Aibu to be really cross about this breakfast club situation?

[Henni19]

My 3yo started at the school nursery on Thursday, his 5yo brother went into y1.
On Friday I put them into breakfast club as I had work.
School are still operating bubbles and all other restrictions (i am annoyed about this, although from a thread I posted the other day many disagreed with me).
Anyway it turns out my 3yo is the only child in the nursery bubble in breakfast club so they made him sit at a table on his own for the whole hour, while his brother sat the other side of the hall with his friends.
My eldest saw him crying asking for me and asked if he could sit with him but was told he wasn't allowed.
Only 2 staff work there and they both greeted us so no confusion over them being brothers, sounds like just taking the bubble rule to the extreme.
I cant work out if I am more devastated or bloody fuming about it.
Aibu to send an email to school asking them to use some common sense?
2 days in and 3yo already doesn't want to go back ☹

Ridiculous! Put him and his brother together on the table, they arrived together!

Any result Henii?

Well this was the response... thoughts?
Basically told that nothing will be changing 😔 but reassured more nursery kids will be in wraparound from this week.
Have I misunderstood the PCR thing, I thought a test was recommended but not compulsory. The dep.head also spoke to me at the end of the day to reiterate nobody would be allowed into school from that bubble should there be a positive case until they've had negative pcr?! She believes this is the goverment guidelines.

Oh dear. Can you find the actual guidance?

PCR following contact is advised. Not mandatory.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/actions-for-schools-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak/schools-covid-19-operational-guidance#tracing

Any decision to recommend the reintroduction of ‘bubbles’ would not be taken lightly and would need to take account of the detrimental impact they can have on the delivery of education.

From the government guidance. It does not recommend bubbles.

I quoted the guidance on my email, and they seem to have totally overlooked it. I guess i have nowhere to turn.

@zombielady

Bugger, was expecting a thread about teenage detention films.

The thing I’m really cross about, with the Breakfast Club situation is that Allison speaks. I think she’s have been a stronger character by being completely mute.

Their argument only makes sense if you wanted your youngest to sit at the year one table.

If your eldest had went and sat alone at a table with youngest then the bubble wouldn't burst.

That head has it completely wrong. Schools don't do contact tracing any more, since step 4 of the roadmap - contact tracing done by 111 now, not schools or childcare settings. And no requirement to isolate yet alone get a PCR!

You can ask for their complaints procedure. If that was the response from the head, probably next step is chair of govs.

I would ask them very specifically "Whilst I understand why you would not want Bobby to join Billy's cohort (even though bubbles are no longer necessary) why can Billy not sit with Bobby while Bobby is alone?"

Make them put in writing why that specifically is not a solution in case they've overlooked it.

My DD was the only nursery child at breakfast club and had her own table of toys. The adults spoilt her a bit knowing she was independent and she was fine after a week. I was employed by school so knew that when she told me she was horribly unhappy and they didn't feed her, it was a lie. Give it some time.

This is horrible! This failing to prevent harm and they chose not to do something! Agree with pp - disgusting heartless behaviour!
@MayorGoodwaysChicken is spot on

Bubbles are irrelevant now! Bojo said!

We had exactly the same scenario this am- we sat the older sister with the younger brother.no issues

You've to remember the people staffing the club dont make the rules.

Where would the staff be if they let one of your sons into a different bubble and it turns out he's got covid? or someone in the bubble has it and he's not meant to be mixing?

How would you feel towards the school if you son got sent home because he was a close contact with someone he wasn't supposed to be mixing with?

This is really sad for your little one but I run a wraparound care scheme and unfortunately we have had children sat alone at times this last year. It's not always as simple as "why can't they sit with their siblings??" Firstly, where? It's been a table per class bubble with barely enough room to fit all the tables in with 1M in between. Secondly, play with what? We've had to disinfect toys and quarantine them for 3 days before using them in another bubble, anything that pair of siblings have played with is now out of commission for 3 days.

Its not ideal but we have always made an extra fuss of any child sat alone and made sure to keep them entertained and happy, it's been all we can do. Luckily none of our parents have complained and the children were brilliant. Also ours are now in year group bubbles which 2 classes per bubble for us. Whilst bubbles have supposedly been scrapped we still have a responsibility to contact trace, we can only do this by keeping the children in smaller bubbles.

@MrsVakarian when you say you still have a responsibility to contact trace can you give me more info on this please?
As my school have said the same yet the goverment website states the following -

**Settings only needed to do contact tracing up to and including 18 July. Close contacts will now be identified viaNHSTest and Trace and education settings will no longer be expected to undertake contact tracing.

“Bubbles” (I can’t even begin to describe how sick I am of that word) aren’t even supposed to be a thing anymore, for fuck’s sake.

I’d speak to the head. This is totally unacceptable.

This is just appalling, and also totally pointless because they live together. I would pull my children out of any childcare that behaved in such a cruel way to children immediately. It's shocking and actually abusive to tell his big brother he can't go to comfort him when they, as adults, have failed to meet his needs so badly that he is distressed.

It's not always as simple as "why can't they sit with their siblings??" Firstly, where? It's been a table per class bubble with barely enough room to fit all the tables in with 1M in between.

At the table designated for the 3-year-old's bubble, where he'd have been sitting alone had the sibling not joined him. You don't need an extra table for this. Presumably someone's wiping them down every day anyway - and if not, they should be!

Secondly, play with what? We've had to disinfect toys and quarantine them for 3 days before using them in another bubble, anything that pair of siblings have played with is now out of commission for 3 days.

The toys designated for the 3-year-old's bubble, that he'd have been playing with alone if his sibling hadn't joined him. The 5-year-old won't infect anyone else in the 3-year-old's bubble by contaminating the toys, because there are no other 3-year-olds there to play with them. That's the entire problem here. That said, quarantining them for three days after disinfecting them is seriously overkill. Why are you doing that?

@PurpleOkapi In our case the children in a bubble on their own are not on their own the whole time, I'm not sure if this is the case for the OP's child. Therefore the sibling cannot play with the toys as they are not in the same bubble. Re: the disinfecting/quarantining, this is what we have been asked to do, we are a very large setting at a large school and the school are concerned that wraparound care could be a huge infection risk, we understand this completely.

@Henni19 Our children do not even know every other child's name so how they could relay who they have been in contact with is a mystery to me. In fact I fail to see how many primary school aged children could do that. In the interests of minimising transmission in our school and setting it has been decided that the children will be remaining in smaller groups. Amongst my network of wraparound care managers and school staff I have not heard of a school that isn't keeping the children in smaller groups. Your child shouldn't be left alone and upset on a regular basis of course, I would hope that the setting is doing everything they can to get your child settled in.

Also to everyone who's saying that bubbles shouldn't be happening anymore anyway. I think most headteachers are worried that the government may have to go back on this decision over the winter and it will be extremely disruptive for the children and the schools as a whole, like it was the first time. We want to get back to normal as much as everyone, I can't wait to see the year 6 children play with the Reception children again, have boys of all ages play football together and just to have them sat around a snack table instead of eating at their seats

With that response I would consider moving both children to a more nurturing school. If they think it’s okay to do what they’ve done then I don’t think you can trust their judgement.

I would also make a complaint to Ofstead.

Some might say that’s over the top but I don’t think it’s is.

No bubbles at our school now. If they need to bring it back in then fair enough but even then… I am fairly confident they would never act this way with a child.