The Twenty-first Republic - All back but for how long? Why is Big Gav still in post?

[StaffAssociationRepresentative]

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. It is meant for school staff only – a sort of room of requirement. Baiters, haters, goaders 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 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

Do not give ‘The Every twat for Themselves mob’ the staffroom password as a number of them are operating in an alternative reality.

No DfE muppets allowed

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.

If you are fed up with cakes and biscuits there is now a cheeseboard on offer

If you come with a stick to goad us then that is not allowed in the staffroom, especially if you have not used the hand gel. Close the door quietly on your way out and put your mask on.

Oh god I bloody love nessy! And ds would have too.

Gutted school abandoned it. Apart from anything, I'd have got ds on it on my laptop. I got some of the apps when he was younger but he's beyond them now.

He's ok, I just think we have to get a routine going and refer back to school, ask for some praise etc.

Swimming sounds bliss. Probably safer too...

Signing in. Hopeful we will get our test results back today.
Wondering how many more schools will have cases as the day goes on.
and all , not sure a full term of this is manageable.

I think you might be right, starry. I'm starting to wonder if it won't be covid that causes a lot of the sick leave, but a collective breakdown. Something has to give, and unfortunately in education it's often the teachers rather than the system.

Occupational health appointment this am. I don't really know what I'm going to say to them tbh.

You can get an online subscription to the latest version of Nessy for about £8 a month.

Checking in!

I have both children fuming at me, and our cover supervisor telling me off for not reporting my absence before 0745! DS has mild symptoms. Nothing bookable online apart from 65 miles away but going to try walk in - just turning up...

Oh no August! Hope you manage to get one and are all ok.

I've normally dropped my son off by now. It takes 3 mins to walk there. But due to staggering, another 20 mins to kill! (And he's bizzarely read a mr man book to me of his own suggestion just now )

Thanks Arti That's not bad but will have to cancel reading eggs which the toddler loves. I know he wouldn't do regularly either.

Maybe if a second lockdown...

This might be teaching you to suck eggs, but try non-fiction if you haven't already. Some reluctant readers will happily sit and devour non-fiction books on topics of interest. It help's that there's often no need to sit and read through the whole book, you can just dip in and out of pages/sections that interest you.

I can't even blame the ipad for that random apostrophe. It was all me.

@minisoksmakehardwork a colleague at work made masks with the kind of plastic you get in thick poly pockets - the clear ones not translucent ones!

DC's school aimed for about
band 3 for end yr r
7 end of yr 1. Then al lot seemed to become free readers during year 2.
But at least 1 still on scheme (our scheme only went up to lime) starting year 4.

Dc liked project alien too. I think there are 2 packs from band 7 up. They were cheap on book people .
Other than that we did the book delivery and ordered free library books to pick up.

How keen they are makes such a difference. Dc1 was very keen and could basically free read by 5yo.
Dc2 just starting reception has been resistant to even learning sounds. But getting on well now on reading eggs. Definitely is going to struggle more.
But now in yr 4 with dc1 you can see that most are similar level and it's the other skills and grammar which are important and creativity. We have had toput effort into maths instead (and that will be harder to support at home) so swings and roundabouts.

August I was offered three different places over the course of two hours yesterday. We had luckily just got a pop up site right by us as our cases are high. I just kept logging in until I got offered that.
Hope your all ok.
This is the thing it’s not just us getting symptoms needing time off, it’s our children to sigh

Thanks, we tried just turning up and that was fine - why doesn't the booking site /general info suggest you do this?? OK you might have to wait a bit, but probably better than sitting on the booking site all day or driving 100 miles!

My DS was a star doing it; his Y11 sister is fuming at both of us as is missing a test and her activity this evening!

I was quite surprised, but perhaps shouldn't have been. She knows how serious the situation is and how easily infection is going to be in school. I guess like all of us, it's one thing knowing these things in theory but possibly another when it affects you and your plans. (Sideways glance at many on MN.....)

One school on BRTUS 4T 1S. So surely in school transmission.

if something like 3% of people incubate 14d+
And some are contagious longer than the 10d off. It's easy to see this will escalate.
Its the same with Q if enough went to high risk country . Say 1m went to fr and spain. If 1/1000 rate then 1000 get infected 3% still get it after the 14d. So 30 people. Of the 1000 infected some wont have Q anyway.
And some of the 1000 will be contagious longer than their 10/14d Q.

Do you think they would check any of the positives to see if they had been abroad. I mean if they end up 1d after holiday being the cause of a school closure for ignoring the Q surely it should be a fine.

I did read though that flying obviously increases blood clot chances and i think that was true not just on the flight but for a while after.
Although cases rising across Europe and they are not likely flying. It seems likely though that young brits who love sun holidays with young family are likely to be asymptomatic spreaders.

Sorry, what is BRTUS 4T 1S?

Realise I should have clarified earlier:

the reason I hadn't informed school before the required time is because I hadn't known I was going to be off before that time, ie hadn't put the little things DS had commented on together, to equal "needs a test, therefore we all have to isolate"!

BRTUS is the Boycott Return to Unsafe Schools group which is collating numbers of schools closed currently. A few of us have joined their Fb group out of interest but I think at least me and @NeurotrashWarrior are a bit 🤨 at their borderline hysteria and school blaming .....
not sure what the last initials/numbers are about though!

I also meant to add, we're in an area of rising cases and border an area of Increased Concern - where our school is! You'd think there'd be increased testing capacity. The testing centre was certainly busier than last month and there were a couple of other families there, but I don't think it was at capacity.

Someone on another thread, claiming knowledge, said the problem is lab capacity, which is vital as if a test site for too long it becomes invalid.

"Small number of cases" at a local first school. Not clear if it's staff or children.

Yes, I'm only looking at Brtus for any anedata; there are many very worried parents there and it's quite chaotic. I feel very bad for them actually. Many are sending children in but terrified about what actually happens at school.

The map on the website is interesting as they're linking school website letters or news articles, but not very cohesive. Spelling and geography is an issue!

Amusingly they call U4T "the group who shall not be named..."

Thanks Keep, I've been thinking about how he wouldn't draw or paint until he could just pick up a pencil and draw it perfectly, which he started doing over the last year, and is very good. But rarely draws for fun. I have no idea how he got like that. We are all very artistic but I used to spend ages drawing!

He's like that with a few thing, so it may be like that with him for reading too.

Has anyone managed to get a test through the key worker portal? We're trying but nothing coming back.

Unpaid day today and I’ve spent about 3 and a half hours planning, setting homework for the next week and getting my head around group shares etc.

Full on teaching day tomorrow which is all planned for and resourced still got one lesson to plan and resource for Friday and also start marking on Friday.

Back on the rollercoaster.

Hope those waiting get quick results 🤞

Although cases rising across Europe and they are not likely flying. It seems likely though that young brits who love sun holidays with young family are likely to be asymptomatic spreaders

Why do you think people in Europe aren’t flying? They go on holiday too . My family are in Spain, they fly abroad for holidays. So do their friends. A young Spanish relative has just got back from 2 weeks in Greece.

Sorry yes i meant 4 teachers and 1 student at one school.
I expect the histeria is because it now isnt a choice so some have sent when they didnt want to. I think you feel more calm when it's a choice. Plus as it's already not looking good but i dont think gov will back down. But really the anger should be at gov as the procedures are rubbish and it's not school's deciwion about fines or all back in etc

It is so much easier when kids go into a phase of wanting to do the learning or drawing etc. Mine started reception not interested in writing or drawing but does have phases or writing her own stories oe drawing. I think unfortunately school tires her so much that term time there isnt much of that going on.
So more progress made at school but it's less self driven and maybe inventive.