Schooling - do you think there will be a choice?

[Missmummy88]

I know school threads have been done and no one really has any answers just speculation and guesses.

My question though is do you think we will have a choice whether to send our kids to school should they reopen in June?

In my personal situation dh is a shielder ( cancer and autoimmune and history of stroke) I am currently pregnant on furlough but 90% sure I’m being made redundant should furlough not be extended. If not I can work from home as only work part time online.

My kids have been so happy at homeschool. My 8yo maths has come very far with 1-1 learning (although I appreciate I have focused much more on maths and English than the full range of subjects)

My 5 yo is happy and engaged in the different activities we do, is doing well with handwriting, number formations, counting and reading.

Technically my 8yo falls under pupil premium as the pp stays with the child for 7 years as we claimed benefits while dh was ill when he was in foundation. Stats would say he is disadvantaged by virtue of this, but technically he’s not we are degree educated, no mortgage, financially stable.

I don’t want to send my kids back to school in June, to me it seems too early. The risk for us as a family, I believe, outweighs the benefits. Do you think there will be an element of choice? Particularly for those with shielders in the family?

Our school is accepting that staff and pupils with vulnerable people who are shielding in their household will not be expected back in school when it opens, if the official shielding period is still in place.

I want to believe my dd’s teachers will care enough about her GCSE’s to teach her online so her mother doesn’t potentially die and she can continue her education

You misunderstood me. This is not a question of care, compassion or dedication to the job.

It is about what is possible.

Teaching remotely (live lessons, regular marking, etc etc...) is currently taking me, on average from 9-3 each day. My job in school takes me from 7am-4.30 each day with regular (several a week) evenings of working plus a day at the weekend.

How could one person do both effectively? It is simply not possible.

Also I’d rather I (asthmatic) and my (elderly) family didn’t die too thanks all the same.

@PastMyBestBeforeDate
It’s only the case if you dc is in a special school , if in mainstream with a echo you can deregister without permission.

@AldiAisleOfCrap thanks for that :)

@AppleKatie I am shielding my outcome if I catch Covid 19 is considerable worse than yourself in the vulnerable group. Although I would be happy if all teachers in the vulnerable group could remain at home.
I would be hoping my dd could be virtually added to the classroom via a medium more appropriate than zoom.

You misunderstand me again.
I’m not angling to stay at home forever.

I’m just pointing out that the same person can’t provide remote education and face to face interaction at the same time.

Let’s not have a competition to see who’s more at risk. I’m sure you’ll win.

Doesn’t change the basic fact that you cannot have the moon on a stick though. There are limits.

@AppleKatie
No you misunderstand me, I don’t think you want to stay at home forever at all. I was sympathetic to vulnerable teachers back in schools!
And you are wrong schools can and will provide my dd with an in-line link up to her classrooms. It’s being planned now for my dd and other pupils.
Your attitude is appalling, I am thankful you do not teach in my dd’s school.

*online

😂how do you know I don’t?

I’ll leave you now. But if you seriously think that it’s fair or right for the teaching profession to do their jobs twice there’s no talking sense to you.

It is worth pointing out one final time though. That literally nobody thinks remote education is as good as the real thing and teachers who are more tired, stressed and overworked than normal cannot offer an effective programme in this way.

If forced they will fail.

But sure yes, I can well imagine the comforting BS that you’ve received from the school.

Priority 1: stay safe

Prority 2: education.

Surely it’ll be one set of teachers to do the online teaching, maybe centrally and those who are vulnerable too and a different set to teach in the classroom. I’ve thought for a while online teaching would be great for the poor buggers being made to work into their 60’s

@AppleKatie I don’t think you should do your job twice , dh used to be a teacher I understand the workload. It the refusal to be accommodating and do things a little differently I have an issue with.
Like I said my dd’s teacher will be teaching her and a couple of other children at the same time as the rest of the class. Any tic toks etc and my dd would be excluded she knows that, it’s a grammar school , the teachers are willing to take the risk.

If you have half of a year group in, surely one teacher (assuming two classes) can teach those who are there and the other (from home if needed) can provide the best that is possible under the circumstances to the children who are at home?

Refusal to be accommodating and do things differently? Yep I’ve heard it all now. You clearly have no idea what my days consist of and what the last few months have been like.

@AppleKatie once back in school obviously not currently.

What about the many schools that are not two form?

Just watching my ks1 lessons would be pretty rubbish! I talk for a minute, then wander and talk to the children doing an activity give feedback etc , stop the class when necessarily , introduces something for a minute or so and repeat etc. It would make terrible online viewing but it’s generally how younger children learn ( bad explanation I know but lessons are practical with shorts burst of talking for their short concentration spans) It’s why live teaching is so tricky for younger children.

What about the schools that have mixed classes, so you have one teacher teaching saying 3 years, that's hard enough in the classroom, never mind trying to do that simultaneously with remote learning.

You have a choice.
Just de-register your child from school and home school.
You lose your existing school place but the choice is (and always has been) yours

You know, deregistering may well not be the only choice for those who are shielding or those who have a parent who is shielding, as in the op.

You may well like that to be the case. You might think it is perfectly fine for someone to have to chose to put themselves at extreme risk of a virus or hold on to their child's place at school. You might like to think that nothing will will happen to support those families but actually, no-one has said that yet.

It comes to something when you have more faith in the compassion of a Tory government that the MN loudmouths.

If you have half of a year group in, surely one teacher (assuming two classes) can teach those who are there and the other (from home if needed) can provide the best that is possible under the circumstances to the children who are at home?

That would only be possibly if you weren’t a one-form entry, which many schools are.

What if it was 2-form entry though and most children in that year group were sent back? You’d have no social distancing, 2 nearly full classes and say 15 children at home, not being set work.

If you have half of a year group in, surely one teacher (assuming two classes) can teach those who are there and the other (from home if needed) can provide the best that is possible under the circumstances to the children who are at home?

But the point in having half the kids in is so that they can socially distance and not be crowded into one room. Is this one teacher running between the two class rooms now?

And what about those of us trying to teach A levels and run practical lessons.