Just for info about teaching in the pandemic

[stayingaliveisawayoflife]

Hello

I am not writing this for sympathy at all or expecting people to ignore their own experiences but just for information.

In the first lockdown we were in teams either in school with key worker children or at home prepping work for online. We were told the national curriculum was suspended and children in school and at home should receive the same level of work. At this time we did not do any live work as we had children without access so there would be inequality. Our focus was well-being and providing learning activities for a small group of children from Reception to Year4. This meant writing complete new plans and trying to keep all the children safe by doing a lot of cleaning. We were with the children all day from 8 till 3.30 with no breaks. We stayed in our bubbles throughout just leaving to go to our designated toilet. We cleaned the classrooms first thing in the morning, before lunch, after lunch and at the end of the day.

If we were at home we put work on line. We had never done this before and we're starting from scratch trying to find activities with some learning but trying not to overwhelm parents who were also in a whole new world. This meant adding explanations to every activity and answering lots of emails.

I will carry on in the next post.

Every school was different. We didn’t do much, to be honest. I was in one day a week just supervising kids. Then set work but it took minutes.

But I know teachers in other schools had very different experiences. I just think we should be careful about ‘this happened in schools’ when people mean ‘this happened in my school.’

DS’s teacher did fuck all and nothing will ever convince me otherwise. The Monday dump of Twinkl worksheets that were never marked, no live lessons. First lockdown the school had only a handful of keyworker children so I know she was only doing 1 day a fortnight.

It was such a mixed experience.

Parents from my primary put the word out that a nearby primary was loading lots of stuff - a full timetable with worksheets and resource links on their website fully accessible to all - and using that.

In the meantime, we had a newsletter from the head blathering on how we should look for leaves on walks - to working parents. The newsletters stopped after - I promise I’m not making this up - one of the updates was that Mr Jones had a new personal best 5km and Miss Bradley had painted her lounge.

*names changed

Thank you for posting these examples - brings back memories

I too worked in school during the pandemic and have now retired - I don’t want to list the endless things we did ( including formatting all the laptops that arrived and then training parents through the window how to turn on a laptop)
I do know of other - ‘outstanding schools’ - that sent home lists of web pages or photocopiable worksheets!! It wasn’t all equal in terms of effort that schools made

However - what really gets my goat is the use of the phrase ‘when schools were shut’ it suggests that nothing went on and that teachers were at home. Schools were not shut.Many people who had nothing to do with schools during the pandemic are utterly staggered at what we did say in day out when they find out - this phrase ( schools shut)has done so much harm

thank you also to parents and all efforts to home school- many of the parents I knew were bowled over by the demands of the curriculum and were totally foxed by Y6 grammar !!

whilst we should be able to move on it’s the lack of clarity about what actually happened in schools that stops this happening - please remember all announcements about school closures etc were announced to the public and the schools at the same time. There was no heads up to what was about to happen and frankly all guidance form DfE was barely worth the time we had to take to read it ( and wait for the inevitable updates and clarifications)

I think part of the problem was definitely a lack of joined up policy from on high, which left children in some kind of lottery as to whether they had lessons, or worksheets, or sweet FA.
Funny (it's funny now, but it wasn't at the time) I was absolutely laid into on here for saying that at my school (secondary, south east) we were doing live lessons. Started on Skype (of all things) migrated to Zoom after about 10 days and then to Meet after Easter 2020. I honestly thought that was what everybody was doing. But no, I was apparently lying and inventing a narrative to make the teachers who weren't doing live lessons look bad.
PS I agree with pp that whilst the first 2020 lockdown was needed, subsequent ones were just lip service to fuck knows what.

digitaleditions.telegraph.co.uk/data/1262/reader/reader.html?social#!preferred/0/package/1262/pub/1262/page/60/article/391400

interesting take from the Telegraph

Nope, that definitely wasn't happening for that particular teacher. Nice try.

I think the effects of terrible teachers and/or terrible parents were just amplified. Often both. Now it's easy to see just how many children are being failed.

The scaremongering on her Nobelgiraffe and the followers with the tales of how teachers were more at risk that other groups, how they were dropping like flies were proved wrong when the statistics came out later.

I had threads detailing how covid was spreading in schools and how schools needed more safety measures to mitigate the spread of covid to try to keep them open. People at the time were making the laughable claim that kids didn't spread covid which was utter bollocks.

And I got a fuckton of abuse from people on here.

And then I was proved right. Schools did need safety measures to mitigate the spread of covid to keep them open, and it got to the point where the spread in schools couldn't be ignored any longer and the government closed them.

Utterly devastating that that had to happen, because people were sticking their fingers in their ears and pretending that what was going on in schools was fine, or actually throwing abuse at those who were trying to discuss the situation sensibly.

With reasonable measures, it's possible schools could have stayed open. That schools closed again is down to those who fought against those measures.

That’s the very opposite of what later data showed - clearly you either didn’t see it or chose to ignore it anyway.

Maximo2

Much of the "data" about the spread of covid in schools was taken from when schools were "closed" to most pupils.

It was completely irrelevant when schools then re-opened to all pupils.

Speak for yourself. I found it interesting and can empathise with what was said.

Agreed. And the later data showed the exact opposite of what the pp claimed.

Worked all lockdown. Sixth form college. Extra work. Strike today. Many of us can't make our mortgage payments etc. I spent over seven hours marking exam papers. My pay will be docked by over £100. Feel completely exhausted.

I still can't believe how children (who are the future) were shafted so badly by society. I always assumed we would put children's futures first but they were seen as walking disease vectors. My DDs school set her no work.

Thank you for your honesty. Teacher I know said similar things. Some worked harder elsewhere and many didn't.

The set work from my child's school would have taken minutes to set (link to various websites) and sent via email to all children in several classes with no differentiation. Then the teachers did their gardens. Children were failed massively. Parents did their best whilst also working either from home or going to work and leaving children home alone/with family even though it wasn't allowed etc.

But study after study up to 2021 showed that they weren't at a greater risk!
Have a google and see for yourself.

I am a teacher and at the end of my tether. I am fed up of being unable to teach my subject due to pupils’ poor behaviour and attitudes. Teaching during lockdown WAS hard, but COVID’s lasting impact on society has made it much harder now. I am counting the days until I can retire.

If that’s true, that some teachers were having to sign into primary schools daily and go in (unpaid on a rota) through Easter holidays, when across the country, other teachers did nothing, then I am furious. I had to leave my GCSE (yr 10 at the time) age son at home on his own every day and I genuinely thought we were all in the same boat.

I’m with those who say enough now. Some schools and teachers were great, some average and some terrible. The pandemic was awful for most people for different reasons. There is no need to make everything unique to teachers.

I absolutely agree that everyone had it bad and a terrible time was not unique to teachers. In fact, I feel for the poor front line hospital staff, care home staff and mums and dads trying to work from home and look after children far more.

However, as fortunate as I think I was…it’s still a relief to have a moan from time to time on a thread specific to teachers. It really doesn’t mean we think we had it the worst.

I'm good, but if you would like to provide evidence for your own point go ahead.

@Logicoutofthewindow It had already been explained to you that previous studies included figures compiled when schools were closed. Here is the data that showed the opposite. Can you not work Google?

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveycharacteristicsofpeopletestingpositiveforcovid19uk/16december2021