Never in known history has schooling come to an abrupt end like it has over the past months! Schools were suddenly informed about five days before, that children were to leave the term two days early, and since then children have been ‘locked out’ of the school premises! School staff were also locked out slightly later but have also felt a sense of sudden loss of all of the ‘usual’ and familiar.
Every school community member, at every school, has personally been grieving for what is lost and has been trying to create a new normal for their families and for their schools. These are some of the things Pinelands North has been working on while school has officially been closed:
We have been trying to support our school families. Many families have had to create a new routine which adds the stress of being both parent and teacher. Many have had a loss of income, either for one family member or both so they are now unable to finance usual bills. The school has created a Solidarity Fund, funded by staff and parents who haven’t been directly affected financially by the lockdown. This fund will pay school fees for those families who might struggle to pay them. Weekly letters to parents have been sent and we have been communicating via FaceBook twice a day, in so doing trying to create community in other ways so people don’t feel so isolated.
Because we had some idea this might happen, teachers started preparing work to give to children during the holidays a few weeks before the holidays. The idea of this plan was to keep children focused and ‘entertained’ to help parents, even though officialdom said, ‘everybody is on holiday’. Regular Zoom meetings have been held with whole classes or smaller groups, either as a check in or for teaching. Children have been telephoned, whatsapp’d, emailed or contacted through other online systems, depending on the needs of the families. Staff have also had weekly online grade and phase meetings to share ideas and concerns.
The teaching staff have been well in tune with families and so have adapted their teaching offerings throughout the lockdown. The school started by providing subject specific lessons for every day, then changed to giving work for two weeks at a time, and then now we continue to provide work for two or three weeks at a time, but focus on a theme which can create fun tasks for all ages within a family. The recent work has revolved around measurement, time, mass and capacity and the tasks have been following recipes, ‘playing’ with water and calculating time in different countries. The school families have been much more settled with this as they now don’t need to sit with children of different ages, each doing something completely different. 
The Governing Body decided immediately to keep paying all staff salaries as every single person was valuable. A Radar Team of four staff has been meeting weekly to co-ordinate calls to all staff, and to discuss those we were concerned about. Many staff meetings have been held online, mainly to discuss work but also to check in on each other because teachers have taken particular strain, having to be parents and teachers of their own children, and to continue to plan and teach. Many have had to adapt to online learning and teaching even though they had never done it before.
Our school plant has needed support too; we have many animals which need to be fed and cleaned daily, the school site has needed upkeep and we have been keeping check on security. Luckily the Operations staff managed to clean and disinfect the school fully before leaving so when we return, we will just need to arrange the classrooms to maximise the available space for staff and children.
The Management Team have now made plans for the return of staff and pupils, preparing transport for those staff who might otherwise have to travel by train or bus, buying health supplements for those staff who will be at the forefront and preparing systems for children and staff to arrive and social distance. Now we wait for the next directive…
The hardest thing during this time has been the indecision and the changes of plans. Being a ‘plans driven’ person, I like to start working on the implementation of directives immediately. It is so frustrating because every date has changed about four times, every plan we have made has had to change at least once. School parents and staff are daily asking questions which I cannot answer, or if I do answer, the question or answer changes the next day again.
I believe that good will come out of this time eventually though! We will be celebrating this time in the future. Families have had a golden opportunity to spend valuable time together, playing games, reading books and learning together. Children have had a unique learning experience – some of our children have managed to speak to famous people around the world via online platforms, have learnt to collaborate with their siblings, to be creative, to communicate with older and younger family members and to learn things that school doesn’t always encourage. I believe this generation of children will be stronger, more empowered and more knowledgeable than our previous ones ever were. So, lets’ stop worrying about what our children aren’t learning at school and start focusing on helping them learn as much about the world as they can in this unique time.
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