Ventilated classrooms

[BorrisBikeIsBreakingRules]

My DCs school has a policy of keeping all doors (to the outside) and windows wide open to keep the classroom well ventilated.

DC has been wearing - vest, long sleeve t shirt, school shirt, jumper, coat, hat, leggings, school trousers, 3 pairs of socks... And is STILL freezing.

His friends parents have said the same thing on the class mail thing - they are all v cold.

I do not have the confidence to email school as I am so grateful he even has a place that I don't feel I can say anything. However, he's so skinny and really struggling and I'm worried being so cold all day will cause him to become ill.

Anyone else's school.doing this??

What should.i do? Am I being ungrateful? He really needs the place (both DH and I are critical.workers, NHS)

Wow he's wearing a lot of layers already!!

There is a Public Health England video that suggests opening windows for 10 mins every hour (I think) could you / someone suggest to school to try a frequent / regular doors open policy rather than permanent doors open??

Could you try proper thermal vest and leggings as a base layer if these are just generic at the moment. Maybe try stuff designed for skiing. Also hot food in his lunchbox.

We bought thermal leggings and top off Amazon which arrived yesterday and he wore them today. He said he was still cold (and today has been warmer than last week when he was really freezing!!)

Might try two jumpers tomorrow! (Not sure he'll be able to move much though!!)

They need to allow them to move more frequently.
We all need to be flexible to get through this.
Heating on, blankets in, gloves on, moving around frequently.
Why do people lack such imagination?
I'm sure I read somewhere that places in Germany, have done this.

Yes our school does this. Everyone is frozen. Current advice is windows open and maintain ventilation apparently - which we are doing. Not pleasant for anyone and the heating is going full blast.

OP sorry that your DC is coldZ it's a tricky situation.

From personal experience though I do think that ventilation is very important.

DH and 21 of 22 colleagues all caught Covid despite masks, visors, customers by appt only, constant deep cleans, nightly deep cleans, social distancing and screens in a retail environment. This has been attributed to poor ventilation.

Our school policy says doors/windows open all the time. I'll look out for ideas before I'm next in. It's bloody freezing. I was wearing ski base layers (only outing they'll have for a while!) and we wandered out for a stomp about outside. Two lucky souls get to sit near the radiator.

Seriously, I've just been doing as I'm told and freezing everybody. Will pass this on to our EHT.

Heres the video link

Some of my classes brought blankets they put over their legs in lessons. And those hand warmers you snap and they heat up.

Which part of the country are you in? In East Anglia here and we have windows open all day with blasts of heat on occasionally. I'm always cold but wearing usual work wear with gilet on top and not feeling it too bad. Several of the children still need to be reminded to put a jumper on!

Thanks for the video fusion!

All doors and windows are open in my school. It is absolutely freezing but we have lots of children in and with no SD or masks it's our only defence. Very miserable though.

We have all windows and doors open and had heating on at 23° today?

We do keep moving though and do socially distanced movement breaks/ dancing in class to keep circulation going.

But guidance to schools says to do this. There is some other specifics like high windows and not ones next to desks if others can be opened.

Could someone who is a teacher or on the PTA not raise this?
DD 15 in secondary (much more sitting still and had to do mock exams in freezing cold classrooms and makeshift halls in December sat all day in ordinary uniform jumper trousers white shirt underwear they are not allowed to wear coats but the teachers can. Windows are flung open wide all day from before they even get into school. Not an issue now for us as schools closed for the foreseeable.

If you are not vegan, you really want natural fibres. So depending on how deep your pockets are you want to look at pure silk long sleeved vest, pure silk long johns, silk socks. Then you want a wool long sleeved tops (lambs wool is very warm, but can be very itchy; so merino wool or cashmere jumper might be better but it won't be so warm) next wool or down body warmer, and then a long down duvet coat. Wool trousers and thick wool socks. You can get down trousers or padded trousers. Silk gloves will and the fingerless gloves over the top will keep hands warm whilst being able to use a pen or keyboard. Failing that look at mountaineering technical clothing!

It's certainly a tough one but I can understand why teachers would want to keep as safe as possible the way things are right now.

I can really really recommend thermals that are made for tradesman/ builders. Much cheaper than all the fancy ones I've tried and a hundred times better, the thermal socks and gloves from screw fix are brilliant and actually have smallish sizes which is unusual for those kind of things. You can also buy heated gilets on Amazon which I've not tried but have good reviews if you get really desperate..

Our school prelockdown was also recommending hot water bottles but they had the means to refill them.. good for a few hours at least while the frost is melting!

Buy good quality base layers -like merino.

Don't over layer, the base layer needs to not be skin tight - you need to have air in there that warms up

2 pairs of good quality socks.

Long wrist warmers, so no gap between gloves & coat.

Decent quality hat.

Head
Wrists
Ankles

All cosy

Not to many layers.

At least they have good ventilation, the majority do not!

When ds was at school they weren't allowed coats indoors in the classroom.
He said it was so cold.

I've been the teacher in the classroom. It is freezing. I've asked for ( and got) extra heaters, and have told the children to wear extra layers, trackie bottoms instead of school trousers, gloves etc. Most of them don't even want to put a coat on when we go outside.
It is an issue that we are aware of, not sure what we can do about it - I don't want to be sitting in a classroom with the doors and windows closed. We do try to keep the children moving and doing exercise as much as possible. Can you give them extra jumpers ? wool is warmer than polyester or cotton knit jumpers. Maybe try portable handwarmers?
And do contact the school, it may be that they can supply extra heaters.

Does your child have to be in school?

I hear you, I bought a knock off oodie to wear in school the other day. It's been a life saver! Our reception kiddies are running around in just t-shirts though, I swear they don't feel the cold 🥶🥶

Hats! I'm not in school at the moment but before Xmas I wore my hat constantly for teaching in and lots of the kids did too. I just tried to keep us all moving as much as possible too, it felt warmer outside some days!

My DC school is doing a "daily mile" where they do a few laps of the school (outside of course and only one class at a time) both to break up the day and get the kids warm and moving. Could you suggest this, they need to move more and wrap up well. Agree with PP about skiing stuff, when I go to outdoor events I always wear skiing tops and leggings as they keep me much warmer. I bought mine from amazon too.

Awful. I am having to sneak in a small hot water bottle. My feet are like ice by lunchtime. Indeed miserable.