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.

SD hugs all round.

Just worked out that staff at our school may very well have kids at a local first school which has two ks1 classes and a ks2 class 1 SI. Not sure if it's children or teachers; school has been very careful not to specify.

They may not but it's a common one for colleagues to have had kids at over the years.

First proper teaching tomorrow, very challenging though lovely class. I expect I'll take a peek at them a few mins before and change the lesson entirely...!

We're going to do what we did during lockdown for isolation learning. White Rose maths lessons - us talking through teaching powerpoints. Print the sheets and send them home. English/history lessons with some writing. Pencil and paper only, you tube vids. Email work pics, wellmarl from that. I'm going to sort it out tomorrow as I have management time. Presumably we'll have to have some sort of Teams contact, but it can't be live lessons - maybe a tutorial type thing with 6 kids at a time.

I've got 6 children out of 23 sneezing and coughing. Another 4 off for undisclosed (to me) reasons.

I'm trying to be positive, but I'm also absolutely hating it at the moment.

My friend whose school has sent year groups home has said that they will be running live lessons from within the school according to the timetable

This is my nightmare. I have no idea how to do a teams lesson. I strongly suspect my bottom sets won’t look at it anyway.

@ohthegoats

I've got 6 children out of 23 sneezing and coughing. Another 4 off for undisclosed (to me) reasons.

I'm trying to be positive, but I'm also absolutely hating it at the moment.

You shouldn't have children coughing surely! Our policy (apparently - not tested it yet) is to send coughers home.

@WhenSheWasBad I can help with teams if needs be.
Luckily every member of teaching staff has a laptop with camera (which is automatically disabled in teams), as do all LSAs now. But it wasn't fun.

Happy to help with teams too.

Already stressing about tomorrow.

I actually hate my job right now. I can't deal with the constant unending barrage of information, requests and demands thrown at me every day.

Tomorrow is my day off. I'm hoping to have a day OFF but I can guarantee I'll end up working.

I had SLT do a 'drop in' today. Thought they were just checking in but caught them writing up something outside - and then they went next door and did the same. No words.

That's shit, odds.
I'm going to be doing formal obs in a week or so but people will know and I won't be a twat about it. But NQTs have to be observed :(

@Myusername2015

So both my toddler and I woke up with hacking coughs and temps today. My head was t best pleased. I had to drive 50 miles to a testing centre and was told they have a delay of up to 7 days for results. On hearing this my head said “well it’s probably just a cold always happens this time of year just make sure you socially distance from the kids until the results are back. 🙁

Omg your head is so irresponsible. Wtf

Myusername I cannot believe your head said that

Hi team. Baptism of fire for me today teaching a class in a dance studio with no working IT. Still, I survived. Probably pretty boring for them though. My biggest challenge with the bubble model is using my PPA time productively. I'd normally work in my room but other teachers are teaching in there. We have no staffroom with staff computers.

MrsHamlet - your teams booklet has arrived! Thank you so much for your generosity

WhenSheWasBad, happy to help with Team. I'm in my 21st week of online teaching, all through Teams, and they keep coming up with spiffy new things.

No-one's back until week beginning 4th October.

Thanks MrsH I need to go off and re read your walk through on Teams. Cases are shooting up in the town I work in. Need to prepare myself for the worse.

It’s (potentially) such a shame for the kids. I’ve not been there long but I’ve already spotted a few incredible kids who will could work entirely independently at home. But it’s not a skill many teenagers have.

Formal obs is a shit thing to do right now. NQTs fair enough, we know we have improvements we need to make. Hopefully it’s done in a supportive productive manor.

But for actual established teachers, it’s just cruel.

If you can get school to get you a visualiser, you'll be glad of it.
I had to persuade the head to let me observe NQTs - he wants no one extra in classes. But the legalities of it are vital. I'm not having them fail to progress because we didn't do what we needed to.
Technically, I also need to see 10 other staff in the next 3 weeks, but they'll have to be flybys to check they're okay.

I'm not going to observe any of my team this term. I've been told to do support staff appraisal stuff, even that is a bit bonkers.

I've just checked my email for the first time today. A parent has kept a child off school because she put her jumper on the ground in PE, and then put it back on. This is apparently 'covid unsafe', and I'm promoting covid unsafe behaviour. FFS.

Then all the emails about children with mental health issues, parents asking for referrals. No point my lovelies, EPs haven't even been allocated this term from the LA. None of them want to do visits.

Accidentally just posted this on the last thread!

I'm going to do my librarian's next week. No pay progression for her anyway so it's a waste of everyone's time - but she's bloody awesome and I want it recorded.
Everyone will get their progression anyway this year, so it's really only the NQTs and UQTs who need observing, and that's all on me.
Love that DrM

On a personal note, my DD (who had a rocky time including having to get Camhs on board after going missing etc during lockdown) has had several 1-2-1 Camhs sessions and is seeming to be in a much better place. And she has managed to get back to school and is saying it is 'fine' (high praise in her teen-speak) so that's a huge plus point here.

Still just as knackered today as I was yesterday. Some of the smaller intricacies of having to work around aspects of the risk assessment are becoming clearer - but it's still far from normal and just thinking about all the extra things we have to do or are not allowed to do is taking up so much headspace!

Hello, I'm new to all this but loving the Republic! I'm a HT in a 3-11 State school in the UK. I wanted to say that we are awaiting a couple of results- but one child who developed a severe cough today was told he needed test. However all test centres were fully booked and when the parent requested a home kit, they were told they couldn't have one because there were none left to send. They had run out!
You really couldn't make it up.
As for SLT doing formal obs atm- they need to give their heads a wobble. Staff need supporting not being made to feel even more under pressure.

Greetings @Clarityiskey! Would you consider giving him one of yr ten kits or haven't you had them yet?

@MrsHamlet oh how so wish you were managing our library.....

So good about yr DD Madeleine.

August - the library has been taken over lock stock and barrel, but we're determined to find a way to get the library to the students somehow. I love line managing it - the student librarian interviews are such fun :!

@Augustbreeze, Yes, I've had the ten kits, and yes after a nice chat with his lovely and really supportive parent, was happy to hand over one of the "for use in extreme case only" kits. Wonder how long the results will take?