The Forty Third Republic - Lockdown learning continues - when is half term?

[Staffdontblowitnow]

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.

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If you come with a stick to goad us then that is not allowed in the staffroom and you will receive a detention

monkey

Yes the inauguration was wonderful.

Noble do you know if anyone else in the whole country has picked up what you did about the disconnection between the NEU's graphs yesterday and the spreadsheets they were based on? Are you NEU and will you ask them?

Keep seeing the graphs posted on PUAUS page and of course school staff reacting predictably. Only Sen one or two even questioning whether it should be a comparison between school staff and other public facing workers, and none raising the questions you raised.

I keep being tempted to try and explain to them, but it would take a long time and c careful choice of words and am not sure it would go down that well either!

• Only seen one or two

I'm not NEU. I did go and have a look at their announcement and they had 'sources' at the end and they've got a spreadsheet showing their working.

I was confused by why the rate on the graph was about half of the rate on the spreadsheet (i.e. 0.8% of teachers off with covid or 800/100,000 led to a rate of 400/100,000).

And it turns out that's because that's what they've done. Nothing clever. They've taken the percentage of teachers who are off with covid on any given day, halved it, and presented that as the case rate for that day. I don't know why. Wouldn't you assume a tenth rather than a half given that's the isolation period?

I'm not sure I understand the DfE data either. If teachers are off for at least ten days when they catch covid, and infection rates were going up in general, why is the proportion of teachers off with covid so static? (I think monkey brought this up).

I can't make head nor tail of the NEU graph still. Halving it doesn't seem right.

Where did the DfE get their data from? Schools or wider population testing. I wonder if their sample size just wasn't big enough.

Found the DfE data and squinting at it on my phone. Looks like national data reported by schools so big enough sample. Will look later at the proportions.

Haven’t caught up yet but apparently Gav is on Radio 4 later.

Good morning! Thank you, Staff. I did lol at “Michael Sheen hair”.

Our LFT starts next week (saw some discussion on last thread about it). I must have a name as a Cynic, because several colleagues said they were surprised I’m not opting out . I have been pretty vocal about Sensitivity V Specificity over the last week or so. It’s not being presented as a revolution in Covid control, I don’t mind doing it at home twice a week and I’ll be off for a proper test at the merest hint of a symptom whatever the LFT says.
My only worry is that colleagues will relax social distancing and ventilation etc even more than they already are, if they have Negative results. But I’ll deal with that if it happens, I suppose.

Gav on BBC1 now.

This man is infuriating!!!!

Charlie Stayt v good.. nudging him towards admitting U turn.

Feeling knackered today. Was in school yesterday, got a bit annoyed with the kids (not all of them) who weren't taking the social distancing seriously. Y7 room was basically at capacity and we have other kids due to come in on certain days.

Remote parents evening again tonight because the technology let us down last time. No real acknowledgement that we are all giving up another evening to do it.

Also had several parents complaining about the volume of work, because we are doing "optional" live lessons and setting work online and live lesson timetable doesn't match with students normal school timetable. Obviously parents want their kids in the live lessons, which means they can't complete the other work which means we have to chase.

I also spent about half an hour on the phone yesterday trying to help a parent/child set up a school laptop and dongle, and still didn't manage it. And I had another parent basically outright lie to me that their child was submitting work - I can see they've submitted nothing this week, I'd accept one or two pieces going missing as a technical issue but all of them?

Signing in - thanks Staff

@SansaSnark, what platform are you using? We've had some issues in google classroom with people submitting their work incorrectly and it being logged as missing.

Just looking at new guidance for LFTs.

Why is there such emphasis still on testing pupils when they return (and then not again)? After a national lockdown , surely very few will be positive compared to later in the term?

The guidance says tests upon return and then for students not again as 'there won't be enough tests'. Interesting that there were enough before for the crazy 7 day test plans!

So much for ' regular mass testing' Gav.

Again we get tested upon return (I shan't be : I haven't been anywhere!) but we then get done weekly .

Morning! Found you

Gav on Good morning Britain. Piers laying into him and Gav just sits there gormless.

God he is just AWFUL.

Why is Gav doing the rounds now? What are they asking him about?

@noblegiraffe

Why is Gav doing the rounds now? What are they asking him about?

Piers asked what it would take for him to resign. They asked about the laptops, when schools will go back and why we hard the worst death rate in the world.

Where did the DfE get their data from? Schools or wider population testing.

Just schools reporting how many teachers they had off that day with covid.

And the NEU have halved it and said that’s how many teacher cases there were that day.

Oooh what did he say, Riga? Particularly to the resignation question!

@noblegiraffe

Oooh what did he say, Riga? Particularly to the resignation question!

He kept changing the subject and looking gormless. Susannah shook her head at the end. Piers said can't you just answer a straight question.

This morning I’ve had emails from parents:

• swearing that their child has submitted work. No, a blank google doc isn’t work.
• insulting me, saying that I’m piling on work because working from home means I can now do that to students. Nope, your child doesn’t work unfortunately. Anything would feel a lot.

Gormless is exactly the right word for Gav.

He was absolutely pasted by Piers.
Piers was doing a Paxman and firing the same question at him over and over again about why he hasn't resigned and every single time, Gavelar just repeated, "my focus is...."
He mumbled and jumbled all the way through it, had no answers for any of the questions and said "sort of" and "you know" a lot. He also managed to slip in a "schools are safe," at one point, and got away with it.
Piers and Susannah did their best and actually asked quite a lot of pertinent questions, but he just spouted the party line. Badly.