The Fourth Republic Rises - solidarity comrades!

[StaffAssociationRepresentative]

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. Baiters and bashers can jog on somewhere else.

If you are not staff and just have a general education query please start your own thread.

You can play here only if you are a member of one the following groups-

-ABBA - anti bashers and baiting association
-SWAB - school workers against bashers
-SWOT - school workers opposing teacherbashers
-STARS - schoolworkers together against ranting + slurs

Other requirements for staff room entry include the ability to find the staff room, the ability to find a clean mug in the staff room, knowledge of the photocopier codes and the ability to sniff out where the toffee vodka is hidden.

Fuck knows how this will work in an sen school.

Only positive is that we have more staff but we have those staff for a reason. Mind you as we are class sizes of less than 15 will that mean business as usual

Thing is - we will need a full plan for the 1st which will then be turned on it’s head a few weeks later. If the numbers on our rota are to go by - we have 15 teachers including a non teaching deputy (head is shielding). We would need 14 groups of 15 or less to open to reception, y1 and y6. Then we need to stay open for key workers (with capacity increase) and by reading this - also be open for nursery. If nursery too our classroom capacity would probably be hindered. Summer term is the largest intake for nursery.

There is seperate guidance for SEN schools but it basically boils down to 'do your own risk assessment'
Theres even less information for children with SEN in mainstream. Our school only has SEN TAs in the afternoons. So thats a blind child's TA with a group of 15, or a chid who needs help with the toilets and getting in and out of wheelchair etc.
Still it probably is just 3 weeks..

Checking in all. Not long till half term now . Not that that seems to be any consolation at the moment!

That "are teachers and TAs being paid" thread is still rumbling along. I see and other TBs are planting the seed of teachers going on strike in the heads of posters. Arseholes.

I'm on a fairly light timetable at the moment as I had 60% exam classes this year, so it feels manageable, along with homeschooling my own dc who are now working pretty independently, with lots of support from their excellent teachers. We are providing bridging work for Y11 and some pre-University work for Y13.

I am having lots of uncharitable thoughts about the goady posters, and those like them (mercifully very few), who are like this in real life. They are so noisy that I'm finding it difficult to maintain perspective sometimes.

Just spotted this thread!

I work in a specialist setting and we are open for a number of our most vulnerable children. No SD happening at all (impossible and v v stressful to try to implement) and so far no one has got ill. We are making our own plans to have more children in (and more staff on a daily basis) after half-term and we will assess how this is going for a few weeks before making any other changes.

I would urge HTs/SLTs to take control of this situation for their own schools and consult with their staff to make a plan that works for them. Surely schools could identify a number of R/Y1 children to have in initially, and only increase the number once they feel things are going OK? School staff are the people best placed to make the decisions for their schools, not Boris!

Ok thanks grass. I worked out yesterday that trying to look through it all myself is affecting my mental health.

It's also just occurred to me that my role, ppa cover, is difficult as I personally would meet a different group 4 times a day, and I have moderately severe asthma. Ppa and part time staff will need to be assigned to one class. Ppa can then only happen within groups, if at all.

Sorry just moderate asthma. Thankfully. But it's a risk. I seem to have been deteriorating over the last few years.

I’ve just read the article on the BBC that pegs our lovely return to school as being-almost wistfully-just like they have done in Denmark, and am really annoyed.

Have Denmark gone back in groups of 15? I thought it was no more than 8?
What does it actually look like there now?
What precautions are actually in place to protect staff?

And more importantly...
Have they gone back in Denmark with the near promise to parents that ALL primary would be back as normal, 3 weeks later?!! That expectation is going to be looming very heavily over our heads.

What’s the point in meticulously planning for something for just three weeks if you’re going to check it all out if the window for ‘normal’ shortly after?

Plus-what are we actually going to DO with the children for 7 weeks? What normally happens in June and July? Transition work, picnics, cooking, leaver assemblies, group photos, residential, transition visits, Discos. It’s not that we aren’t working, but the very hot sticky weeks are usually interspersed with lovely things to keep the kids going, motivated and happy. Will we have y6 in rows in hot sweaty rooms, just writing for 7 weeks? Any y6 teachers care to comment on that? Or the behaviour? Often those things are used as rewards for children who struggle to cope in the hot, emotional last few weeks of term. What else can we offer?

I was reading stuff about viral load last night-being stuck in a hot windowless room together is a pretty sure fire way to spread this. I rather suspect Denmark has a little more outside space than we do. I’m surprised there wasn’t mention of a tent in the guidance, through how we would put up tents when our playing fields were sold off, I don’t know.

YR and Y1 can’t play with soft toys or toys with small parts as the guidance wants them removed from the room. That will be fun. What will they DO? What you can do with 8 (if we’re going to start comparing this to Denmark) is actual v different to what you could do with 15.

I await what the Union have planned and am hoping this is just a pipe dream.

As a secondary teacher I feel so anxious now. I barely slept and had an odd dream that I met a nasty neighbor of mine while I was in full PPE then woke up coughing .

I just don't understand the instruction for Y10/12. 'Some face-to-face time before summer' to me implies not full days o full-time and perhaps not even in school much or even at all.

But at 9pm last night my head had emailed that 'the government wants us to open on 1st June' and he will be letting us know how it will work in the next couple of days. No meetings, no consultation, and I'm afraid I don't have faith in him to be able to keep us all safe. I think he will just want them all in as soon as possible.

I am sp to Y6 and Y8 children and not keen on sending the Y6 child back at all and not keen for Y8 to go to school as child of a key worker or for him to be alone all day every day either.

This is just shit. Really hope to hear from unions today.

Too much open to interpretation by heads. Ours has taken a wait and see approach.

www.tes.com/news/im-primary-head-and-im-baffled-latest-advice

Sums it up perfectly

Key thing about Denmark is that their "primary" go up to y8 so they have bigger schools with more rooms.

The "all pupils in for a month" surely must be on a part time basis unless kw, of which there will be more as will include teaching staff. You can't physically do it with the room spaces.

This document has been shared in an slt fb group which is a summary of the key points. I found it useful.

The whole thing is batshit. If we pull this off I'm demanding some claps and pan bashing and some grovelling threads on mn.

The only reason I can see why they're doing this now is to test it during the summer months. This would be harder to organise over the summer for September and also more risky as we go into the colder months.

Throughout all of this my biggest query has been "what about the winter." We are surely going to have another lockdown then.

lookaside.fbsbx.com/file/DfE%20Schools%20Guidance.docx?token=AWyTOLtCjHNuUY2H7uoO3A0T8Kw64KQjl2zO2aO8y0JgQPLpWiUnN4L3gqmFAdLyy2YzXdTOseGMm1fULXS6ye2c8DnYxuBTcxgLqVDALlUygGYnTkUZOXpw-DZ23675ndCI1kNvTjJ2YG6sEOo4MSCgpe-Eexak1SIvieM8ZjyKzsA6JijI6g6SQBo5vL1jx1GsTjSmeo9A5Pnu5L-yovPp

Practicallyperfect yes it does!

Down to the head-scratching about colours.

Surely we needed a pink for think in there too??

Was anyone else sniggering over the quality and stupidity of the government's visuals?

Theduchess

I wonder if they mean a personal socially distanced tutorial? Pep talk?

The "all pupils in for a month" surely must be on a part time basis unless kw, of which there will be more as will include teaching staff. You can't physically do it with the room spaces

Well, that would be what anyone working in a school would logically think. The only mention of part time in the guidelines, however was in relation to y10/12 and a lot of parents now believe their Primary child will be back for a month this summer.

If part time is fine but the clarification in the guidelines doesn’t actually mention this...then, they aren’t very good guidelines.

20. Toys and equipment should not be used by other groups and should be cleaned between groups.
21. Unnecessary items in classrooms should be removed and stored elsewhere in the school.
22. Remove all soft furnishings, toys and soft toys that cannot easily be cleaned every day.

This is a massive issue for Sen. We rely on lots of these and sensory equipment.

Theduchess, you shouldn’t be going in. Secondary schools have had no notification and you are meant to work from home

Oh god, taxis...

Just remembered transport. Kids get picked up from talk over in loads of minibuses and taxis, and then go to different classes. That'll be another factor to consider.

Glad I'm not on slt right now.

Why is there a head on BBCNews now who hasn't read the DfE guidance??

Why the fuck hasn't she read it???

The actual words about year 10 and 12 in the DfE document are REALLY confusing .

‘Elsewhere in the school’ ? Errr, where, exactly? We are going to need all our classrooms.

Danish teacher on BBC1 now.

The guidelines are very confusing with regards the whole of primary and the exam
classes. Why would the suggest the while of primary getting a month when it may bot be possible.

Mary was just on LBC. Nick asked why don't you trust the modelling saying its safe.
Hilarious!

Watch BBC1 now.