The truth about education

Mrs is a Primary Headteacher; they record lessons on castify daily and send to the children along with reading and writing tasks. They still have a huge number of children in school (over 130); her staff are still expected to complete phonics assessments both virtually and in school. In my secondary the children have at least 3 live lessons a day so that they aren't overwhelmed along with a homework timetable for their other timetabled lessons which is uploaded daily and progress, completion for each student is checked and there is an expectation that staff set key tasks in order to assess effectively. It is incredibly tricky to manage at the moment but we're doing what we can to support; I wish we could do more- we spoke about introducing extra lessons for Y11 (they already have a 7 period day instead of 6 for everyone else) but with the exam situation it's a little bit up in the air. They all still have a form period with their form tutor daily and can interact with their peers on teams; although it's not the same they are still getting some socialising which is utterly crucial and sometimes much more important than the learning taking place.
 
My son was in his last year in primary school for the first lockdown and the lessons were non existent, we got told to follow the BBC lessons and that was about it. His first proper lessons was on the week before they went back and it was a zoom style quiz.

This time at secondary school it couldn't be more different, the lessons are all planned and delivered to Google classroom the previous evening, they do this in case you have only one device but more than one child. He has had 2 live lessons so far this week and all the teachers are on line to answer any queries that the kids might have.

He starts at 8.45 and must register his attendance and is finishing around 1.30 - 2.30 with only breaks for toilet and 20 minutes for lunch.

I cannot express how delighted I am with the way at has all been organised and apparantley he will also receive at least 2 phone calls a week (one from his tutor and one from another of his teachers) to discuss his progress and for a general catch up.

All this is possible because the school had excellent contingencies in place for when children had to self isolate when they arrived back in September.
 
My daughter is clearly one of the lucky ones - Google classroom lessons all day as would be the case in class. Though her IT teacher talking about databases today was a crock, refactored maths teacher I expect.
 
I think what we can take from this thread is that the teachers are working bloody hard to make everything work here and are definitely not to blame, not that I'm suggesting that they ever were! They are a credit to the job they do and receive very little praise for time and effort they put in.

I think that the majority of parents want the best for their kids and unfortunately the government are once again coming up short with support, and in the process they are jeopardising the future of a generation. Whilst I don't want to turn this into a Tory bashing thread I honestly don't think there has been one example that I can think of where the government have covered themselves in glory during this whole shambolic pandemic.

What I find really hard to believe is that contingencies were not in place for a pandemic. The fear of something like this happening has been around for many years and to think that we didn't have the foresight to plan around it is a disgrace.
 
My wife is a secondary school science teacher. She is delivering live lessons everyday from home via Teams, so is every member of staff there. She is starting work at 7am, then working till after 7pm everyday. Work doesn't just stop once the last lesson of the day is done! She has to now plan a way to teach her subject remotely. Ask any teacher, they would much prefer to be school as it is actually much easier to do. But is it really too much to ask to actually work in a safe environment! The amount of teacher bashing everywhere makes me so angry, I have to hold my tounge when I hear and see it everywhere. Unless you are a teacher, or live with a teacher you really don't see how much work they do, or what they have to put up with. We should be standing up for them and supporting them, along with all the other key workers. Twice I heard people say today "I'm f#cking sick of my kid, he's being a little b#stard, I wish he was at school so I can have some peace" they are not babysitters!
 
45 minutes on MS Teams 930-1015 and then a maybe a couple of sheets for which we don't have a printer anyways.

During the 1st lockdown nothing at all and then 1 day a plastic wallet full of sheets was pushed through the letter.

My daughter is 6 Year 2
 
I teach primary. I was up until 1am on Mon and Tue nights building banks of resources and trying to get ahead of myself.

Luckily for me I was part of a Samsung research project a few years ago for digital work in schools, which gives me a lot more knowledge and experience, but it takes ages to get each lesson sorted. Two daily live meetings, constantly trying to second guess issues with technology and pitch it right so that the kid working at Y8 level is just as engaged as the ones working at Y3 level.

You've then got the kids (35%) of my class where the parents don't speak English and can't assist the child, in addition to those from huge families cramped up in small homes with a couple of tablets between them.

It has been a good investment to buy my own graphics tablet this week as I can do proper on-screen teaching like I would with a board in the classroom, as well as a webcam better than ye olde tech from the cupboard at school so that children can actually make out individual letters.

Left on the backburner are my own primary-aged children, but having taught kids with the most awful backstories I know that mine will kick on so long as I take care of the basics with them like phonics, reading and maths.

If anybody is unhappy with their child's provision, they need to take it up with their headteacher. The school day features play, lunch, discussion time and other things, so the 3-5 hour suggestion by the government is pretty reasonable in my opinion. So long as you have books at home, talk to your kids and provide them with problem solving opportunities, they will be fine. As corny as it sounds, there is a magic when 25 people are together in a lesson and it just can't be replicated by a little boy or girl alone at home.
 
Secondary teacher here.

We are teaching our normal timetables via Google Classrooms. Every lesson for every student is streamed live. This means the same preparation is being put into all lessons. Staff have the choice of delivering from school, in a designated classroom, or from home, if the internet connection is suitable.

We are following the normal curriculum that we would have been doing in normal circumstances but with some adaptations because of the nature of online lessons. For example, feedback is a lot slower because students have to type into the chat box and some of them are not as comfortable sharing ideas and answers in this way. It is very strange but I still deliver in my usual way, in terms of body language and movement; I must look a strange sight for any other staff walking past.

We have over 70% of the students accessing the online lessons and we have a number of students in the building as part of the key worker and vulnerable student groups.

It is odd and it has been, and is, a steep learning curve but I think we are offering our students a pretty good deal considering the circumstances.
 
Laughing said:
I had to provide a reference from uni when I started my first job, but even they didnt ask to see my degree
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Most employers will contact the registrar at your university to check your degree. There's no need for the employer to hold paper copies of certificates. You won't get very far claiming a PHD in rocket science if all you have is a Physics O level.
 
Soutra said:
Most employers will contact the registrar at your university to check your degree. There's no need for the employer to hold paper copies of certificates. You won't get very far claiming a PHD in rocket science if all you have is a Physics O level.
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Surely they need permission for that? I have no idea never really thought about it until now.
 
Laughing said:
Surely they need permission for that? I have no idea never really thought about it until now.
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When you apply for a job you are tacitly giving permission for the employer to check you are who you say you are.

You could say that you withhold permission to check but you wouldn't get the job.
 
Soutra said:
When you apply for a job you are tacitly giving permission for the employer to check you are who you say you are.

You could say that you withhold permission to check but you wouldn't get the job.
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Maybe as I say I don't know and I probably should
 
Teachers are spinning so many plates at the moment and having to adapt quickly to changing circumstances. It must be so frustrating to them that the people at the very top either cannot grasp, or do not care that whole weeks of lesson plans can't be converted with a few hours notice.
 
I've heard of teachers being trained to do covid tests on pupils, without any PPE, which is an absolute joke, especially on top of all the other crap they're being made to do.

Again though, it's not teaching/ education the government wants, it's childminding for those that can still work (not necessarily just key workers), they give zero fcucks about public education, as they know their own type will be covered privately. They only say they're prioritising education stop the parents that actually care about public education from kicking off.

To be honest I don't think delaying education is actually a bad idea, or even the anything is better than nothing theory, but having kids effected by this year competing with those that haven't is unfair. The same as counting this year as a "normal year", it's not. I just wish the government would be honest about what they're doing and stick to one plan, more would support it then.
 
Matt said:
My GF is a teacher, albeit for reception aged kids so the delivery is a bit different than for the older kids I think. But here is my view of her experience in the last few days...

Wanted to get her planning work done for the start of term over Xmas, but delayed and delayed because of the seemingly "inevitable" closing of schools. The issue being that planning for online delivery is very different than planning for classroom delivery.

Started on the planning the weekend before school starts as no announcement made, works all weekend, Boris says "send your kids to school!" so she's made the right choice - great!

Monday night - Boris says schools are closing, teach online. She has to redo all of the planning work for online delivery.

Tuesday-Thursday - the school is in chaos trying to get organised. Part of it is because they couldn't organise a p!ss up in a brewery but obviously the chopping and changing doesn't help. She's had to redo about half of her planning again because there's a lot more kids in school than they anticipated (about 200/600 rather than 50/600) and in order to teach them adequately they need to provide differentiated work (e.g. same lesson but for higher/lower ability students) and to make sure that the online work is more suitable to be used in a classroom.

On top of this, they are being told to ring parents of students who are not doing the work, provide thorough feedback to each student as they complete activities, and plan (online and in person) work for next week.

The issue is, basically, there is a lot more planning to do and a lot more follow-up/admin work to do to make sure they are reaching all the kids in a satisfactory way. They're unfamiliar with the platform and no-one really knows what they're doing.

This is on top of teachers being overworked in general - I really had no understanding of it before I met my GF, beyond hearing about it anecdotally. It is a brutal job, I would not advise my kids to be a teacher.
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I totally agree with this my wife is a teacher, if they only worked contracted hours the education system would grind to a halt, this is without the uncertainty and changes going on constantly at the minute, schools were given 13 hours to provide a platform (from 20:00 on Monday evening) and produce online content. Williamson and Johnson have made egregious mistakes, and will likely blame it on teachers.
 
Sybil_Fawlty said:
My experience is not great - I have two kids, one in juniors and one in seniors. They both get sent work to complete on their respective online platforms, neither of which are ideal for learning and comprehension of the subject matter and are pretty much left to their own devices to complete, which I'll admit neither are particularly motivated to do.

I'm not sure what else teachers can do as I do believe they have a thankless job in all of this, but I would love online Zoom type lessons, where the kids can be interactively involved and can ask questions in real time.

As it is now, just does not work for my family and even reading this forum, I can see I'm not alone. I am on month 10 of WFH in a really time demanding job, my partner works full time as a key worker and I just cannot give the kids the time and encouragement during the day that they both seem to need to get themselves going. The one in juniors gets 3 "lessons" per day - an online worksheet for Maths, English and one other topic for the day. My eldest is to attend lessons via TEAMS as per their normal timetable but rarely does and just logs on when they wake up and completes work around "playing" on the computer. We're past battling as it leads to more emotional outbursts for everyone in this horrible situation that none of us want, yet all find ourselves in.

The pressure (and guilt) is enormous, do I drop my working standards and level of output and potentially put my own job at risk to help motivate and ensure the future educational security of my kids or do I carry on with my work and let them do what they can and leave what they do not understand??

Impossible predicaments sadly.
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It's tough.
 
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