The Forty - Eight Republic - countdown for DfE media agency to wake up

[StaffRepFeistyClub]

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 staffroom password just in case it attracts the wrong sort

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

God, I hate the moving round teaching thing. It's awful. The behaviour is bad, I hate not being organised and sorted in my room.

Which has been trashed as I'm not in it any more. Spent ages sorting it after a refit and it's a pigsty now. What's the point?

Am resigned to ignoring the HoD email and smiling blankly when asked about next terms plans. Not bailing out any more. It's cost me my mental health dealing with this for 18 months.

@MrsHamlet have you got any ibuprofen or other painkiller gel? I have a bad shoulder and voltarol gel is the best when I twang it. Rotator cuff injuries can travel nerve pain down your arm, get some painkillers in, heat and rest you arm up on cushions to take the weight. I get tingly fingers and aching elbow when I trap nerves in mine, it really hurts. Hugs x

That'll be it @EnemyOfEducationNo1

It's like gaslighting on a national scale- everyone who works in a school knows how much transmission there is but you're told otherwise so much you start to doubt yourself!

www.sportme.com/blog/10-yoga-poses-to-help-relieve-shoulder-and-neck

Especially number 1, 6 and 7. Theres another good one but I can't remember what it is called! But you hold your hands together then touch elbows together and raise so your forearms are parallel to your face.
Raise and lower the arms keeping the forearms together and vertical.
Then raise with you head nodded, as high as you can, squeezing your elbows together, keeping hands clasped.

MrsH, any osteopaths or chiropractors who are open near you? I'd bypass GP. They will just refer.

Get to pharmacy, if able and her heat wrap for lower back and take ibuprofen AND paracetamol.

Don't do any stretching exercises etc yet: you could make it worse.

@MrsHamlet - it does sound like a trapped nerve. Hopefully you get through soon and get it sorted. Try not to move much.

I have paracetamol but no ibuprofen. I'm going to attempt to shower and get dressed and then I'll try the yoga.
I'm such a wimp!
I wondered about seeing if my shiatsu lady was open.

@Cantaloupeisland

That'll be it *@EnemyOfEducationNo1*

It's like gaslighting on a national scale- everyone who works in a school knows how much transmission there is but you're told otherwise so much you start to doubt yourself!

I am indeed genuinely starting to doubt. I mean, how can there have been all this research and it ALL shows teachers not at significant increased risk of infection/death, schools not contributing to community spread, etc. And then there were those graphs showing school kids as THE most infected demographic before Christmas. How can they both be true? I just can't reconcile it in my own head.

The research didn’t show that teachers weren’t at significantly increased chance of infection. They quietly ditched that to talk about death data. We aren’t at increased risk of death because of the demographics of the teaching population. Infection, yes, death, no.

I don’t think they’ve collected/published data relating to covid outcomes short of death by occupation, so we don’t know there.

@noblegiraffe In response to your post on ‘safer schools thread’. Am thinking we can wrap ourselves in tape and forgo the 2m rule. The virus knows not to go within 2m of the tape! Why didn’t we think of this before?

@MrsHamlet Hoping it’s closer to 2 than 6. You poor thing x

Thanks Staff

MrsH sending 💐 and solidarity (still in yucky amounts of pain too)

@MrsHamlet hope you get relief from it soon x

Wrapping the kids in tape would solve even more problems, mother

MrsH have PMd you

Good wishes to Hamlet for a speedy resolution. I've had similar before and it's excruciating. I usually cut out the middleman and go straight to the chiro. Ours is open now.

Re: teacher data, I've been assuming that when they say that we are no more at risk than other workers, they mean that if you put, say, a supermarket worker and a teacher in a crowded classroom under the same conditions, both would be at the same risk.
Or am I missing something?

God, I hate the moving round teaching thing. It's awful. The behaviour is bad, I hate not being organised and sorted in my room.

Yes to this. Suddenly it is the pupils ‘owning a classroom’ and the behaviour has switched negatively.

Our year 7s have only known their classroom for example and it takes time out of every lesson with the calls of ‘we don’t do it this way’, ‘you can’t do that’ and ‘we always have the windows closed’. (Yeah right!)
Year 9 has been tough too.
Year 8 has been mixed.
The exam year groups have been a little better but it’s definitely the 10s who have been the worst in ‘trashing’ their classrooms at break/lunch and trying to get into other year 10 classrooms.

The wasting of 5/10 mins every lesson setting up, logging in etc with numerous hands up asking to fill up a water bottle or go to the loo, is also taking its toll.

Genuinely cannot wait until some semblance of normality in the future (even if it is far far away!)

I genuinely feel like they aren’t just going to send us all back at once in secondary until after Easter - but maybe wishful thinking. I think maybe something for coursework/practical subjects maybe? Or exam years? Or Y10 and 12? I feel like all the talk from the gov has been very cautious rather than we want to get them back asap... maybe I’m just channeling my inner Pollyanna... 🤣

The data clearly showed "teachers were at no more risk of catching Covid than healthcare professionals" (!) and not random other occupations. Just less likely to die than some occupations because of socio-economic reasons.

And now there's been this very suspiciously quiet ushering in of the increase of shielding based on postcode, obesity and ethnic category. So bizarre how there's been so scant coverage of this. I would have thought it would have been a much bigger story. And no press leaks!

There's no point in testing them before Easter if we're not going back till after Easter because they'll only go and catch covid in the meantime.

It seems like a lot of effort in the wrong place.

Yes Chloe it's never discussed that far from 'catching the kids up' between Sept-Dec they were having a far less educational experience than they would have had in normal times, that they will also need 'catching up' from.

Ange no the 'at no more risk' is based on counting the number of teacher deaths per head of teachers (iyswim) vs the same number for other professions.

Our Easter holidays start on the 29th so if we stagger the start of term over 2 weeks some pupils will only have 1 week in school before they are off again. If they insist on opening schools surely it makes more sense to focus on just getting a few key year groups in for the full 3 weeks we have left before the holidays.

Hope you get some pain relief and an appointment somewhere Mrs Hamlet.