The Twenty Fourth Republic - conditions not great and are teachers becoming modern day lepers?

[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 yo

Unpaid day today. Had a really late night on Sunday marking, and it's thrown me out of sync for the week. I thought it was the weekend when I woke up! Got a parent's evening (on Teams) and compulsory IT training after work on Friday too.

Going to try and plan ahead the next week or so of A-level and figure out how to get my rowdy Year 8s back on track. There are no spare chairs or desks in the classroom and we are being advised not to move their seats because of test, track and trace. I don't really want to have to go down the official sanction route, because I would find it difficult to pick one or two - there are a handful of lazy kids who know I can't stand right up close to them, then a bunch who refuse to think for themselves and take up so much time going "I can't do it!" and end up chatting to their neighbours. Have raised my voice in the last two classes, because I can't hear the person who's talking to me from 1 metre away but I can hear the kids at the back of the class!

There are loads of genuinely delightful children in that class but I'm starting to feel as if I'm failing in this class.

Behaviour is generally good across the school, so I know I'm not up against challenges such as violence or being sworn at. It's so hard not being able to circulate around the classroom though, it's knocking my confidence in being able to manage behaviour.

Think I need to do some algebra to take my mind off things .

Oh, and for A-level Maths teachers, I quite like the videos from Bicen Maths for students who are isolating. He follows the Dr Frost slides/EdExcel textbook. He hasn't done the whole lot, and the sound is dodgy in a few videos, but I've had positive feedback from the students about him.

www.youtube.com/channel/UC58b34-W7M-bLEARri1912g

Thank you for the video link DreamingofBrie - they look very promising. It’s crazy that we are being told we must teach live (or at the very least record our own videos) when so much good stuff is already out there.

I’m glad to hear I’m not the only one who finds algebra therapeutic!

These videos also cover the Edexcel A-level maths textbook plus Further Maths www.youtube.com/channel/UCyyRmnmtgVy5Sm7_UiCLFgQ (and some higher GCSE)

Saved my lockdown.

Thank you, Noble!

Yes thanks Noble - so many options, and far superior to my amateurish efforts!

I made a recorded powerpoint for the first time last week, for a remote lesson that couldn't be timetabled.

Students laughed at my posh telephone voice (they didn't hear the swearing , which was wiped during the many, many retakes!), but said it was useful.

But does anyone know how they can pause audio during a Powerpoint? It seemed to play the whole way through, so although I was speaking and annotating at the same time, which slowed things down, they couldn't pause/replay without coming out of slide show, then opening up slide show again at the slide they needed to rewatch.

I hope I don't need to upload it to Youtube or anything .

Confirmed case in a year 8 in DH's school. Not sure what school is doing.

Thankfully, he doesn't teach year 8.

First confirmed case my college! Apparently just the kids they sat near to sent home...not sure how that works in a completely bubble- and SD-free setting but there you go!

DreamingofBrie I was doing recordings using Loom instead which just records over whatever is on your screen. The kids can pause, rewind etc, but also play at double speed which is good.

Mayhem at DH's school today apparently. Staff have been 'asked to decide' whether they need to SI. The test result must have come through during the day as they were attempting to send kids home during the school day. Whole form class sent home and lack of certainty over what happens with the setted maths class.

This is a school which has seemed serene and organised.

Today at my school we had a load of fights....

And now we are starting a rota for after school revision sessions with unfamiliar kids in a classroom with shared resources and no seating plan. Joy.

@DreamingofBrie I've just looked at one of mine and the PowerPoint has a bit to press play to listen to my audio, the play button turns into a pause one once it is playing. I can't see how you'd fast forward or rewind but could definitely pause. (This is in slideshow)

Unpaid day today but seem to have spent the whole day working and just attended an online meeting about a problem year group.

Full on day tomorrow and I go from 11.50-3.10 without a break at all which is exhausting. 3 classes in different zones and a break duty and zero movement time so just hectic. Possibly my worst day on my two week timetable.

Keeping my head above water but doing a lot of extra hours to achieve that. No idea how full timers are managing this.

Yy to sending one lesson and saying you'll send more when you receive the work. Learnt that very quickly this term.

Thanks for your help, everyone! I've downloaded Loom to have a play with, and unclicked a box on slideshow setting, which hopefully will let the students pause and move on manually.

Third cover of the week today. I have a lot of frees but others with more have done none. Not happy.

I was using loom during lockdown. Then the ICT support guys decided that wasn't secure enough, so now I have to use MS Stream to do any videos. But now I've got the lovely YouTube videos helpfully linked to by noble and dreaming I hopefully won't need to make as many of my own.

I've been suffering badly with heavy bleeding due to the perimenopause. It's caused me to feel exhausted. This week, I've also been feeling breathless and had continuous bad headaches for the last three days.

Today I was told a girl on my front row 2 lessons per week has had a positive test. It's up to me whether or not I want to self-isolate, based on whether I feel I have symptoms or not.

I'm thinking that I will still go in, since I haven't got one of the main three symptoms and can probably put what I have got down to my excessive bleeding, but I've had lots of people asking me if I am okay today. I don't want to do the wrong thing and put people at risk, but I also don't want to be a drama queen.

First confirmed case at DS’s school today, close contacts sent home. No idea (yet!) which year group.

It's up to me whether or not I want to self-isolate, based on whether I feel I have symptoms or not.

This is so unreasonable. It shouldn’t depend on whether you have symptoms - you’re either a contact or you’re not - and the onus shouldn’t be on you. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

Hope you feel better soon.

I agree, it puts me in a tricky position. I'd much rather they made the decision. I'm going to go in. I think my symptoms are much more likely to be related to my period issues and I can at least say I'm playing it by the book.

I'll pretty much isolate apart from work though, I think.

And thanks for the well wishes :)

Sleepless night here due to my asthma rearing it's head. I kept waking myself up with a cough, but I know it is def my asthma cough so that's Ok! A boy in my class is off isolating because his dad has fesrwd positive so I am holding my breath that he's not already brought it in to school. The weekend break will hopefully have helped with the timings and the lad was last in on Friday.
A year in my daughter's school has been told to stay at home, but not her year.
And my dd who is in uni is in the room next to a lad who is isolating because someone in his f2f tutor group tested positive. That with the rising numbers does all contribute to making me a little more nervous than I usually am.

Are you assuming perimenopause? Or is it a change as on the 'lungs' thread it affected periods.
Think im heading for menopause only just early 40s though so seems too soon. But i have had 4 rounds of ivf so that might make a difference somehow ( i know it doesnt actually use more eggs each time)

Dc1 was just describing her friend getting sent home early today due maybe to a cough. (They were at a soft play yesterday)

Is this a new technique to put pressure on individual teachers to keep going no matter what, ie "You decide if you want to appear paranoid or a wuss and isolate"?

It's definitely not fair to ask teachers whether they should isolate or not. It should be a blanket rule that if a child in your class is a confirmed case you isolate. That should just be it. Nothing about symptoms, because you'd already isolate if you had symptoms. Contact isolation should be a very clear rule, not individual discretion!!!