‘School will have to look different from now on’....

[Starrynightsabove]

‘With a mix of home schooling and in-school learning’

So said Nicola Sturgeon.

So how does this work for a single parent trying to work full time from home with a full on job who needs to pay the mortgage. Literally how does this work?

Leaving aside the question of setting work (I have just finished uploading videos for tomorrow for my primary class. I nearly cry every time I get the stats for how many have watched them - 5 max. But I continue to do them for those 5), I think the onus has to be not just on schools but on workplaces in general to help people to work.

These are unprecedented times and while there are some jobs that are completely inflexible, a lot more employers could be proactive about supporting parents in working flexibly while they have no choice but to have their children at home. It won't be forever.

My post was in response to Also please please contact the head of school if you are unhappy with the level of work being set or the lack of work - nothing will change unless you let them know what is or isn't working.

Also, maybe I'm being petty but the fashionable use of the expression "look different" (rather than the boring old fashioned "be different") is annoyingly euphemistic and patronising in this context . School will "look different" to many disinterested casual observers whose lives won't be affected by the changes because they don't have children in the relevant age bracket, or because they possess both a penis and a retrograde attitude to the division of labour in a household. It will feel different, it will be different, for many others. Better for a lucky few, worse- much worse- for many others.

@justanotherneighinparadiseustanother I agree strongly with your point. Open school for the core subjects first. Half the kids could go in the morning then half in afternoon doing maths, english and science. Then other subjects could be set for home learning.

Absolutely ridiculous.

People can’t be expected to live like this for any length of time. Why is our kids education less important than the virus?

There’s going to corne a time everyone just needs to take their chances with the virus, not now but at some point.

My son is in high school, he’s extremely clever and wants to study medicine. He needs a decent education. It is disgraceful to expect our children to carry the can for this. It can’t be tolerated.

You do ‘get’ that by overwhelming the NHS, many, many more people will die? Have you looked at the Scottish government’s projected stats if schools were to fully open? Worst case scenario is pretty grim, most likely scenario would also completely overwhelm the NHS by July..

But regardless of that children’s education must also be a priority. Today’s children in school are our doctors, nurses, leaders of tomorrow. How do they get into those roles with no decent education?

Ooh powershower spot on.

At the moment the virus, people dying of it, and the NHS are all that matters to government. That can’t, won’t, and shouldn’t continue. Other things such as the education of our children will have to take priority at some point.

Why do people casually say on these threads that the solution is having a SAHP - that's not an option for some of us unless we plan to live on beans and toast for the foreseeable.

If we keep , keeping kids at home for months they will all end up having to repeat a year . Not all of us are able to home educate I'm rubbish at it and my ds says he prefers being at school learning rather than online as can get help from teachers etc ,
But how you will get younger children to social distance I don't know and with class sizes in our schools large ,splitting classes down will also be an issue with having enough staff and space
It's an impossible one to second guess and I don't envy anyone having to try and think the best way to implement it , guess we will watch some other countries who have started going back to see how they manage and what affects it has but normal school as before I think is a long long way off

We can't get kids to social distance. They are not at risk anyway. We just need to make sure they socially distance from vulnerable people.

@IfNotNowThenWhenever if you have already contacted them as the response was as you said, I would be very unhappy and I can understand why you feel that way.

It's not as easy as getting together with unions t put in place a universal offer for school pupils because we all might teach the key skills of the curriculum but the way we deliver it is very different depending on the school.

There are a number of well planned websites/resources pupils can access so I'm not sure why your children's school can't supplement what they are doing with these. I am of the mind that we are in pandemic and really the most important thing now is that children are safe but as a parent I would be unhappy if my children were given no support at all.

I completely agree that education is important and I say that as a teacher and as a parent - but if the reality is that we are told we need to implement some sort of temporary social distancing, then schools will need to be a part of this which will mean some disruption to learning and this will have implications for working parents too.

Unfortunately I fear those 'working parents' will primarily be women who typically bare the brunt of childcare. I'm not sure how I am meant to reach full time if my children are not in school or if there is no breakfast or after school club.

I cant cope with home learning. It's the unknown and uncertainty of when it will all end as well. You cant plan for a future you can no longer see.

Also eldest was supposed to be sitting his gcses right now. That was binned off in a flash. It's really hard seeing where this ends.

It's not practical to expect children and young people to suddenly know how to learn online or adopt independent study skills. That takes time and is generally something developed in higher education or the workplace, to some extent. The learning deficit for the current crop of teens, especially those at exam stage, would be significant.

At younger end of scale there could perhaps be scope to extend nursery stage and delay going to school. Again though, there's babies coming up and patents will need nursery capacity if they are to work. So I don't know if that's practical in terms of numbers either.

Having older relatives looking after children again is one thing (for those who have that support network) but it also puts those older people at greater risk again.

This is all pie in the sky of course, and really doesn't help those who are already struggling and/or don't have support network or flexible working. It's a mess, and it's going to be a mess for some time too by sound of things.

The work that’s being set is shit tbh. I’ve seen a massive decrease in quality since bbc bite size was promoted a few weeks ago. One of my year 6 task this week was to watch dads army? My daughter needs to watch horrible histories and loads of other toy tunes but no actual work. Just loads of daffy stuff like make an Egyptian mask. I’m tolerating this, this side of summer because I believe they can catch up but anything longer will not be tolerated by me. They need schooling and I as a solo parent need to be able to work!

Time for society to do a bit of back pedalling.

You mean time for WOMEN to do a bit of backpedelling. Right back in single parent poverty. And we all know that's great for the kids. I'm sure that wont lead to more financial dependence on abusive husbands and squiffy step dads at all.

I agree the work being set is dreadful. It's totally impossible to keep track of it all (grammar school). Transferring a normal lesson to PowerPoint and hoping for the best is not enough.

DS1 is supposed to be revising for exams. They will be emailed home. We can mark them. We do not need to send the results to school. What an utter waste of time. It just shows utter inflexibility by the school. Just because it says exam week on the calendar doesn't mean you have to stick to it.

well given that I'm a doctor and dh is a teacher are kids will not be doing homeschooling anytime soon! We havent sent them to school because they are old enough to stay at home (12,14,16 and almost18) and it felt the right thing to do to keep them home to reduce the burdens on schools and teachers,but the amount of learning the 12 yr old has dne is very minimal and his mood and mental health have really suffered.
If there is not a proper plan for school reopenings laid out veryvery son we will be sending them back as we are entitled to as keyworkers because the current situation is really not sustainable at all.

our not are!

I guess provision, like schools generally, can fluctuate. My kids school is doing an amazing job. Maths and English following same learning objectives as before and things like science and art adapted to using household stuff. I’d love them to get back to school for the social element but educationally the school are going above and beyond what is needed. They have live teaching for about 2/3 of the lessons which is also recorded (presumably for safeguarding). Even for those lessons done with a video the teacher is in the live meet for the duration of the lesson so they can ask questions.

And they are very focussed on feeding back achievements to the kids! Lots of praise and encouragement.

In turn I have been emailing them and headmaster when particularly impressed. We all like to feel valued - and as I’m wfh I very much value the efforts they are making.

My experience is similar to @Raver84, in terms of the quality of home learning. Are the teachers doing videos for their classes and marking work in scotland, and in primary?

We are getting links to YouTube, BBC Bitesize and Twinkl, with some online reading books and a handful of worksheets from other resources. Nothing is being submitted and marked. Class size is 18, and the only differentiation is in the choice of reading book, and they provide two ability levels for some maths worksheets. I'm not complaining - I have been impressed with the variety of the work, and think it's a realistic quantity. I don't expect any more from them at present.

I think that Nicola Sturgeon is making a good point. In some form or other, there will need to be some home learning for many pupils for a while, and teachers and parents need to work out how they can do this in a way that everyone can cope with. Part of that will be coming up with realistic expectations and support for working parents.

If the schools go back too soon, then they will just need to close again. Some parents who are shielding etc will want to keep children home. There will be periods where children and staff need to isolate.

No one wants this, no one would choose it, but there is very little choice here. No point sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that cases aren't going to soar at soon as people start mixing again. They need to be making plans for a worse case scenario where this carries on for a while, rather than reacting to it when it happens.