The Sixtieth Republic - One half term to go - just need to survive Sports Day and Activities Week!

[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 for school staff to let off steam.

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.

Do not give the staffroom password to non-staff as it attracts the wrong sort of crowd.

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. Do not sit on the chairs and do wear a mask. Finally, upload your covid test results twice a week on Wednesdays and Sundays.

Another good instruction one is working in pairs . get one to write simple instructions (jam sandwich like rule said, or cup of tea works) and get the other to mime out doing it. It's fun but also reveals issues with clarity.

Also good for teaching modal verbs and imperatives.

Get them to look at some recipes ? Can't remember how old they are name but recipe writing varies a lot and features direct instructions , different sentence types,and modal verbs.

The they can write a recipe for something you have just studied ( I like how to write a Victorian mystery story , have also done how to survive being married to Henry VIII! Do this right up to A Level...how to write a Carol Ann Duffy poem...)

Oh, here's Twatcock changing his tune: "we know transmissibility is very high in children." "We know children get Long Covid..." Didn't know that last Autumn, did you???

They knew it for a bit in January, Dangling, then forgot it again.

They've remembered it now because they want to vaccinate school kids.

Basically, because IV more transmissible their sums now tell them they can't get to herd immunity without vaccinating teenagers. It's not really about us, the kids, education.

Halfon on my politics show now on BBC wanging on about the Four Horsemen again. For chair of select committee who is meant to hold gov to account he isn't half bigging up their spending.

I am aghast at Hancock. How dare they spend 18 months brainwashing the country that ‘schools are safe’ - actual words from their mouths and now he just says what we have always known with no word of an apology.

They'll blame the variant, just as they did in January with Kent.

BBC article says Gav has said all pupils should do a LFT (an?! LFT) prior to return to school tomorrow. Apparently last night Matt H said something about getting a test also, which some, including Geoff Barton, seem to have taken as meaning get a PCR, which of course it’s too late to do!

Think Geoff’s probably got it wrong, although actually everyone in schools getting a PCR on Fri/Sat would have been a good idea.

Very good for talking about algorithms too this one!

Yes! I was going to say that, then thought that might blow name's mind on a day when she seems a little stressed! We've had a load of computer training since Easter, and I've started referring to lots of things with additional computer language. Debugging and so on. It's been good.

Four horsemen??

Ooh....I half know about debugging but I can't remember which (female?) computer scientist coined the phrase.

Gav has said all pupils should do a LFT

Where is this information? I've not seen it anywhere. There are going to be loads of kids coming back with colds (and other things!), so high chance of covid being in the mix. The surge testing around my school is every postcode AROUND the school, but not the post code the actual school is in (a tiny area in the centre of a city). So even though loads of them live in the target post codes, I bet they don't get done.

Everyone at my school is double jabbed + two weeks now though, which makes everything feel a little 'better'. A little. Even though it could still mean some remote teaching.

I am looking forward to the day when they say the vaccinated can stop isolating or whatever. I know they can't do that yet because of equity across age groups, and we possibly shouldn't do it at all, but other countries are. If people don't see an obvious benefit to being vaccinated, there will be a load of annoyance.

Every time Halfon opens his mouth e talks about children facing the four horsemen of the educational apocalypse'. Not that he wants to be alarmist or anything.

@JanFebAnyMonth

Four horsemen??

Death, Pestilence, Famine and War.

So Boris, Hancock, Free School Meals Gav, and Cummings.

@motherrunner, as King Lear says:

" .......... Get thee glass eyes,
And like a scurvy politician seem
To see the things thou dost not."

I half know about debugging

If they write instructions and it goes wrong because they haven't got enough detail, then they need to debug it. Sort out the cockups until they get their intended task completed.

Now, without one hint of self awareness, Halfon said we have to be 'optimistic in our language and be careful about the language we use'!

@MrsHamlet

Ooh....I half know about debugging but I can't remember which (female?) computer scientist coined the phrase.

Admiral Grace Hopper. Cracking lady!

Here’s the article quoting Gav re LFTs but it doesn’t say where he said it. Must have been yesterday sometime. Obviously publicising the suggestion a bit more might help....
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57372641

Matt H still telling the world that a whole bubble isolates if there’s a positive:

'Positives to vaccinating children', says Hancock

The Andrew Marr Show
Should we be vaccinating children, Hancock is asked?

The government is "taking clinical advice" on this, says Hancock. There are advantages, like cutting transmission to adults and also protecting education.

He points out that currently, if one child tests positive "the whole bubble has to isolate”.

name for the instructions one get them in pairs/groups to write instructions on how to make a paper plane. Swop instructions between groups/pairs, follow instructions to make said planes then everyone outside to test them! Back indoors to critique

The government is "taking clinical advice" on this, says Hancock. There are advantages, like cutting transmission to adults and also protecting education.

He points out that currently, if one child tests positive "the whole bubble has to isolate”.

So if we're vaccinated we don't have to isolate? Is that the plan? When?

@BadlydoneHelen

name for the instructions one get them in pairs/groups to write instructions on how to make a paper plane. Swop instructions between groups/pairs, follow instructions to make said planes then everyone outside to test them! Back indoors to critique

There is some great resources for this (although computer science, doesn’t have to be the focus and you might be grateful for the saving of time and the helpful videos that come with it (my kids often love the chocolate factory one!

code.org/curriculum/course2/2/Teacher

If Hancock is talking about 'whole bubbles isolating' he is obviously confused with primary schools ... where there are no plans to vaccinate.

Jesus, does anyone in that government know anything about schools? I mean some of them have children. Do they perhaps leave all of that to 'the missus' as Dominic Raab would say?

@noblegiraffe

They knew it for a bit in January, Dangling, then forgot it again.

They've remembered it now because they want to vaccinate school kids.

Ah, yes. January. Where the science turned on a pivot in one day.

They spent £3.7 million on their 'schools are safe' campaign.

What an excellent investment that was. www.parentsunited.net/government-paid-3-7-million-for-back-to-school-marketing-campaign/

Yes, he said the best thing parents and children can do today is take a LFT.

Still many, many unvaccinated staff in my school. In my dept of 6 teachers, we have 2 vaccinated (one bc of age - me - and one bc of vulnerability) and 4 unvaccinated.

75% of our TAs are in their twenties. Tonnes of ECTs.

Most of the senior staff (SLT, HOYs, HODs) are early forties at their oldest so only had one jab and very recently.