Statement in parliament this afternoon on 'reopening of schools in England'

[DownRightAmazing]

By Gavin.

I'm aware there are a million threads on this generally but this is specifically regarding the statement - any leaks/clues/predictions?

To state my own position: I think schools need to close to all except keyworker and vulnerable children. I feel it's obvious this needs to happen. My own two children are thriving at school and I'm not concerned about them at all - if their (primary) school is open, I will send them - but I worry for their teachers, any vulnerable parents of their classmates and of course the NHS.

My prediction (based on nothing): secondary schools blended/part time. Primary fully open. We are tier 4 fwiw and I disagree with opening schools in January...

@itsgettingweird

Sue I'm not disagreeing with you that you feel staff are being honest or that you discuss well-being at length.

Same for our governors.

But what you think is getting the full lowdown and what staff really feel may differ.

We've raised some stuff. Other stuff we moan about between ourselves because we know it won't change. The governors can't go against government guidance any more than we can.

I wasn't talking about being unhappy with things we can't change- believe me, working in a university I have my own issues with government guidelines! However, we're a very small school and it's difficult to hide major issues. Our staff governor is brutally honest and doesn't hold back. I'm an experienced governor and know how it all works and this is the first school where I really feel we get a good overview of staff feelings. The general consensus is that staff as as happy as they can be given the circumstances.

That's precisely it.

"As happy as they can be given the circumstances"

Right now I know for staff I work with that's far less happy and relaxed than we were in November.

But we are still going back next week and not taking up the testing.

@itsgettingweird

That's precisely it.

"As happy as they can be given the circumstances"

Right now I know for staff I work with that's far less happy and relaxed than we were in November.

But we are still going back next week and not taking up the testing.

I guess some of this will depend on what's happening in your area. We've had very few cases in school and even though the wider area has been classed as a 'hotspot' since July the cases in our immediate area are well below average..... and I mean well below, we average between 4-6 cases per week in a population of 9k.

If we start to see a spike then the feeling may change.

@PandemicPavolova

🤷‍♂️ Me too, we followed the time table as is, 2 days after lock down.. Dd was next to me on the computer. Not ideal but she was safe and I used her roblox time as leverage to get her up 4 reading levels and teach nearly 2 years of work?

6/7 year old don't need that much supervision? As I said people have to be resilient, lower some standards, be flexible....

My dd ended up flourishing and yet that age group is way out of my comfort zone. She has sen and was massively under achieving and wouldn't work me happily. It was constant negotiation and bribes, but I was determined to make it work.

But teachers are accountable. Everything you do needs to be planned, justified and importantly show progress. We all know bribes work, but who pays for the Haribos at the end of the lesson, the end of term rewards or takes the flack for 5 minutes extra break?

SEN children make great progress when the pressures of an educational system are removed. The summer lockdown worked for us because of the freedom to teach off timetable. Yr 11 weren’t being taught at all from Easter remember - pressure off them and school.

Its important to consider this year it’s not just GCSE’s that have to be crammed into 6 months to a decent standard ; it’s BTEC’s, Functional Skills and Entry Levels for those that often aren’t bothered at the best of times.
Whilst having half the school at home ( goes down well with reluctant yr 11’s).
There’s no work experience to be had and trips out are in nearly impossible ; hard to engage those for whom sitting in a classroom is less than ideal anyway.
It’s a dogs ear again.

Sue Ellen I think you're right about spike.

That's what's started to worry us. Felt safe before it started creeping into local schools. Also we are special school so far wider geographical area of children, mixing on LA transport with taxi drivers etc.

All we can do is keep ourselves as safe as possible and work to maintain optimal MH.

Secondary schools are not safe in Tier 4, neither is travelling to them on a train or bus mixed with pupils from other schools and the situation will be no different by 11th January or 18th January. In fact there will probably be more daily deaths, more cases and more hospital admission. What fucking planet is this government on?