The Twenty-Eight Republic - Lockdown Light

[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 booze is stashed - Thirsty Tuesdays, Fizz Fridays now in operation.

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 and you will receive a detention

I looked at the state of the house and went for a long walk instead. I am not one to incentivize anyone for housework.

Ooh, saucery you've incentivised me!! I shall go for a walk, as it's much easier to ignore housework/schoolwork if I'm not in the house!! What an excellent idea! I'll just have some lunch then I'm going out 😃

I’m reading Derren Brown’s A Little Happier today.

It says “Barbara Ehrenreich, in her book Bright-Sided: How Positive Thinking is Undermining America traces the injunction to be positive above all else to Calvinism: a form of Protestantism with a particularly gruelling work ethic. Under Calvinism, constant labour and accompanying material success indicated that a person was one of God’s elect. The fact that today many people feel guilty if they’re not filling their time with work is traceable to this Puritan movement. Ascetic dedication to labour was a way of absolving the terror of damnation that was seen to hang over all of us. Dickens’s Scrooge is a Calvinist figure.”

Today I will be channelling Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes instead.

Off out for a Pokemon Go walk as well. It's glorious here today. If I finish my y8 marking today I'll be happy.

@noblegiraffe, thanks again for your Desmond recommendation. I have one untimetable-able lesson with a 6th form group and have just found an excellent transforming graphs exercise that will stretch them. Can I ask - do you create your own activities or use the ones provided?

Desmos .

No idea who Desmond is.

@MsAwesomeDragon

Ooh, saucery you've incentivised me!! I shall go for a walk, as it's much easier to ignore housework/schoolwork if I'm not in the house!! What an excellent idea! I'll just have some lunch then I'm going out 😃

Glad to help! When you get back I can recommend making an apple and cinnamon cake too. House still a shit-tip but smells amazing

I generally create my own lessons, Dreaming but they are nothing fancy! Sometimes a screen in a lesson might just be a link to a video and a checkbox saying ‘tick this box when you have watched the video’.

If you try to search for lessons within Desmos it only shows a limited selection, if you Google search for Desmos lesson on x it will bring up far more.

I am doing no marking or housework, but instead am in the woods with my kids and a frisbee, and piles of leaves

I live alone, and school can honestly fire me if they think I'm not going to see my family at Christmas. I'd be fucked financially, but it's getting to the point where I don't really care.

We've got observations and book scrutinies next week, and I know about half my classes books aren't up to scratch, but over petty things, not major ones that actually have an impact on the kids.

I had a lovely, supportive HoD last year, who's left, and the HoD role is being shared between an SLT member who is known for being two-faced, and the former second in department, who used to be lovely, but I now feel is getting very passive aggressive.

I was managing fine, but for some reason the idea of being judged and found wanting given everything we've had to deal with since March has just made me both really angry and anxious. I've just had a proper cry about it, too.

I feel like you. sansa. I live with my ex and it's bloody miserable. I think I'd rather be on my own - but all of this chaos has put my plans to move on on hold.

@SansaSnark that is shit. I had a sixth form folder srutiny once and the feedback was I should get them to underline the date and title with a ruler. I asked if they could explain to me how this would improve their grades and progress... the silence was deafening.

Crikey if anyone was peddling incentivisation at the moment they'd be raking it in - here certainly!

@CallmeAngelina

Am I chuff not going to see family over Christmas so I can go back to school early January and hear from my clearly non-quarantining class what fabulous family fun they've all had.

This x 1000.

My sister’s driving down (she’s not that far away) and we’re going for a socially distanced walk. Hopefully before it starts pissing with rain.

Oh no we’re not it’s absolutely rammed out there, apparently.

I had a sixth form folder srutiny once and the feedback was I should get them to underline the date and title with a ruler.

I never even see my classes’ notes...god knows my classes manage to scrape through their exams when I don’t have a clue if they’ve underlined the title - or even written one!

I wonder how many people on the ‘school has all the windows open and my dc are freezing’ posters are the same ones suggesting teaching in a gazebo?

(Looks around shiftily)
I rarely have a title.

me neither mrsH!

Oh no we’re not it’s absolutely rammed out there, apparently

You’d certainly not think there was a lockdown where I am - large ish city. I just drove through town to go for a run and it was really busy.

@MrsHamlet

(Looks around shiftily) I rarely have a title.

We would literally be laced. The date in full needs to be written too. Apparently basic standards sets the climate for learning and standards linking to high expectations.🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮

Boris needs to be firmer about this lockdown.

The date is often on the board. Rarely because I wrote it, though. It's also rarely the right date.

Well, dh and I went for a long dog-walk this morning (from the house) and passed through a large park at one point. It was beyond rammed, particularly the children's play area. So we didn't get to go on the seesaw!
Some quite large groups there too, standing around chatting not exercising.
Lockdown? What lockdown?

I've been awake a long time, quietly panicking in the night about the American election, which I think has become my personal totem for "all the shit that's happening". Have cleaned the house and put out a load of washing, sorted out my insurance, bought pizza from the meerkat app (far too difficult) for lunch, sorted out a load of paperwork but totally failed to do any school planning.

Can't bear to look at any other bits of MN at the moment.