Our children have the right to an education.

[NameChange738676756]

So many posts about whether schools will be safe when they reopen but I’m not seeing this point made. Lots of discussion around the childcare that schools provide and the importance on children socially.

My 11 year old has lost all interest and I can’t get him to do anything significant. We’ve had one zoom social with his teacher and classmates. So pretty much zero learning going on.

We know children are less susceptible and there is some discussion around whether they’re transmitting less. The children of key workers (i.e. the ones more likely to catch and spread it) have been at school the whole time and as far as I know there haven’t been massive outbreaks in schools.

So I think I just want to loudly shout: our children have the right to an education.

How can there be 'zero learning' going on when your child has a parent? Education is not the sole responsibilty of the school - even when things were normal.

She’s paid a very decent salary to educate my child

The 'decent salary' comment aside, you have no entitlement to know anything at all about your child's teacher. She could be ill, she could have had someone die, she could have had a mental breakdown, she could have had a car crash, she could be pregnant and suffering with hypermesis and officially 'off sick', she could have received a life-changing diagnosis she's trying to get her head around....so much could have happened to any teacher who apparently isn't working at the current time and it is absolutely none of your fucking business what that might be. Jesus fucking wept.

This thread is the gift that keeps giving.

So teachers have zero accountability for how they spend their time, are subject to no scrutiny by their SLT and consider any parents who criticise them to be failing in their parental duty to educate their child.

Oh and they'll go back to work with PPE. Except they don't know what PPE they want and if you offer them the usual level of PPE that everyone else has aside from Intensive Care medical staff (who are, you know dealing with Covid patients who are at deaths door, not children who are fit and well) then the concern is NOT for PPE it's in case children spread the virus.

Unfuckingbelieveable.

DS's teacher apologised for sending work 'late' the other day at 10pm instead of the usual 6.30pm because she's obviously been getting shit off the parents.

She’s paid a very decent salary to educate my child
If you don't like it, complain to Ofsted or go private and see how expense your child's teacher is.

I think the problem is that a lot of people don't realise how many seemingly healthy adults have underlying health problems. I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, but other parents in the playground wouldn't have realised that! COVID-19 affected me very badly and I'm a long way from better even now. My DH has asthma, but he hasn't had a day off sick from work in over 5 years.

There are a lot of vulnerable people around, teachers, parents and some children. Please bear that in mind.

Second time I’ve heard somebody say that one of the difficulties in educating your child at home is lack of guidance.

I’d like to teach history but I don’t know what history topics they would normally be doing this term. I could even do art if I was given some ideas. Geography, French, loads of things.

Between us, DH have university degrees and A levels in maths, physics, chemistry, French, English and geography. We’d be able to have a good stab at most things if given some direction. It might even be fun.

Instead I’m presented with really inconsistent uploading of worksheets (my Y6 can identify nouns, that worksheet took about three minutes).

On the one hand, teachers rightly point out that there’s more to education than the academic stuff, but then they only upload English and maths worksheets, and there’s no guidance on what else they’ve missed that we might help them catch up on. PHSE topics, for example.

Many years ago, DD was refused permission to finish school 15 minutes early in YR to complete some swimming lessons. I think there were three lessons left in the course.

This was despite my explaining that the reason for the lessons was her having almost drowned in a pool the previous year, and her being very nervous around water. She was 4 at the time, so below the legal age for compulsory education.

The reason given was that she would miss her ‘citizenship’ session. I think there will be lots of parents just doing their own thing and flouting rules in future, because the rules will be so hard to justify after this episode. It’s actually going to be really hard to get some of them back on board.

a) Not all children are healthy
b) Not all adults in school are healthy
c) Not all adults in school are under 45
d) Previously healthy children who pick up the virus in school and take it home to their parents and anyone else living with them
e) R will increase as a result
f) The further R increases, the more likely we are to need another lockdown

But what about any of this will be different in September? Or January? Or any other arbitrary date?

By that line of thinking, schools will never reopen and teachers should all be made redundant. Is that what you're advocating?

@Jojobar sums it up to me
Even moaning about the notice now he clearly said 3 weeks notice would be given and this could include half term plus surely head teachers were considering this a possibility especially once schools in Europe started going back
He has also very clearly said if the r rate is too high it will not happen June the 1st , you won’t be going back at current numbers only if they are going down

Also, I wish people would stop going on about PPE

I cant help but wonder, if the NHS had been properly stocked with PPE so that Joe Public never got to hear about it all over the news, whether that would of meant all the other professions out there would have just gone back to work regardless of what PPE measures were in place. Hearing about it all the time and the different varients etc has just increased the fear factor.

so much could have happened to any teacher who apparently isn't working at the current time and it is absolutely none of your fucking business what that might be. Jesus fucking wept

See, this just says so much to me about the difference in public and private sector expectations.

So, my son’s teacher is essentially checked out and I have no rights to whatsoever to have that service provided by someone else or even a courtesy email from someone to let me know that service will not be forthcoming?

If private sector workers carried on like that with their clients they wouldn’t have any. Their businesses would be bust.

If anything happened to me that I couldn’t deliver my commitments to clients, my boss would be managing that situation and delivering in some other way.

Dropping the ball, going off grid, delivering bare minimum is somehow ok for teachers to do right now? On full pay?

*I don't see this outcry from teachers in other countries who have gone back ?

You should hear the noise from Australia.*

Really? I live in Australia and most of it isn’t noisy. There’s trepidation in Melbourne and Sydney, maybe but more of a loud whisper, at most. In many states primary up to and inclusive of year 1 and years 11/12 are back with the rest back in a few weeks. Most people are sending their children back happily. Although if you read the Guardian Australia it echoes the “not until it’s safe” comments from here.

I'm not going to lie. I want schools back as I think we need to learn to live with the virus and schools returning is part of that. I have no concerns about my children going back into their existing class without any social distancing. I do not think the risk for them being in school is any greater than it is any other time.

I accept that its not the same for teachers and other school staff. And it is right that your employer should protect you. How that is done, I don't know. I would have no objections to PPE being worn.

Our school have done a good job with the kids learning. I have no complaints. I will also follow the advice of the school re returning and have total faith in our HT. If she doesn't think its safe then they won't return.

But if teachers win the battle for now, I really don't see how september will be different. My children will be different- and not for the better. They still won't be at risk. But CV will still be about. Plus all the other nasties that kick off in the Autumn term.

I really feel strongly that if schools don't open then we can't start visiting others.

Its most likely to spread in family groups.

If you are not prepared to go to school, or send your child to school then you really do need to isolate form others as much as possible, over the next 4 months.

So teachers have zero accountability for how they spend their time, are subject to no scrutiny by their SLT and consider any parents who criticise them to be failing in their parental duty to educate their child

Teachers using Teams experience massive scrutiny by SLT. My SLT can listen to any one of my lessons I give online and see what work I have set and what I have or haven't marked. If you don't like what your school is doing, complain. Make an actual formal complaint but base it in fact not Daily Mail fiction.

Oh and they'll go back to work with PPE. Except they don't know what PPE they want and if you offer them the usual level of PPE that everyone else has aside from Intensive Care medical staff (who are, you know dealing with Covid patients who are at deaths door, not children who are fit and well) then the concern is NOT for PPE it's in case children spread the virus

Teachers on this thread have made it quite clear that what they want is to understand the risk properly so that they are able to minimize the risk for themselves, their students and the wider community. They want the financial support to be able to help them minimize the risk. That might include PPE. It might not. But it shouldn't include 'you don't need PPE' from the Government on the one hand when on the other they are saying 'You need a basic form of PPE, a mask, to go on public transport or go to the supermarket'. Because if I'm at risk on crowded public transport or in a crowded supermarket (or indeed, am a risk myself to other people) then I am at risk (and a risk to others) in a classroom.

Unfuckingbelievable that you have read post after post and not seen that.

Kids should be at school and people should be back to work. We should never have had a lockdown in the first place. Look after the vulnerable but the healthy folks should be carrying on as normal. The virus is nasty for those it hits badly (very few) but near everyone will suffer from the ramifications of the lockdown. And children not socialising is bad for their immune systems.

I know my opinion isn't popular, but come on, whoever heard of healthy people being put in quarantine and wearing gloves and masks? What a joke!

redtoothbrush

We usually get a sheet at the beginning of every term telling us what the learning goals are that term. What they will study in each curriculum area. It’s quite helpful usually.

Since Easter, nothing. So for this term, nothing. No guidance, no idea what would be on the curriculum. It’s possible to look up the National curriculum and pick it apart, but you’re never 100% sure what’s been covered. The teacher does know, however.

A simple sheet explaining topics like ‘research the Romans’ or ‘learn French words connected with school’ would take about an hour maximum to prepare and email out. If parents chose not to engage with that, they’d have no resin to complain. Though I accept that some are still working.

It’s not an unreasonable expectation, it’s not expensive or time consuming. I’m astonished that our school didn’t have even that level of initiative or expectation placed on them.

So I think I just want to loudly shout: our children have the right to an education.

OP legally, responsibility for a child's education rests with the parents. If you're child is not being educated at home that's on you!
Teachers have a right to be safe at work just like other key workers who come into close contact with many people from outside their household. Yes, most kids are missing school and the closure of schools and lockdown in general is taking its toll on many of us in terms of mental health. However this does not justify risking the health of teachers and pupils and their families at a time when the virus is still spreading widely in the community.

I agree with the OP. There’s so much hysteria about CV19 and almost none of it is justified.

According to the Kings Fund, there are about 850,000 older adults receiving social care and a further 1.5 million who need it but aren’t able to access it, so close to 2.5m people. The UK has a total population of about 66.7m.

Deaths attributed to CV19 are between 30,000-35,000, and many of those are people who would have likely died anyway, eg Comedian Eddie Large who was apparently in hospital with heart failure when he caught CV19 and then died.

This means that even among the most vulnerable, the risk is still low. In the population as a whole, absent relevant medical vulnerability, people are highly unlikely to suffer from this, ie if they catch it, they will not become seriously ill.

But many people are suffering from the lockdown. Normal medical care has stopped, as has education. Talking about waiting for the R to fall ignores the fact that the majority of transmission is now in hospital or care homes...the R in the community is not published but is certainly far lower.

It is also the case that the science behind the 2m guidance is non-existent....there is some evidence for 1m having some benefit, but 2m is excessive.

A return to school trying to maintain a 1m distance would be far more feasible, but as the risks of either transmitting CV19 or actually becoming sick from it within school populations is tiny, there is really no justification for not re-opening schools. Talk of “safe working environments”, PPE in schools etc is seriously OTT.

The harms from the lockdown outweigh the benefits for all but the most medically vulnerable, and while needing to shield is obviously very burdensome for those concerned, if they’re shielding thoroughly they are not more protected by the existence of a more general lockdown. Therefore we need to get back to normal life for everyone else, and in particular we need to re-open schools and regular medical care.

People need to realise that covid19 isn't going to go away, ever. It is in circulation now and always be. Yes there may be a vaccine, there may not. A vaccine may be 100% effective (doubtful) or it may have to be rolled out every year. SARS has been around for 18 years with no vaccine yet available. If we don't start trying to get things back up and running what is the alternative?

The virus is nasty for those it hits badly (very few)

Around 20% of people that we know have contracted the virus have ended up in hospital. That's thousands of people. Not a few. Many more people are struggling 2 months later after diagnosis. Again, this is not a few people.

I genuinely don't know the answer but to suggest only a 'few' people are struggling is just plain wrong.

Your child has the right to an education. So teach them..

There has never been more resources available for learning at home. It's not forever but right now you are the best placed person to educate him.

The majority of my friends privately educate and it is true that the support that their schools provide is simply incredible. Working parents are accommodated with 1-to-1 when the parents' timetable allows, and every child seems to be set tailored tasks.
I sent back completed worksheets in the first two weeks of this term. The feedback was "WELL DONE". Despite my child struggling with one of the questions, and me encouraging them to write down a question to the teacher, asking for clarification.
A quick check on the class whatsapp showed that we have roughly 15 of "well dones" and 15 of "great jobs".

I havent read the full thread. I am lucky (in one way) that I'm furloughed as I can (try to) help my DC with their school work without having a full time job of my own to do.there has been much criticism of the OP and why isnt she motivating her child? But school is a whole experience. I think the loom lessons are good but I understand that they are probably more time consuming for teachers who may have their own DC to look after. I have a friend who is a teacher, and shes really honest about struggling with homeschooling her own kids!
Working with peers, having discussions or debates, asking a teacher for clarification or help (in real time) are all things that can't be replicated however many bbc bitesize you watch or worksheets you print off. I have been really impressed at how responsive my DS teacher has been via email (and some of DDs teachers - although she contacts them herself) when we've had a query but it isnt the same as interactive learning with teachers and peers. Also I dont gave the same authority or vocabulary as a teacher, in persuading my DS to do a bit more/change something that I think may need more detail.

That said, as long as I am at home I'm ok with them being at home but my DC do want to go back. It's such a tricky situation and I dont blame schools for not wanting to rush back. Also a lot of parents will still want to keep their DC at home but will be expecting the same level of remote learning which will put a lot of pressure on the teachers as they cant teach in the class room and remotely simultaneously.

A return to school trying to maintain a 1m distance would be far more feasible, but as the risks of either transmitting CV19 or actually becoming sick from it within school populations is tiny, there is really no justification for not re-opening schools

Please point me to the science behind that because it contradicts many things I have read.

@Lostmyshityear9
Around 20% of people that we know have contracted the virus have ended up in hospital. That's thousands of people. Not a few.

I'd respond but @ostinato put it beautifully

This:

"But many people are suffering from the lockdown. Normal medical care has stopped, as has education. Talking about waiting for the R to fall ignores the fact that the majority of transmission is now in hospital or care homes...the R in the community is not published but is certainly far lower.
It is also the case that the science behind the 2m guidance is non-existent....there is some evidence for 1m having some benefit, but 2m is excessive."

Indeed.