradicted less than 24 hours later by the 50 page document) about Y10 and 12 was made entirely without consultation of or reference to school leaders.

Setting a hare running, causing confusion by stating two different dates - and not even having the decency to consult school leaders - is appalling mismanagement.

Why cant these years be taught virtually. My dd has been working very hard , long days. She has a private tutor for one subject and that works very well.

My son is being taught remotely as much as he can but doing GCSE PE is quite difficult at home with the practical aspect and I figure lots of subjects will be similar.

Ds is in y10 and I do think that they are the ones rather than current y11s that will have their education the most impacted. Current y11s will always be the ones that first missed their GCSEs but timings have meant that most of them had covered most of their syllabus and would have been in revision mode. Some who did badly in mocks but were hoping to turn things around for the real thing will never know but at least they will have covered their topics.

This year’s y10 are missing a huge chunk of teaching. It’s going to be really difficult for them to be fairly examined or assessed (especially for things like PE and DT, both of which ds does) so who knows what ripples it will have through their lives? I changed school for the 6th form and once I got. There discovered I couldn’t do the a level subjects I wanted as they had changed the way the subject groupings worked - so I had to make last minute changes, ended up doing a subject I ended up hating and it had an effect on the subjects I was then able to do or not do at uni which in turn meant I met dh and now have dc - so chances are if I had done the subjects I wanted at a level I would have done a different degree at a different uni and would now have a very different life... I think it will ultimately have similar effects on their life but as it’s a one way journey you’ll never know whay else might have been.

I usually like Boris’ style (not a popular opinion) but he was so wishy washy about the Y10/12 thing, We are left hanging.