Can we just stop with the school/teacher bashing

[TheWristBoundLatexBitch]

The teachers needed in most schools to do the "bubbles" is at least double what they already have. If it's a two form year, you may need 4 bubbles, so double teachers. Oh and then there is the class rooms!

How do you think schools will magically make this happen???

Some schools are staying shut except key worker children as that's all they can take.

Some schools will take one or two year groups, because they can.

Some schools (not many I'm guessing) will take all that they can back).

If your child goes back they will not be with friends, in their own class or with their teacher. This is childcare because the government said they need to open.

Let's stop bashing schools and teachers, and moaning because your child has a T.A. I'm not even a teacher nor do I work in a school, but I realise the difficulties the schools are facing.

[thecatfromjapan]

Well, you know, the teacher bashing is, ultimately, a distraction.

Teacher's might be copping flak at the moment but ... it's unravelling.

The lockdown is almost certainly happening too soon.

More deaths, a second lockdown ... all the teacher-bashing in the world isn't going to save Johnson.

[ChloeDecker]

My primary aged child is having nothing like that set and nothing marked at all.

Primary schools tend to be a lot smaller than Secondaries, with fewer teachers. Therefore, Primary teachers have been going in to school more than their Secondary counterparts (who have more staff to work a rota) which takes up just as much time as marking, for example.
Swings and roundabouts.
Upshot is, so many employees, not just teachers have tasks that are invisible to the outside. I don’t understand why teachers are required to list/justify all of theirs.

[SpiritEssence]

Shop workers are allowed to wear PPE and have it of we want it

[Pieceofpurplesky]

My parents will be delighted that I must be middle class.

[CountessFrog]

Sorry didn’t mean to bold that! Just correcting my predictive text!

[CountessFrog]

makes total sense

[CountessFrog]

Beawilla

That names rural sense, I can see that what you are doing equates to similar hours in a different way.

Primary school is different I think. My secondary aged child is having work set that probably generates the sort of marking that you point out takes longer. Totally get that. My primary aged child is having nothing like that set and nothing marked at all.

[thecatfromjapan]

It looks like sense, grammatically. It looks as though it should generate meaning.

But ...

[CountessFrog]

Depends what point you want to make. R rate in care homes is probably even higher.

[qweryuiop]

@W00t

If the DfE had been told to take a bottom-up approach, and asked each school what their provision could safely be on a school-by-school basis, I am certain that a percentage of children would already be back in school, with plans to increase numbers week on week as evidence from on the ground in schools comes to light.
It is the individual circumstances of the schools that are the impediment to blanket re-opening.
DfE have the infrastructure to collate that information weekly, even daily with some assistance. Schools could then have prioritised those children most at need in their communities, and had those back in first.

Instead Cabinet made the decision who would be returning. It was a political decision with no basis in local need or practicability.

I have a Y6 son. He has no need whatsoever to return to school at this point. He's happy, calm, has more than enough work provided by his school, is able to chat to his friends online, and is an introvert who is more than happy to spend all day reading or playing with his Lego by himself. DfE say he should go back.
In contrast the little boy next door is Y2, a sporty, extroverted child who is driving his parents demented with his need to run around and kick a ball with friends, but we have no gardens, and Dad is at work each day (can't WFH), and mum has a newborn so she can't just take him to the park all day. He is becoming isolated and frustrated and anti-social. The Y2 teacher really hasn't provided adequate school work for his class either, so his learning has completely stalled. He really needs to be back at school, but somehow cabinet know better than schools what local need is?

The whole response has just been so badly handled.

This is lovely. This kind of community mindedness is what we need (not just on the schools issue, but more generally).

[FrippEnos]

Floatyboat

Not sure where you are getting that from.

[MyHipsDontLieUnfortunately]

sort of post

[MyHipsDontLieUnfortunately]

Actually @Flaxmeadow, I was referring to the wort of post you made earlier when I said MN is so hostile that I barely use it now. I don't wish to have a pop at you (that would be ironic) but as a teacher who grew up in poverty and was the FSM child that could be classed as vulnerable now, I do take exception to your earlier remark. I drive a 53 plate car to school as the earliest train journey would take 2.5 hours and get me there an hour late.

[Floatyboat]

I thought the consensus was that schools are just getting on with opening now. People realising their anxieties are over done

[Beawillalwaysbetopdog]

Countess, you asked:

Perhaps if teachers posted how they used to spend their day/evening and how they currently spend it, then people might be willing to believe they are ‘Working harder than ever.’

In a normal term time week I'll work 7.30-5.00 in school every day, then 2-3 evenings I'll do a couple more hours work and maybe 4-5 at the weekend, so just over 50 hours a week. It used to be more, but I've been teaching ages and have improved lessons so much that beyond tweaking a bit for individual classes or for the latest fad we're being asked to do my planning doesn't take very long.

I wouldn't say I'm working harder than ever, I'm working about the same. Probably a bit less so 40-45 hours. However, that's because, being an experienced teacher I'm given mostly exam classes, so 6 of my classes (half my timetable) are y11 and 13 who I don't need to set work for. Most teachers will not have this many exam classes, and if I didn't, then I would be working harder than ever. This is because everything takes so much longer. Marking takes longer because kids take really bad photos of their work and I have to manipulate the image to be able to mark it, and writing comments on word or paint or whatever takes longer. Planning is taking me ages as I have to replan everything from scratch - my existing resources do not work as standalone resources at all. We're also asked to phone our form once a week, which takes an awful long time.

However, not commuting is saving me 8 hours a week, so if you were my neighbour you might report me as going on really long walks in the day (as some on other threads were saying about their teacher neighbours) because I'm getting up my normal time and working when I would be commuting so I can be more flexible about when I'm doing work.

[FrippEnos]

CountessFrog
Depends what point you want to make. R rate in care homes is probably even higher

My point is that the government has once again moved the goal posts on opening schools, the R value has moved from under control in some areas the exponential growth.

But what can be expected from from a government that has changed the guidance on opening primary schools 41 times and has only just published guidance on opening secondary schools?

[FrippEnos]

CountessFrog
Depends what point you want to make. R rate in care homes is probably even higher

[thecatfromjapan]

I really can't fathom why anyone would blame teachers for what is, let's face it, a colossal government fuck up.

It's the equivalent of those people who shout at check-out staff because there's no flour in stock.

🤷‍♀️

[thecatfromjapan]

Agree with you both, Belle and Fripp.

The point about the R rate in the local population is that the last thing we want is a second, local (or national) lockdown. Avoiding that is crucial.

I actually came back to point out that the teaching union guidelines focus on safety, safety, safety.
I'm baffled by people who say they are 'over-demanding'.
Safety matters, right?
You start by insisting that teachers/schools drop safety measures in a pandemic and ... where do you end up?

It's a boundary. Erode that boundary about people's - starting off with with 'some' or 'other' people, & 'some' or 'other' people's children - and you have moved a crucial boundary about what erosions of health and safety you will tolerate. And, of course, you are also eroding your baseline about all people having value and rights: you've moved into the territory of some people, sometimes.

That's bad.

You can start by dismissing a whole category of workers and end up slightly surprised when you suddenly find your children, someone you love, yourself, in that category of the less-valued.

[CountessFrog]

Depends what point you want to make. R rate in care homes is probably even higher.

[FrippEnos]

BelleSausage

Other countries have spoken to and taken on board the views of the unions and education establishment.

Working with a unified front that the UK doesn't seem to be able to manage.

[FrippEnos]

Would now be a good time to say that in some areas of England (I say England because its relevant to schools going back) that the R value is still above 1.

On Monday, Brighton was calculated at 1.68 up from 0.45 two weeks previously.

[BelleSausage]

I find that all this debate is just essentially encouraging a race to the bottom mentality.

It is a distinctly English thing and I cannot begin to understand it. Someone else has it shit and so all others must also have a shit time too.

Why? How?

Why such low aspirations? Other countries have managed to pull together more practical and inventive responses. Our government offers a dog shit solution and suddenly people are up in arms when its utter crapness is pointed out.

Bizarre.

[CountessFrog]

I’ve read quite a few threads about teachers and schools now and I don’t think the conversations I read on MN reflect the conversations I hear in RL.

On MN, every teacher is ‘working harder than ever.’ In RL they are having long lunches in the garden because of the nice weather. I don’t blame them, but surely it’s not the same as a normal working day.

I work in the nhs and my normal working day is currently nothing like pre virus. For a start, I have children at home so I can’t concentrate. Presumably that applies to teachers with children. My life isn’t harder, it’s different. I’m doing what I can, but realistically I’m not ‘working harder than ever.’

I can’t wait for things to go back to normal, I feel unproductive and inefficient. There must be teachers who feel the same.

One thing I will say, friends who are teachers work very hard in the evening, pre coronavirus. I have a friend who works VERY hard during the evening and at weekends. I cannot believe how hard they work, actually. However, due to the virus, she now hasn’t been into her school for five weeks. I often see her on her daily walk or sitting in her garden. She’s writing end of term reports at the moment, presumably she’d have previously spent evenings doing that, whereas now she can do it during the day.

It’s working hard, perhaps, but it’s not ‘working harder than ever.’ I think that sounds illogical and people won’t believe it. Perhaps if teachers posted how they used to spend their day/evening and how they currently spend it, then people might be willing to believe they are ‘Working harder than ever.’

Personally, as NHS working from home, I used to get up at 6.45 and now I get up at 8.30. I am most certainly working less hard, coronavirus means I can’t currently do my job.

[LittleFoxKit]

That's not to say class divide dosent exist in the UK. It does to a scary extent. But it's not exist between teachers and retail. A manager in retail can easily earn more then a new teacher, hell, even a standard floor worker can earn more then a teacher.
The class divide is rather blurred between working class and lower middle class. The class divide is huge when you start looking at upper middle class vs lower middle class. Or upper class and middle class.