My cynical view on why they are making sure they open primary schools ASAP

[DebbieFiderer]

It's simple really - if they get primary school pupils back before the end of the summer term then it is business as usual in terms of childcare and they don't have to keep schools open over the summer holidays for keyworker children. Anyone else think I am right, or am I being overly cynical and they genuinely think it's the right thing to do for the kids?

Schools will be having meetings about how to organise this with the staff that can work etc. Expect more info from your schools later this week.

The children at our school get a weekly email of work for the week. Limited, online based. Now tell me how that shows that teachers are 'working through this' Please we are not stupid it doesn't take a full week to prepare an email of suggested work.

There are a mere 6 pupils in on average at our school out of a normal 400 primary and 20 out of a average 800 secondary.... a few teachers are in and the others are 'working from home' - don't make me laugh - the email would take about an hour at a push to write.

Nothing else to do all week but twiddle thumbs cannot be compared to the office workers who complete a full workload at home.

The reason that people criticise teachers is that many get fed up with the exagerated work claims. The union will net get involved and instead of thinking about helping the country return to normal we get militants instead. Copenhagen positive and managing to do it so come on UK teachers - it hasn't been difficult at all the last 8 weeks so time to get back in the classroom unless in the shielded group - just like the rest of the workforce are doing.

We worked out 5 children per class if social distancing!

FFS .
How much autonomy do you think teachers have!
We can't swan back in and start telling our senior teams the ideas we have to social distance/insist we are teaching our curriculums and ignore directives from the govt!
The papers published from the government yesterday make it clear (ish)what the expectations are. I was surprised to read that year 10 will go back for some small group tutoring to plug in any gaps in remote learning. It doesn't mean I can override that and insist they do a full timetable. One section in the paper already predicts numbers will be low as parents opt out altogether.

Lots of teachers are keen and ready to go back, but we have rules to follow. We need the govt to be honest with the public. Of course schools aren't 'safe' where is?

@Weallhavevalidopinions teachers have to find the relevant work specific to their class, ours view it online and mark it and they are also working on non teaching parts of their jobs. Some teachers are also SENCOs and have lots of reports to write, funding to apply for etc, some have other extra responsibilities. Teaching is about a third of the job.

@Ciwirocks

I obviously only know this second hand and I can’t speak for all schools- only what my SIL tells me. She said they can’t teach them properly because of the social distancing, because in her school she already has mixed years so she will still be doing lessons online for the Y2 children that are not coming back, because group work will not take place, paired reading, circle time, gymnastics and other things that need close contact. That’s all she said last night but they are her perceptions.

Sorry for the delay getting back to you and I haven’t caught up with the thread so apologies if someone has already answered.

I do think it’s showing the education sector in a disappointing light. The attitude seems to be that they will wait until there is perfect safety and no problems until they’ll teach. Shouldn’t they be problem solving rather than just dismissing everything?

Copenhagen? Compare their figures to ours!

Weallhavevalidopinions (you know that's not true by the way? For an argument to be valid it has to have a good structure and be truth-preserving)
I'm sorry they have not been great at your school, you should get in touch with them. My dc's school have been sending daily emails (primary) and secondary have been uploading buckets of work to google classroom.

They’ve not been working particularly effectively or to full productivity by any means.

As someone else said, we've been following the direction from government and our SLT. Just like everyone else...

All the teachers I've spoken to are happy and keen to return. We just dont like the uncertainty and mixed messages.

EVERYONE who has posted on here on various threads has said that they are not working to full productivity due to the circumstances. Why is your expectation of teachers any different?

Even people who work from home as standard have said it!

Schools are trying to problem solve!!! It’s different in schools with hundreds of children milling around, touching everything, not very clean at times, rushing up to you, touching you. We can’t sit behind Perspex or sit 2m away from another adult in an office.

I do think it’s showing the education sector in a disappointing light. The attitude seems to be that they will wait until there is perfect safety and no problems until they’ll teach. Shouldn’t they be problem solving rather than just dismissing everything?

Precisely.

I’m really disappointed at how readily education has been tossed to one side. It should be as critical as healthcare and other services.

Thanks:
"lilgreen Tue 12-May-20 09:46:41
@Weallhavevalidopinions teachers have to find the relevant work specific to their class, ours view it online and mark it and they are also working on non teaching parts of their jobs. Some teachers are also SENCOs and have lots of reports to write, funding to apply for etc, some have other extra responsibilities. Teaching is about a third of the job."

Sadly in our schools there is no teaching like that happening. The teachers are on a rota to go in and every other week part time. There is no marking, no online lessons (local independant school are providing 6 hours a day online teaching) - we just get an email once a week with what to do. The child in year 2 had the same topic as the child in year 6.

My opinion is just relevant to the 2 local schools and what they are providing and the teacher's representative on tv this morning. Glad to see that some school's have provided much better resources/online teaching for their students.

We can’t sit behind Perspex or sit 2m away from another adult in an office

Neither can care workers, shop assistants, bus drivers. But they’re not sat at home.

Who has tossed education aside?

Because it would cost money

A drop in the ocean compared to the bail-out package to date.

Just watched a teacher from Copehagen the attitude versus the woman from the UK is so different. BBC news now...

The difference in attitude is due to the Danish feeling well supported by their socialist government; having a well funded education sector with the resources they need at the time they need them due to their 50% tax rate. Look how quickly we closed the borders, closed public offices and gave clear information to Danish citizens (source: British expat parent and worker in Copenhagen)

I don’t really understand why teachers have been shielded to the extent they have

they aren't being shielded. Shielding is for vulnerable members of society, not workplace sectors. I find it somewhat concerning that people are not grasping some of the core concepts.

Shop assistants? Perspex and masks in supermarkets.
Bus drivers- Perspex screens.
Carers- ppe (most do and absolutely are allowed to)

Teachers are valued in Denmark. UK love to teacher bash.

@Orchidflower1 well I suppose that makes sense in mixed year groups and maybe her school are actually providing on line work not like ours. Lots of schools are not like that and I think the majority of parents know they kids won’t be getting the full curriculum but I would expect maths and English to be taught at least. For clarification I am happy to keep my kids at home I like them being at home and look forward to the holidays. I am not happy to continue to have this burden of trying to teach them the National curriculum with no help from school when I am not qualified to do that and I have my own job to do.

Triangle have you never seen a shop assistant or bus driver sitting behind Perspex? Really!

The Perspex in supermarkets is limited to those on the till. There’s those on the shop floor, those on the door managing the amount of people allowed in.

Who has tossed education aside?

Policy has. Learning has been seriously interrupted and continues to be so.

Like this comment from a comment below the line( one HansSachsisback ) in the paper today:

“the glaring contradiction in this: you can mix with dozens of people (at work) whose hygiene habits, adherence to social distancing and illicit contacts you know nothing about, but you cannot meet your aged grandparents safely in a park, who have been meticulously self-isolating for 8 weeks. Tory priorities in a nutshell: economic profit before human relationships.”

Whether or not you agree with the last line, the whole bit before is hard to refute. Where’s the logic?

In my supermarket the shop floor workers are limited and wear masks and gloves.

So you didn't mean
Neither can care workers, shop assistants, bus drivers. But they’re not sat at home.
You meant, neither can care workers (though they wear PPE) or some shop assistants or some bus drivers.

Weallhavevalidopinions

I am contracted to work 32.5 hours a week.

We have an online meeting a week; I spend approx 12 hours a week speaking on the phone to parents and children; maybe an hour a day following up on tasks from those calls; around 3-5 hours a week planning online activities for the children and the rest of the time writing reports, marking work, responding to emails and completing online tasks. Plus 1-2 days a week in school.

No, I'm not working the 50+ hours a week I normally would but given that I only get paid for 32.5, I'm not too fussed about that.

I'm certainly not twiddling my thumbs though. The main advantage is that I get to drink tea and sit in the garden with my laptop when I'm wfh.