Will you send your DC to school if they're open for keyworkers only?

[BlowDryRat]

Hopefully this won't happen but if it does (probably with hours' notice like last Jan )...

DH and I both qualified as keyworkers (medical supplies) for all the previous lockdowns. We could WFH though so kept the DC at home so they weren't taking up spaces really needed by others and to minimise the risk to the school staff. The DC got on with it but both struggled socially and DD in particular fell very behind academically.

Now that everyone who wants a vaccine has had at least 2, if there's another partial school closure I'll be prioritising my DC and sending them in.

What are you planning to do?

Have you ever worked in a school?

The setup you are describing is literally what most schools in fact did? They were not "teaching" the KW kids, but they did sit the kids down and circulate as the kids went through their individual work. Everyone had realistic expectations about what could and could not be accomplished, but there is absolutely no excuse for schools not having scheduled time for the kids to sit down and do some worksheets or workbook stuff.

If your school was just letting the KW kids do crafts and play all day without any schoolwork time at all, on the grounds that "well, they are all different levels," that's poor compared with what most schools were doing.

I'm surprised by so many schools not giving the kids in anything other than TAs. That's hideous provision. Thank goodness my DC's school didn't go down that route

@Senmumm2021

I'm surprised by so many schools not giving the kids in anything other than TAs. That's hideous provision. Thank goodness my DC's school didn't go down that route

Me too, it wasn't like that at DS's school. In the second lockdown half the kids were in school, if only half the kids were at home then why would all teachers need to be teaching online? Surely you only need half the teachers doing the online work, and half can be in school. That's how they did it anyway.

@Senmumm2021

I'm surprised by so many schools not giving the kids in anything other than TAs. That's hideous provision. Thank goodness my DC's school didn't go down that route

The only thing that made it marginally better for us the second time was minimal numbers in and teacher online with equal access to all.

Of course it didn’t solve the terrible lack of contact with friends etc which I’d do my utmost to avoid again.

@waxonwaxoff0 I don't see it either. The kids at home at my DC's school had 2 daily zoom registrations and lessons introduced via video clips. The school surveyed parents after the initial lockdown and it was 75% really didnt want live lessons for kids at home as it was more pressure and rathered videos to accompany the work and drop in support as needed.

The numbers in were too high to justify not giving those in any teachers, especially as they were in for either being vulnerable or having KW-er parents so less likely to get the support at home.

Tg we didn’t do that, it was hard enough at home as it was.

[quote Senmumm2021]@waxonwaxoff0 I don't see it either. The kids at home at my DC's school had 2 daily zoom registrations and lessons introduced via video clips. The school surveyed parents after the initial lockdown and it was 75% really didnt want live lessons for kids at home as it was more pressure and rathered videos to accompany the work and drop in support as needed.

The numbers in were too high to justify not giving those in any teachers, especially as they were in for either being vulnerable or having KW-er parents so less likely to get the support at home.[/quote]
Yes, there were no live online lessons at DS's school, work and videos were uploaded online to complete as and when.

My class remained my class, whether in school or at home. I taught them all equally, I set and marked all their work. I answered all questions from them or from those looking after them. It just so happened that some were at home with parents and others in school with support staff in loco parentis. Had I taught full time in school, I could not possibly have given such focus to the children at home. Especially as we had to refuse places to about half those who wanted them, giving both equal treatment as far as humanly possible was really important. It’s also important to note that we couldn’t combine classes in school without going over safe numbers, so we couldn’t have a teacher in school and one at home.

We did a max of 75- 90 mins live each day (2 sessions, 1 teaching 1 feedback / social, staggered to allow siblings to share devices). Rest were video and other forms of asynchronous learning.

Remember that the target is not ‘how can we give the children in school the best possible experience’, but ‘what is the best we can do for all children both at school and at home so that we can pick up everyone from as far as possible the same point the day that lockdown ends?’ There were some things that we could have done to make learning ‘even better’ for one group or the other, but if it systematically increased the gap between them, we didn’t do it.

Schools will not close .New data coming out already suggests that hospitals will not be over run as the new variant does not make people as sick as the delta variant.

The only restrictions I can imagine will be similar to wales and Scotland. Schools will definitely be the last things to close as everyone knows that children have lost far to much of their education and online learning really doesn't cut it.

The only possibility is certain schools may have to shut due to staff isolating but there will not be blanket closures .Boris has already cut down the time you need to isolate from.ten to seven days.

But staff can't necessarily come back into schools after 7 days with 2 negative LFTs when symptom free, because those released early are not meant to go out into crowded places, are meant to avoid close contacts and are strongly advised to work from home!

Those who leave self-isolation on or after day 7 are strongly advised to limit close contact with other people in crowded or poorly ventilated spaces, work from home and minimise contact with anyone who is at higher risk of severe illness if infected with COVID- 19.

[From the Government statement]

(That doesn't mean that Heads, SLT and parents won't demand that teachers come in after 7 days - or that teachers won't feel guilty if they don't. But it is clear from the Government's own statement that returning would be against strong advice...)