I don't understand this idea of all the teachers going into school to look after the YR, Y1 & Y6 children

[UndertheCedartree]

The DC will want to be in their classroom, with their teacher. Otherwise I see little point. Aside from the purely childcare point. But I mean in terms of the benefit to the DC.

Surely it makes more sense for the DC to go in maybe one week in, one week off with a thorough clean at the weekend. The survey at my school suggests around a third of parents won't send their DC in so schools may be able to get away with splitting classes in half.

That's without even considering where will all the extra classrooms come from considering the vulnerable and keyworker DC will still be in? And that the teachers of other year groups will still be sending home work and supporting their usual classes.

It’s not about education, or about the children, it’s about childcare so parents go back to work. Otherwise they’d be concentrating on year 10 and 12.

And they’ve said it won’t happen unless “conditions are right” so I reckon they government will get to the end of May and say “oh well, we tried, but we can’t “

Because each class of 30 becomes 2 bubbles and the adults can't mix between bubbles.

I'm normally a year 5 teacher I will be teaching one of the year 6 bubbles. They will be in my year 5 classroom and won't have any contact with any other bubble or teacher.

A year group of 60 has to be split 4 ways..... ought to be more, really.

I’m a year 5 teacher and will be looking after the keyworkers’ children from years 2-5.

A lot of children won't be able to return to their own teacher, if their own teacher is from a vulnerable group.

In most schools though, children do get to know other teachers and TAs quite well, and spend time in other classrooms, so returning to a small group, seeing classmates and a known adult will still feel like going back to school. Not quite the same, but still very familiar.

I suppose we have to ease our way back in and test the water. Hopefully the bubbles of 15 won’t raise the R too much and then things can be eased back more.

Our reception, yr1 and yr 6 is 180 children - so 12 classes/bubbles will be needed - that's a lot of teachers (as we will also still need teachers for the keyworker children of all ages).

MinkowskisButterfly TA's can also be the adult with a "bubble".

Doesn't really matter how big the school is - Years R, 1&6 are 3/7 of the kids. There's also the handful of keyworker kids in years 2-5 so that will make about half the school max (less than that if some kids are kept at home voluntarily or because they're vulnerable) So there ought to be enough teachers or TAs to take half a class each in separate classrooms. Once all the year groups go back, they'd either have to go to full size classes (or near-on), or only have half the kids in at a time though. Could still limit social contacta bit in a primary schools by things like not mixing classes up and staggering breaktimes. Not so easy in secondary though. I guess you could move teachers rather than kids for some subjects (not lab-based science obviously)

Sending back kids just in these year groups - or at all - is daft.

Supposedly it will allow parents to return to work - but as due to social distancing, kids in the relevant school years will only be in school half the time, parents won't be able to fit work round that.

Plus most parents have kids in different school years so actually this will allow only a very few parents with a single child in the relevant school years to return. Many in reception and year 1 will have either older siblings still not at school or younger ones still not in nursery.

It would make much more sense for schools to ask parents who actually need to send their kids in for work reasons and then try to just accommodate those children.

Plus reception and year 1 are really the last years that should be going in not the first - they are the age group least likely to be able to socially distance and in least need of being in formal education anyway - in most other countries formal schooling doesn't even start till year 6.

Government guidance says that years R, 1 and 6 should be in full-time, so if schools are following this they will need to use teachers from other year groups. Not every school has even one TA per year group, never mind one for each class to take half.

I can imagine if teachers from other years are in school full-time with a different bubble, they will no longer be providing home learning for their normal class. Or certainly no lessons, just work packs to be getting on with, perhaps.

As for the space issue, this is why it is guidance only and schools will have to sort themselves out.

In our school, a year group of 60 plus key worker children is being split into groups of 8. That allows 2m between each child and room to move around, maintaining distance.

It's a huge undertaking and I'm still not sure whether to say DD3 will go or not.

due to social distancing, kids in the relevant school years will only be in school half the time, parents won't be able to fit work round that.

The intention is to have all of Reception (and nursery I think), Y1 and Y6 in every day to start with, and all years back shortly afterwards, at which bubbles must increase to 30+.

I wonder how that's going to work at an infants school? If 2/3 of the students are in, how will you halve the classes + having year 2 Key workers children in?

Obviously in a primary, you can borrow the junior school teachers, but one school I know has two classes (reception / year 1) and year 1/2 + 1 TA between the two classes. Without the year 2 students, this school will need 4 teachers (reception, year 1, year 1 and the couple key workers children) but only employ two teachers and a TA. How the hell is that going to work??

The Bubble thing is also impossible in secondary for years 10 & 12. The reason why children move rooms is because they have different subjects. Obviously, they all study Maths and English, but some do double science, others do triple and then they have 3 or 4 option subjects. At my school, we have two year 10 History classes but only two history teachers... so you couldn't just split the class as there wouldn't be the teachers to teach them. Similarly, being a small school we only have 1 music teacher, 1 art teacher and so on....

The only way you could split the classes is to have the students in part time.

No idea how they are going to make this work in September when all the students are back...

As others have said, this isnt about education - it's about childcare. There will be no 'education's- I've removed all the books and earning materials from my classroom in preparation. And I mean - all. I just have empty shelves now.

at which bubbles must increase to 30+

30 s a fucking big bubble... especially when you consider family members and varying degrees of compliance with lockdown/social distancing.

I have a DS in Y6 and a DD in Y1 so technically both of mine can go back. It’s a smallish school with just one class per year group and all the children in all the years know and have mixed with all the teachers/TA’s so very lucky in that respect. I still need to find out exactly how it’s going to work but am really keen to DS to return with it being his final year in primary school. He’s already missing out on school residential/leavers party etc. so it would be good for him to say goodbye to friends who won’t be at the same secondary. On this basis it makes sense to send DD too as if he’s there anyway any risk will be coming home to us all. Very few Y1’s seem to be going back though so that class could be very small. We shall see. Sending love to all regardless of the decision you make x

TA's can also be the adult with a "bubble".

I haven’t seen anyone from the unions pushing back on this yet. It’s totally wrong to put TAs in that position with their pay and training. Children deserve qualified teachers, and expecting a TA to take on that role all day every day is wrong.

It's all guidance. Head teachers will do what is right for their school community. Then they can be blamed when it goes wrong. The government are making shit up on the fly, as they have been all along. They will twist the figures to make them say what they want.

It must be very hard for class teachers to decide who goes into their 'bubble' and who they will send to another teacher.

TA's can also be the adult with a "bubble".

They can, but how unfair is that? Parents will be baying for an education- why should a TA deliver that on a third of the money the teacher in the next room is getting? The teacher might plan for the TA, but planning is a really small part of the job and you can't plan that well for a group you don't teach.

They will twist the figures to make them say what they want

100% there will be a magic dip in R on 29th May.

A friend works at a small primary school, around 150 pupils. She says that as they're already catering for vulnerable and key workers' children, opening her school up to those specific year groups means a grand total of 5 parents will be helped to return to work by these measures. Not only that, but bringing all staff on board for classroom duties will mean nobody is available for online teaching and help during the school day for the remaining pupils.
I don't know what the solution is, but it doesn't seem to be this.

The DC will want to be in their classroom, with their teacher. Otherwise I see little point. Aside from the purely childcare point. But I mean in terms of the benefit to the DC

There is very little point.

We are offering many of our YR children a place in a classroom that isn’t theirs,with a TA they don’t know, with most of the toys removed. There will be no breakfast club, no after school club, no reading books coming home and no mixing with any other staff or children.

There is no way I would send my child back into that.

The government announced today that they're hoping to get a lab built to make vaccines by next summer, then it will be six months till they make enough to vaccinate everyone. So that's a minimum of 21 months from now.

This isn't going to have gone away by September, or even by September 2021. So the only reason I can see for small classes, etc, is to coax parents and teachers in gently. It's not actually sustainable. There will have to be normal sized classes in schools while we still have Covid19 around.