Eating standing up at school???

[JCWildWest]

Just wondering if this was the case for anyone else’s kids since returning school.

Secondary school, medium sized. Phased lunchtimes as expected, eating in the school hall but no seating of tables provided, so they stand and eat their lunch.

This just seems bizarre to me. I get that it’s because they don’t want to have to disinfect the tables and chairs but these are kids not cattle. And it’s their break, I think it’s mean not to allow them to sit and eat their dinner? I just can’t get my head round it.

Anyone else experiencing this?

Surely someone can wipe a table with a cloth, bloody hell.

It’s not about wiping the tables. It’s about reducing the number of people inside a room (a school break is essentially a ‘mass gathering’), reducing the length of interactions between staff and students, ensuring students aren’t sitting face to face for long periods...

Surely someone can wipe a table with a cloth, bloody hell.
And wipe the chairs/benches?
It goes on and on...

My children are also eating standing up outside. DD's outdoor social area has absolutely no sitting areas. DS at least has grass.

What will happen once it's cold and wet, I've no idea.

Wouldn't the answer be to have children bring in packed lunches/issue a free school meals packed lunch in the morning and have children eat at their desks before leaving the school buildings for breaktime?

You can expect secondary school children to make sure they leave the desk clean and tidy surely?

I think all this has a lot to do with the government refusing to give additional money for cleaning/staff to schools to help them manage this.

At my school we literally Do not have anywhere for kids or staff to eat safely. Older ones 6th form) are allowed out at lunch. We had no extra funding from government for sanitiser , picnic Benches outside etc. So everyone is wandering round eating. We can't use classroom as they are being cleaned and aired at lunchtimes

@Sootikinstew

Wouldn't the answer be to have children bring in packed lunches/issue a free school meals packed lunch in the morning and have children eat at their desks before leaving the school buildings for breaktime?

You can expect secondary school children to make sure they leave the desk clean and tidy surely?

They would need to be supervised and there aren't enough staff.

The answer surely is for pupils to sanitise their own chair/table? And the guidelines say they don’t have to socially distance from each other where it isn’t possible.

I’m not saying I agree with the guidelines necessarily but this sort of thing is why they say it.

At the school my DD's have just left they are doing grab and go and each year group has allocated classrooms or common rooms to eat in

They're also expected to behave and eat without being idiots

Parents are already complaining about them being unsupervised - they are secondary school pupils ffs. They should be able to be left in small groups unsupervised. When I was at primary school the P7's monitored the infants; high school kids shouldn't need an adult every second of the day.

The primary school is also doing lunch in classrooms.

Standing to eat isn't exactly good etiquette to teach children, but under the circumstances it's fine. They are getting an education, social interaction and nutrition as safely as possible.
My DD won't eat her lunch at school now as she won't eat outside under any circumstances. Her choice tbh, she has it in the car in the way home.

I don't think they'll be permanently damaged from standing rather than sitting. They'll get used to it and I'm sure they're sitting much of the rest of the day so I can't really see an issue.

My ds ate standing up all the through secondary afaik!

They use to go outside to where their group hung out.

They could always sit down on the hall floor? I'd just tell them to do that. I expect if a few do more will and school will realise sitting or standing makes no difference. In fact it's easier to social distance sitting as you don't move closer to someone naturally when talking!

All very bizarre and unnecessary. My DD just started high school. Very big grammar. No masks except on buses and in corridors. Staggered lunches so 2 yr groups in dinner hall at a time. They bubble in yr groups so can all sit together with a large space between them and the other year group in with them. If packed lunch they sit outside in benches. If weather bad they eat in form rooms.

I feel so sorry for kids who's school doesn't have common sense and goes over the top and ignores govt guidelines.

@TinyMetalBirds

Mine returned to school today. The canteen is now “grab and go”, and he had to eat is fish and chips out of a box standing up outside, not even in the canteen. He isn’t sure what they will do if it rains. Also, they have to wear masks all the time indoors, even in lessons. It all seems very harsh.

Please God tell me it's not true he had to eat his fish and chips outside?!? How will he get over the trauma!

Seriously now much of the world would feel grateful for that. Get a grip he's absolutely fine standing outside with his lunch. A big life skill is being able to adapt. It won't harm him.

My kids have to stand up and eat... Outside. Lord knows what will happen when it's raining heavily or snowing even! It really doesn't make sense, particularly as they are mixing so much anyway in different classes etc.

It makes me wonder, as many new covid-era rules do, what the impact of this is on disabled children.

I wasn't in a wheelchair at school but I couldn't stand comfortably for more than a few minutes at a time and certainly not to eat my lunch.

I imagine to accommodate similar children, they'll be potentially separated from their peers and yet another opportunity for them to feel included vanishes.

Don't get me started on councils who are closing off on-road parking and disabled spaces to widen pedestrian areas, lengthy one way systems around shops, benches being taped off, etc. I realise that's tangential but eating standing up just adds to a whole raft of measures that seem to place disabled people at the very bottom of the pile.

Same in our school. They have each year in these metal pen things they cannot mix they look like cattle 🙈

Those of you saying they should stay together in the hall etc as they’re together all day anyway are forgetting the other people in that hall. How many non school staff have to attend a mass gathering every day?

I love the ‘eat in your classroom before being excused for lunch’ idea, but that would cut off 10-15 mins of the last lesson before lunch, which would also be complained about.

I'm in a massive school. No one has to stand up. No one is wearing a mask (apart from.vulnerable staff). Kids all very blase about covid, especially the ones who keep telling me that kids can't catch it. Which is weird, cos my friend's son most definitely had it.

We had an email from school saying that even if it’s raining they will not be allowed inside at lunchtime under any circumstances, so kids need to wear a coat and bring an umbrella.
There are no tables or benches outside so they will have to eat standing up, in the rain, while trying to hold an umbrella.
It’s bloody ridiculous.

This was going on in the huge comp I worked at several years ago.the school had expanded but there was simply no room for a larger canteen. They ate hot food from boxes or had sandwiches. Very uncivilised but many schools simply don’t have the funding or space for everyone to sit even precovid.

Apart from anything else imagine the mess and the litter...

@AppleKatie

The answer surely is for pupils to sanitise their own chair/table? And the guidelines say they don’t have to socially distance from each other where it isn’t possible.

I’m not saying I agree with the guidelines necessarily but this sort of thing is why they say it.

Not exactly. It's a push to have social distancing if at all possible i.e. make changes to make it more possible wherever you can.

It's a subtle but important difference. Saying 'only do it if you can' means everyone can stop bothering to do it and just say it's too difficult. Saying 'do it whenever it's possible' means everyone has to try and make changes to make it more possible.

You have understood a subtlety that has passed by many SLT colleagues of my acquaintance 🤦‍♀️😆

DD is eating lunch standing up outside. They've been told to make sure they bring raincoats on wet days.

My older DSs at lunch while standing up/running around out of choice for the whole of high school and it never bothered them.

DD doesn't actually eat anything at school other than one cheese string, so she's it bothered. She might if it rains and is cold though.

Could your children come home for lunch....

Less for the school to have to accommodate.