School staff not allowed to wear masks

Growstuff, can you include a link to the report that advises masks be worn in secondary please? I'll send it to my friends.

Firecracker123, YOU need to stop wingeing about things you're wrong about. The two friends I've quoted worked all the way through the last term, in school.

Why didn't you or your family go into the school's to ask for work OR complain to the headteacher? As a teacher, I know teachers in a lot of schools. They all were required to provide work. Perhaps the parents/grandparents should have done a bit of parenting and got it sorted out.

Ellianne, staffrooms mostly don't exist anymore. Smaller workrooms for 3 to 6 teachers have replaced them in the last 3 UK schools I've been into.

Expect this was quite common !!

The ones I know had to teach online set and mark work throughout and the quality of this distance teaching was checked by SLT

B9exchange It's nuts, isn't it?

Here's a picture of Johnson in a school. The teacher seems to be showing how close pupils will need to sit to each other. There will be two pupils at each table. The picture shows a primary school, but there would be even less space in a secondary school because the pupils are bigger. You can also see in the picture that the table and chair at the back are pushed against the cupboard. With children on those chairs, the tables would need to be pushed forward and there would be even less spacing.

The space isn't the only issue. Most classrooms are poorly ventilated. You only only have to go into a classroom and smell the BO at the end of five hours to realise that rancid air has been circulating all day. Morever, pupils will not generally be moving around, so will stay in the same environment all day.

Current guidelines state that people should be two metres apart or one metre if wearing masks. They are also advised not to stay more than fifteen minutes in close proximity to another person.

GagaJo

rs-delve.github.io/reports/2020/07/24/balancing-the-risk-of-pupils-returning-to-schools.html#2-opening-schools-safely

If the link doesn't work Google "Royal Society DELVE Initiative Balancing the Risks of Pupils Returning to Schools".

Hope that helps!

Are we not allowed to criticise teachers on this site or express an opinion. Teachers are not above criticism they are no different than other workers. All this fuss about whether they should wear masks or not just do the job you are paid for like millions of other workers have been during the covid crisis.

* incorrect apostrophe autocorrect not me!

(You just said that) ... but also did you contact your GC school about lack of work set ?

My post addressed to Firecracker obviously

Firecracker123

Are we not allowed to criticise teachers on this site or express an opinion. Teachers are not above criticism they are no different than other workers. All this fuss about whether they should wear masks or not just do the job you are paid for like millions of other workers have been during the covid crisis.

Wearing a mask should be acceptable in any job.

Of course you can criticise teachers Firecracker, but you said teachers hadn't been working, which was completely incorrect.

B9exchange: have you ever spent time in school lavatories, checked pupils' hands after 'washing', seen where they put their hands during the day in their bodies, in the classroom and in the playground?
You'd get it!

Firecracker123

Are we not allowed to criticise teachers on this site or express an opinion. Teachers are not above criticism they are no different than other workers. All this fuss about whether they should wear masks or not just do the job you are paid for like millions of other workers have been during the covid crisis.

You're obviously in full wind-up mode. Have a good day!

Ireland appears to have seen the light!

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-53733657

There is not one case of children infecting teachers worldwide. It’s about time these overpaid “professionals” got on with what they are paid for.

mbody

There is not one case of children infecting teachers worldwide. It’s about time these overpaid “professionals” got on with what they are paid for.

That hasn't been proved.

There are plenty of cases of outbreaks in schools, including at least one in France, where 33% of the teachers and over 50% of the teaching assistants were infected.

Given the guidance for the general public, who is going to tell the virus it's not in the rules to transmit in schools?

What you seem to have forgotten is that very few schools anywhere in the world have had whole classes full-time. There have nearly always been mitigations. I suggest you read the DELVE Report.

Thank you Growstuff: excellent! There is no confirmed case anywhere of a child transmitting the virus to an adult. Teachers (yes, and before you say it, I'm a trained teacher) are being frightened by politically-motivated unions! Perhaps you would overcome that if you were not on gardening leave and 100% pay! Time to get back to work (without masks which DO interfere with learning). You are in no danger from the children. Furthermore, even if there are a few spikes in positive tests in some areas, the admissions to hospital and deaths are tiny and heading down all the time. Go back to work - you'll feel much better when you're doing something genuinely useful for our young people, who have been massively disadvantaged by this virus.

Very well said NemosMum. Wish more people thought like you.

Neither lucca nor GagaJi said all UK schools were imposing this rule.

Both referred to a school they knew. Therefore after searching for something to verify this, I assumed it was the Head’s decision not a government decision.

I am not sure it is any more difficult to teach through a mask than it is to nurse through a mask. We just have to be mindful of our communication skills, emphathise eye contact, eye expressions etc. and repeat if necessary. If there is someone who needs to lip read then it is the wearers discretion to remove the mask - and maintain distance

Well said NemosMum. I can't understand who is frightening teachers to death, literally in the case of the OP, or why are they so concerned for their own safety? I always thought teaching was one of those professions, along g with nursing, where you didn't show your own fears or paranoia because it would rub off on the parents and children.

I think schools should reopen but I think teachers should be able to choose whether or not to wear a mask.
The latest science says masks do offer some protection to the wearer, as MaizieD
says up thread, the viral load is reduced when a mask is worn. Some scientists recently claimed up to 65% protection for the wearer of a mask.
I must be a bear of very little brain, but I fail to see how other people are protected by the mask wearer not breathing out into the atmosphere, but somehow the atmosphere viral load can be breathed in by the mask wearer. So the virus doesn’t pass through, oh no, it does pass through
Does the virus know it’s only allowed to go one way

Thank goodness! At last someone (NemosMum) talking sense! Children need to be in school, parents need to get back to work, we all need a sense of proportion! Children generally do not get or pass on the virus. Results from a study by Public Health England are expected next week to confirm that there is very little evidence that the virus is transmitted in schools.
Mask wearing is injurious to everyone's health, restricts oxygen intake, creates a damp atmosphere inside the mask for germs to proliferate, can induce headaches, obviously stifles speech, and does not prevent the virus being transmitted. Bad for children and definitely not good for adults.

mbody

There is not one case of children infecting teachers worldwide. It’s about time these overpaid “professionals” got on with what they are paid for.

I was never overpaid, things must have changed in the last two years!

PLEASE. Teachers WANT. To go back to school . All that is asked is CLARITY (Particularly in regard to secondary schools) About RULES plus adequate FUNDING to cover adaptations that need to be made.

Yes, a union would be a good point of contact. Can you imagine a teacher being asked to remove their mask! And if you didn't sign, they couldn't sack you. The science in this country has been responsible for the delay in lockdown and the delay in mask wearing, and who knows what other mistakes. Of course teachers, and especially teaching assistants, should be allowed to wear masks. It protects other people and makes you feel somehow protected too and therefore more confident in carrying out your duties. See-through masks are available for lip reading purposes. I am returning to work in Sept as a TA in a secondary school. Today I hear that teenagers are effectively young adults, and just as 'good' at carrying and passing on the virus. Feeling slightly nervous as the job of a TA naturally involves getting close to those SEN and struggling children. Found it almost impossible to socially distance from KW and vulnerable children during lockdown in school. We're on the front line unlike those who make the rules.

I think OP is mainly talking about the reaction in the States. Obviously in UK no one can make you sign anything. And in the UK there has been no announcements yet in what is worn, when and where. Remember this is not the States and our teaching unions are very powerful. FYI I think schools should go back as I think the impact on kids especially teenagers will be worse than the possibility of getting CV19.