Annoyed with schools with big classrooms only allowing 8 in a bubble

[abreviation]

Government guidelines clearly say primary school dc are not expected to social distance so bubbles of 15 instead (16 in pre school). Why are loads of schools deciding to have half this number? This basically prevents any other year groups any chance of returning.

I'm a teacher and I have to agree- we are a village school and we are prepared for bubbles of 14 children (currently got 8 in my bubble with more on their way in next few weeks) my other 14 year ones have been assigned a different classroom and there's currently 9 in there out of 14. Year 6 we have 2 bubbles of 13 and reception a bubble of 13 and one 11. Our normal classes are 28. We also have a teacher and TA assigned to each bubble.
I know another local village school only having 8 per bubble so can't even have all the key worker children back- let alone open it up to others. Yes there's guidance however I do think some schools could have more. It's not about teachers being lazy though at all- some schools are just maybe trying to get the best they can for their pupils x

15 is the maximum but you can't move 15 children in a queue safely around a school to lunch or toilets.

The risk assessment for that school and the risks and needs of the children in that bubble vary massively.

We have 10 in a group because that is the safe maximum presently for our school.

Reception children each have their own table for their bottles, equipment and work on top They have a tent under the table to work in.

We can't fit in more than 10 even in a large classroom.

@letseatgrandma
Don't know how to tag- we have 2 adults per bubble and some of these bubbles are 8 (mine included) x

The school will have to think about staff to student ratios, access to outdoor space, space to queue up 2m apart for lunch, access to toilets/hand washing facilities etc etc.

I know that parents and students have been asked to put up with a lot over the last few months but please please remember that the vast majority of teachers went into teaching because they like children and enjoy teaching. I teach in an SEMH secondary school. The students I teach are unpredictable, often emotionally unstable, occasionally violent, impulsive and struggling to deal with neglectful/abusive home lives. I miss the ones I can’t see like crazy. It honestly makes me so sad not seeing them every day and thinking about what might/might not be happening at home. Having to choose the 20 out of 60 we can accommodate part-time in school was one of the most heartbreaking meetings I’ve ever been part of. These decisions are not made on a whim or picking favourites.

(P.S I also think my students are intelligent, determined, brave, hilarious, wacky, kind, caring etc I was just making a point that they are the most challenging of the challenging and I adore them)

abreviation

Of course your kids school can get the children in. Every other school in the country has every child back in class. Has had for at least three weeks .

Except for yours.

They are doing it on purpose to annoy you. Sorry.

Another poster who thinks they know better than the risk assessment done by the school.

We looked at the children and the parents.

We choose children who have nice parents.

All the reasonably ones were excluded

Yanbu.

However I dont think its the schools faults. The guidance included a deliberate fudge so that the government did not have to bear responsibility - by saying bubbles of 8 were preferred although up to 16 permitted.

LOADS of schools and nurseries have interpreted this as being maximum 8 as they do not want to responsible for deciding to do 16. The government should never have put a range in as people would always have gone at the bottom of it.

I've been looking at the building I work in for social distancing when we're allowed to open up. I've been looking at 2m distancing in the rooms.

Our room that normally takes 60 (so is bigger than a normal classroom) can take 12, leaving a little space round the doors for people to come in and out, but the rest of the room people in spaces.

If you take a person and put them into a circle with 1m radius, that's 3.14m^2 they need. (You only need 1m as then added with the next person that makes 2m)
But I'm doing it for adults. With the adults, we can say they go in, sit down at the desk and need to stay there (barring emergencies) so not walking past people.
With the children you need space for a child (and the teacher) to move around-unless you're planning on sitting every child at a desk and saying they're not allowed to get up for any reason, and nor can the teacher go anywhere other than behind their own desk.

You've also got to consider corridors (esp at secondary where some of the teaching is in specialist rooms) and coming in/going out. And school transport-over half the children at my dc's school come by school or public transport, all pretty much full with only 1-2 standing spaces left.

Maybe they have much younger teachers and TAs whose own health isn't at risk being inside an enclosed classroom with 15 children.

Maybe their classrooms are small.

I'm over 50 with a husband who is several years older than me, as are a significant percentage of my school staff, so no, I don't fancy a stuffed classroom with no social distancing as we potentially won't fare as well if we get covid.

so yes, our school is doing smaller bubbles of 8-10 based on class size and fitness of available staff.

2 teachers per bubble-really?

What that is more likely to be is 1 teacher and 1 TA per bubble. Because it's not reasonable to ask TAs to be teachers in rooms by themselves all day long when they're not actually teachers or paid like teachers. A large percentage of TAs make barely above minimum wage; unreasonable to expect them to take on teaching roles and responsibilities for peanuts.

1. If you want the social distancing of 2m then 8 will be the number that fits in after measuring. Govment say NO MORE than 15, not that it should be 15. Some classrooms are smaller, plus you need a zone around the teacher to allow social distancing between teacher and nearest child's desk.
2. Teacher needs a break in day and time for planning. This means that it cannot just be one teacher per class. Plus, not all staff are full time meaning that there needs to be some flexibility.
3. Government have opened schools to specific year groups. Some parents have not decided yet to send their kids in. Some only send them in the days they are working etc etc. Schools cannot just decide themselves to override govment rules and say 'Oh let's fill up some more classes with Year 3 or whoever. They are following the rules of the DFE.
4. As more year groups return some bubbles will need to combine to make a bigger group. This can only happen if we are told to dump the 2m rule. Until this is the case, schools follow the rules.

I saw the lay-out of the classrooms being used for the returning year groups. There was absolutely no way that they could have squeezed more than 8 children and 2 adults into those rooms and still be following guidelines.

During the final week before lockdown, we actually had about 11 or 12 children in most classes due to high rates of absence.

We had to try to sit some of the children at separate tables because they couldn't grasp the concept of not sneezing or (fake) coughing everywhere. Even then they were still close enough for droplets to land on other children's desks. I know because I was the one who had to keep wiping the tables and reminding the children to get a tissue and clean their hands each time.

I'm over 50 with a husband who is several years older than me, as are a significant percentage of my school staff, so no, I don't fancy a stuffed classroom with no social distancing as we potentially won't fare as well if we get covid.

Not so great for the children to be too close together either.

Children can have pneumonia, with or without obvious symptoms. They can also experience sore throat, excessive fatigue or diarrhea. However, serious illness in children with COVID-19 is possible, and parents should stay alert if their child is diagnosed with, or shows signs of, the disease.
Milstone says, “Children are exposed to COVID-19 when the virus contacts their eyes, nose, mouth or lungs. This usually occurs when a nearby infected person coughs or sneezes, which releases respiratory droplets into the air and onto the child’s face or nearby surfaces such as tables, food or hands.”
He says the best way to prevent children from becoming sick with COVID-19 is to avoid exposing them to people who are (or who might be) sick with the virus:
• Avoid crowds. Keep kids away from crowded areas when possible.
• Stay away from sick people. Keep children at least 6 feet away from anyone who is sick with a cough or fever, including family members.
Coronavirus in Babies & Kids - Johns Hopkins Hospital
www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/coronavirus/coronavirus-in-babies-and-children

Rethinking Covid-19 in Children
There is new evidence that some children may become very sick, and we are beginning to learn more about who may be most at risk and what parents need to watch for.
www.nytimes.com/2020/05/12/well/family/coronavirus-children-covid-19.html

Christian Drosten, director of the Institute of Virology at Berlin's Charite hospital, urged policymakers to exercise caution when looking at studies examining the effects of COVID-19 on children. He pointed out that the findings of a Dutch study, which was used as evidence that children do not play a big role in spreading COVID-19, were not statistically significant.
According to his own research, Drosten said, children can carry as high levels of the coronavirus as adults. He and his colleagues warned "against an unlimited reopening of schools and kindergartens in the present situation."
www.businessinsider.com/children-do-transmit-covid-19-says-researcher-amid-confusion-2020-4?op=1&r=US&IR=T

This is a modern primary with large classrooms. Each classroom has a sink and a door to outside. They could have 15 children without a doubt.

Well if the room is empty and children sit on the floor.

Each child needs a desk / table, if it is normally 4 to a table you neeed four times as many. You also need each child to have their own paper, pens, crayons etc.

DD school is a tiny secondary, with 18 pupils in Y10. They were planning on having the whole year group back, using the whole school to ensure distancing.
But they've now said due to gov guidelines, then can only have 25% of a year group in, regardless of cohort size. That means opening up the school for 4 or 5 pupils per day. Not really worth it. Such a shame.

OP has no posting history.

Might I suggest that rather than replying to such goady posts we all just report this thread?

The extra space needed applies to the whole school.

@houselikeashed

DD school is a tiny secondary, with 18 pupils in Y10. They were planning on having the whole year group back, using the whole school to ensure distancing. But they've now said due to gov guidelines, then can only have 25% of a year group in, regardless of cohort size. That means opening up the school for 4 or 5 pupils per day. Not really worth it. Such a shame.

Not to mention the number of adults involved with opening a school. It’ll outnumber the children without question. But of course children don’t spread it, so they’d ok.

Each child would have a 4m square to have 2 metres on each side of them. 4m x 15 kids is a 60m square classroom. I've been teaching a long time and many primary classrooms aren't this size, especially when they've got added sinks, built in cupboards etc plus you can't exactly have children with nose to a wall or back to a wall (can't get chair out). It's not as easy as it first seems. My classroom can get 9 in maximum. Weve tried dozens of different furniture combinations, taken some furniture out etc but nope I can fit 9 kids in. I have a pretty large classroom and 2 other rooms in my school are much smaller.

Our school is having 8 per bubble in Foundation, 2 teachers as they need one to be able to take the kids to the toilet. A day in between to clean which means our Foundation child is getting 1 day a week of 5 hours. Her Year 4 sister will not be able to go back as the school is now full with just F, Yr1 and Yr6 back plus 4 groups of key workers. The only way school will ever be able to go back more than this is if they do away with the 2m social distancing.

It's difficult for schools as they have conflicting advice and are also under pressure from staff and parents.

However there are no known Corona virus outbreaks associated with schools or nurseries, and children have been found to transmit to each other and to adults only rarely.

It's a shame schools are taking this over cautious approach and harming children's education for no benefit. Hopefully more children will be able to attend very soon, after y1 and y6 have been in for a few weeks and the sky hasn't fallen in.