DFE have updated 'Critical workers' section to clarify that parents and carers who are critical workers should keep their children at home if they can.

[diddydave]

www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-maintaining-educational-provision

And yet the DfE and DWP are both telling their staff who are WFH to take up their keyworker places. The mixed messages are undermining the broader message of stay at home.

I think I'd send the littlest but not the other two. My y4 can work independently in short bursts and understand when he can and can't interrupt. He might have been able to in Y3 not sure.

Can you really not either of you take a break occasionally to throw a pre-made packed lunch at them or start them off with an activity? Can you each shift your hours a bit so One starts early and one finishes late.

I'm sure this is just my ignorance because I've never had that kind of a job but meetings all day every day sounds crazy to me. I mean meetings aren't work in themselves are they they are just talking about work? Surely there has to be some time with no meetings so people can get things done.

You are going to need a contingency plan anyhow because bubbles will certainly be bursting and the kids will be self isolating regularly at a best case scenario and at a worst case you are hugely increasingly your own exposure to Covid with 3 kids all in school and may very well get ill yourselves plus have the DC at home (recently this was us and it sucked very badly. DS watched at least 2 series of Star Wars cartoons whilst we were both in bed ill) then no work will be done at all. We were off for 2 weeks each.

@piscis

The purpose is childcare to allow key workers to work, it isn't about keeping the children or their parents any safer

Yes, but the safer it is, the better, because parents can keep working. If the bubble burst, that will have an impact on most of the parents, who will need to isolate. So having too many kids in one class is risky and ultimately will lead to keyworkers not being able to work at some point.

I am not saying there is an easy solution and I understand staffing issues but putting kids in bigger groups is really not ideal.

...the key phrase there that I look at is "the safer it is, the better, because parents can keep working"...

The only way the school can have smaller groups is if fewer children are sent in. Doubling up on producing remote learning materials (not live lessons) is the only area that school staffing can free up a member of staff to take physically present pupils.

In many cases if 10 pupils are off, or 100 pupils are off, one member of staff can produce remote learning material. However if the class size is normally 20 then with just 10 not attending class sizes have to rise whereas with 100 off there is the possibility of smaller class sizes. However, the Government brought in a legal obligation with regard to remote learning that makes it much harder to use that kind of economy of scale.

That also only works if you have a large enough school to have multiple teachers for each group/subject.

I totally feel for keyworkers who have sent their children to school but they work from
Home. If you’re offered a place, why wouldn’t you take it! I would. But I’m a bit peeved at people saying “we just can’t do our jobs with children at home” ..... what do you think the rest of us are doing?

I work in public sector but not on keyworker list. I can’t be furloughed. I have phone calls and zoom meetings and non negotiable evening meetings each week. I’m juggling, taking leave, getting up early, working in the evenings when kids in bed, plus homeschooling primary age. I’m sorry, it’s hard but you just need to get on with it and use all the tools you can to get through this.

If we hadn't both had it and we were selfish bastards who didn't care about anyone else I reckon it still would not make sense to send ours.

I'm out at work. DH has his work life disrupted by DS being around BUT a bit of daily disruption that he can work around is less bad for him than everyone self isolating for weeks at a time so he can't even nip to the postbox and the prospect of getting it and being unable to work at all for at least 2 weeks

So even selfishly that's a weigh up that I am not sure people/ employers are making and should be. The disruption from workers getting the virus from their DC in school might very well be worse than that of home schooled kids.

I would consider sending the littlest to schoo and keeping the other two at home. But using time to get her dropped and fetched would impact on the time to support the others at home learning.

If the bubble burst then of course we would have no choice but to manage as I described above. But there is no way we could home school three kids and do our jobs. We already shuffle start and finish times. And yes we have to do actual work as well as attend endless meetings. All on short timescales.

I do feel guilty as I know others are in the same position and not able to access a place either because they are no eligible or no places available.
I wonder whether others would take up a place in our position. Well 3.

@Littlecaf

I totally feel for keyworkers who have sent their children to school but they work from Home. If you’re offered a place, why wouldn’t you take it! I would. But I’m a bit peeved at people saying “we just can’t do our jobs with children at home” ..... what do you think the rest of us are doing?

I work in public sector but not on keyworker list. I can’t be furloughed. I have phone calls and zoom meetings and non negotiable evening meetings each week. I’m juggling, taking leave, getting up early, working in the evenings when kids in bed, plus homeschooling primary age. I’m sorry, it’s hard but you just need to get on with it and use all the tools you can to get through this.

I feel you've hit the nail on the head with "offered a place, why wouldn't you take it" and it's the reason they've issued this, admittedly very weak, additional guidance.

Sending your child to school makes everything that little bit less safe.

They may not be at greater risk of dying (the basis of Boris' assertion that schools are safe)
But they are at greater risk of catching it.
They are at greater risk of spreading it.
They are at greater risk of bringing it home.

“ They may not be at greater risk of dying (the basis of Boris' assertion that schools are safe)
But they are at greater risk of catching it.
They are at greater risk of spreading it.
They are at greater risk of bringing it home.”

Exactly which is why they guidance needs/needed tightening. If you can work from home your kids stay at home with you.

@Littlecaf

“ They may not be at greater risk of dying (the basis of Boris' assertion that schools are safe) But they are at greater risk of catching it. They are at greater risk of spreading it. They are at greater risk of bringing it home.”

Exactly which is why they guidance needs/needed tightening. If you can work from home your kids stay at home with you.

But not going into an office (I.e. working from home) is not the same as being able to actually work at home. Some people genuinely couldn’t get work done from home with young children around if their work is time restrictive.

I'm a teacher, we're lucky in that I work 3 days and I'm studying part time, DH not a keyworker has just had his contract reduced to 4 days. We could take up places for our kids, 13 & 10; but we won't, if I'm in school DH looks after them, they don't get much attention and he gets a but less done. His company have been very supportive of him having his meetings occasionally interrupted and work being delayed a little. Obviously they aren't tiny, my youngest has some learning difficulties and struggles to work independently though.
I'm working into the evening and on the weekends to catch up. DH is working on his day off.

Kids will desperately miss friends and spend too much time on games. I doubt they'll keep up with all their school work, but there needs to be a national effort to get the infection down. I feel we're doing our bit and critical workers working outside of home need places at school more.

@wonderstuff
"His company have been very supportive.."

This part stuck out to me and from what I am hearing (I no longer teach but run my own business) is that companies are, this time around, being far less supportive and tolerant generally. No surprise I suppose as many will be struggling to make money. Those employers are telling their workers they ARE key workers and MUST claim their school place so that even if they are wfh they can be 'efficiently' wfh.

They have no incentive to accommodate more flexible working other than the furlough, though the change in that scheme to allow more flexibility within it is welcomed. It would be nice if they could identify that a worker wfh but with childcare was say 50% less efficient and could therefore qualify them for 50% furlough.

“ But not going into an office (I.e. working from home) is not the same as being able to actually work at home. Some people genuinely couldn’t get work done from home with young children around if their work is time restrictive.”

Yes but that’s not limited to keyworkers. It’s the rest of us too.

What I don't understand is that at my DD's school they have put together both nursery and Reception kids in the same class, with a total of 15.

We've done this at my school. It's so teachers don't have to be in the classroom every day and therefore actually have some time to do their other job of preparing and delivering home learning.

@Littlecaf

“ But not going into an office (I.e. working from home) is not the same as being able to actually work at home. Some people genuinely couldn’t get work done from home with young children around if their work is time restrictive.”

Yes but that’s not limited to keyworkers. It’s the rest of us too.

I agree

@tinsel. With 3 in primary, working full time and homeschooling would be tough.

With 2 parents wfh though and if there is some flexibility in your hours, and you had to do it could one of you work 7-1pm 6 days and the other work 1-7pm 6 days.

Then at least one parent can work solidly for half the day while the other supervises homeschool and childcare, meals etc.

I wouldn't envy you having to do that.