Anyone got ideas on HOW secondary schools can go back full time in Sept?

[Fizzysours]

I am a teacher and I want schools back now. Many of my pupils are getting really low and lonely and about 40% are not managing the work we set. I just don't get how full time will work in Sept though because....
-with one metre distancing we can fit 20, not 30 in a class
-kids will have to sit at one desk all day, to reduce transmission on objects, teachers would rotate
-so if we 'set' the class for english, the setting will be totally wrong for maths, and vice versa, so what level do we teach them? They won't get good appropriate work, but a 'one size for all'- shockingly hard for them
-what about their options? Half of each bubble doing geography, half history etc.....
-how do they get lunch? We can only stagger it so much, with rotating teachers.
Anyone else thinking this is just going to be so hard? Do we give in and have school as normal, with the really high infection risks? If it's as above, these kids cannot be expected to perform at GCSE.

Have I missed some really simple solution? It just seems impossible. But they must come back. Home is just so hard for them.

@GeorgieTheGorgeousGoat teachers do not spend their time at the front of the class, what an outdated view! I never stop walking around them!

Yes I would have Ppe as otherwise I can’t go to the loo, the photocopier, leave me room without waking into 50 kids and no that is not ok with me. I am not ‘brave’. If they scrap SD in schools is masssive discrimination and I would expect them to accept liability if I got ill. You can’t say you have to distance in Asda but not in school. It’s bullshit.

Before the trolls jump on saying other places have to, that’s also not ok, very few people meet 1200 kids a day.

The recent paper stated 20 years old for transmission however if you delve it actually says between 15 and 25. So 20 nicely looks like secondary schools have a lower risk

My classes are not in the same sets for subjects so the teacher moving doesn’t work.

Loads of people saying well kids mix outside of school

What about the staff????????????? You know those 200 adults who run the bloody place????

With nearly three months to go, I'd imagine the social distancing will be removed or reduced...looks like it will soon be down from 2m to 1m...so I wouldn't be surprised if it had disappeared by then

@UmbrellaHat wow we are lazy?
Please outline your super plans?

Also why does everyone think this is going to vanish. Despite the gov dodgy reporting it isn’t going to vanish. Despite how much most of you detest teachers for whatever reason kids will be bringing it home.

Would you laugh and push teachers (because your bitter), back if one gave it to your child who passed it to your mum?

No social distancing in schools, possibly PPE for teachers/support staff.

@Thirtyrock39 they won’t last if they did it for the wrong reasons

Also pain in the arse for staff when we are dealing with this and trainees. And they are not ‘staff’, it doesn’t help. They take our classes, not different ones.

Children should go back to school normally.
Wearing masks at school is ridiculous.
If some parents are not happy they can keep their children at home

Just stop expecting them to social distance.
have realistic measures in place.

eg

1. every classroom has hand sanitizer at the door, every child who enters uses it, for every lesson, all through the day.
2. no large groups eg no assemblies
3. no hugging, touching, rough housing, hand shaking etc, no physical contact, including in pe
4. no sharing of equipment, so every must have their own stuff. This will obviously have a big knock on in some subjects (science, DT) so thinking about it kids wear gloves for those, or how you clean.
5. At the end of the day all the tables and backs of chairs and door handles are wiped with sanitizer
6. For families who really can't go back, due to very ill and shielding parents, kids siblings, zoom the lessons, and make sure they have a laptop at home. Fixed camera at the front and zoom, so kids not on camera, will require a bit of thought from teachers as they move round a room (eg have to return to the front to make a comment)

This would keep the infections down massively, Experiments have been done in classrooms around other infections, eg seasonal flu, colds and noro virus, and making kids wash their hands every time they enter the room decreases the number of infections within a class by 70+%.

Outside of school, loads and loads of people are not social disctancing, not keeping to 1m let alone 2 m. My son works in a phone shop, the shop is only abotu 3 m wide, so no-one is social distancing there. The queue outside Primark as I dropped him off showed no gaps between families, just a crowd. On the day shops opened, there were groups of teen eating ice creams in the town centre, no distancing. There have been parties and BBQs goig on all through lockdown, no distancing.

Let's be real. They aren't doing it outside school, so just accept that and let schools go back, no distancing.

[quote Davincitoad]@GeorgieTheGorgeousGoat teachers do not spend their time at the front of the class, what an outdated view! I never stop walking around them!

Yes I would have Ppe as otherwise I can’t go to the loo, the photocopier, leave me room without waking into 50 kids and no that is not ok with me. I am not ‘brave’. If they scrap SD in schools is masssive discrimination and I would expect them to accept liability if I got ill. You can’t say you have to distance in Asda but not in school. It’s bullshit.

Before the trolls jump on saying other places have to, that’s also not ok, very few people meet 1200 kids a day.

The recent paper stated 20 years old for transmission however if you delve it actually says between 15 and 25. So 20 nicely looks like secondary schools have a lower risk

My classes are not in the same sets for subjects so the teacher moving doesn’t work.[/quote]
So wear PPE? (Which I also said but you chose to ignore)

Look, frankly this is getting silly. I literally cannot think of another industry so insistent that they cannot return to work. Your actions have/will have devastating effects on thousands of children and their education. If you don’t want to teach anymore, maybe you need to consider another career. And yes I do sympathise, my Dh has worked throughout with the public, no social distancing/PPE and I have already returned to work in early years sector.

I'd like to see some changes in transport. We are in a city and children are packed like sardines on the buses, standing room only by the time my daughter gets on and far more people than you would get on a public bus.

There is no excuse for that @ColouringPencils! The school must put on more buses so they're less crowded. I thought all DC were supposed to have a seat on school buses?

Hopefully social distancing in schools will be scrapped. I'm back with my Reception class bubble and social distancing is an impossibility with them. We're really careful with cleaning and hand washing and wear masks when very close contact (e.g. Cleaning up grazes etc,) can't be avoided.
Surely in secondary schools the years 7,8,9 could be taught in bubbles. They all do the same subjects. Years 10 and 11 who have selected options will have to move around but could be super vigilant about hand hygiene. Extra buses could be put on for school runs.
My own children will be going into year 9 and 12 in September and I'm hoping like mad it will be full time.

If social distancing is still a thing "outside" then schools won't be having anything close to full numbers in September, regardless of what government says.

However, I fully expect social distancing to be abolished altogether during August to facilitate a full return. ATM people will say they still won't go back to normal, it's not safe etc, but they will. As we've seen already, as restrictions have been lifted people have been very keen to take advantage, even though many said they felt it was too soon.

What happens after that is anyone's guess, but the horrors predicted after the beaches etc haven't materialiaed yet.

I'm a school Governor and we've all been scratching our heads along with the SLT for weeks and haven't yet come up with an answer that means full time school.

Also we're a rural school who heavily relies on school buses. If social distancing is needed there it will be impossible to get them (or it would take all doing countless journeys and be too expensive).

I have a Y10 who went in for one morning last week. It irks me I hear the government say Y10 and y12 are 'in school seeing their friends'. While my dd found it ok, half the work she'd already covered as she's in an extension English class. She didn't have her normal teacher and isn't in a bubble with any friends.

The only way I can see it happening is no social distancing. Maybe masks? Hand gel? Testing available easily for schools like in Football?

I'm honestly at a stage where is happily send her back with no social distancing. I think this ravaging of years of educational is ridiculous now.

The next thing we'll be asking OFQUAL is how to deal with GCSE's and A levels for 2021. There's no way it can be situation normal.

the govt are NOT sharing their expectations...just making vague sweeping statements that sound good, without any thought as to practicalities

I thought they'd promised a full set of guidelines by the end of this month? They only made the announcement yesterday and the situation is changing all the time.

One idea would be to reorganize the time table. Instead of 5 or 6 periods of different subjects in a day, many of them repeated 4 /5 times a week

Go for a morning and afternoon period. So only having say maths twice a week but a full morning/ afternoon if it.

Headache for schools to regig the time table but reducing the number of kids each teacher has in a day and reduces the amount of moving around the school.

@Lunar567 teachers wearing masks is ridiculous why?

Oh wouldn't it be lovely if the Government really did share their plans and guidelines!!

Sadly schools are finding out plans at the same time as the general public and the DfE advice and guidelines comes out says it weeks later, with numerous draft versions and changes happening each week!

I think the Government have forgotten how secondary schools even work tbh though. All the plans are based on primaries. And even then they seem to have forgotten that many school classes are over 30.

My older two are in high school and they've been told this week that certain year groups will be back for one day a week and some Thursdays until December I think which I think is wrong as my oldest has exams next year this is in Edinburgh

@zafferana yes because the end of term is useful....

Any other teachers here getting tired of all these people who are not in education stating we are being unreasonable for wanting to know what the hell is going on?!

Because we are so terribly lazy obs.

I feel really awful for teachers and can understand their concerns for their safety. I would like to see all kids back in September and feel we should be supporting schools positively to achieve that. Why can’t we offer more funds for support staff? Extra buses? Whatever they need! I don’t have be answers by couldn’t the government be inviting Heads/ Union reps in to discuss their needs and make a plan together? I want students back in school with teachers who feel safe and happy.

I'm clinicallyVulnerable (not shielding) and I'm totally expecting the Government to say it's fine for me to be back in school full time with no SD needed. I also suspect they'll say that families with an extremely vulnerable person in their home can go back with no SD needed, so long as the shoulder person takes care.

It's the only way schools can return to ft for all.

They will also reduce the SD to 1m very soon (as they desperately all want to head to the pub ) and then by September none will be needed in schools at all, and bubbles can be changed or not needed anymore though they might say as a little side bite we can't have whole school assemblies.

As bubbles don't work for secondary at all, then the scrapping of them is the only way secondaries can return ft.

@Davincitoad I appreciate how frustrating it is, I hate all this uncertainty too, but the situation is changing weekly and we have no idea what it will be in September. The government could send out a 50-page document now and it could all be redundant in September! No one wants to have to spend money and transform the way schools look unless it's absolutely necessary.

Double the school estate. Double staffing. And school transport.
Then we could manage 1.5 m distancing.

What I am finding sad is that the government keeps “announcing” that schools will be back/with/without social distancing etc then the guidance comes out later and the poor head teachers then have to explain to parents why it can’t work in their school. For example in May the papers splashed the headlines everywhere that schools would be back 1st June, only for our headteacher to have to write an really apologetic letter that actually they could only accommodate Keyworker & reception children under the guidelines. Cue irate parents.