Skolan och covid-19: del 4

Vi har samlat ett antal exempel och reflexioner från människor som arbetar i skolan, ett försök att spegla den här tiden om än i begränsad omfattning – från när och fjärran, högt och lågt, negativt men också positivt ibland – och vi publicerar några i taget och detta är del 4. (red)

A marathon, not a sprint

I emerged out of lockdown and took in the world around me. A pandemic. A pandemic! 

How could this have happened? How could this BE happening? Still, I emerged from lockdown in better condition than I had entered it, having been ill for a few months earlier in the year. 

Getting into school life again is hard. I’m not made for a nomadic existence, roaming the plains from room to room. I need my classroom, my base, the security of having my resources nearby. I feel permanently insecure and anxious that I’m late (I am), that I’m going to forget something (I do) and that one day I might just flip all my transient teacher kit up in the air like some sort of pedagogical Buckaroo (I will).

In the meantime, I endure  my arthritic knees and hips screaming with burning pains from lesson 2 onwards and I enjoy being back among students and colleagues. There are people who have really suffered over the last six months. I count my blessings. 

Lisa Pettifer, teacher 11-18

Secondary school

Carlisle, Cumbria

___________________________________

Ensamt och maktlöst

Kvalitén sjunker utan fysisk undervisning – trots att alla kollegor arbetar hårdare. Vi har tekniken, den digitala kompetensen, men är inte förtrogna med den pedagogik fjärr- och distansundervisning kräver. 

Känslan är också att vi lärare ska vara flexibla och lösningsfokuserade, medan ramar och riktlinjer från både stat och huvudmän är rigida. Lärarens samhällsuppdrag är vi medvetna om. Andra kan “kratta gången”, ta beslut och checka av för att hålla sina ryggar fria. Det känns ensamt och maktlöst att stå med det faktiska ansvaret och lösningarna för att genomföra uppdraget. Det enda “vi:et” som i realiteten finns är jag och mina elever.

Jonas

Lärare & it-pedagog

Sverige

___________________________________

Dishonesty and Gratitude

Post-lockdown, a familiar conversation played out across countless places of work:

“How are you?” someone asked.

“I’m fine…” you replied, or something similar.

I am roughly the one millionth person to point out the feeling of dislocation that this ubiquitous micro-conversation provokes when repeated often enough and when the answer is a convenient lie, arguably the most common in the English language. 

For those people out there who are going through a rough patch and thus resort to this understandable dishonesty, there is thankfully another thought that this conversation can inspire: gratitude, though the route to it is a little tortuous. We briefly remember that our personalities are fragmented and shifting, that we each have various versions of ourselves that we present to different parts of our social network. Awareness of the ambiguous nature of our identities is intolerable but short-lived, familiar but uncanny, like consciousness of our own breathing. However, it illuminates something that we – or I, at least – too easily forget: that most of our acquaintances don’t find out about our problems, be they heart-breaking, tedious or – more commonly – both. 

Even if we do share, we inevitably photo-shop the descriptions of our lives, even the sad parts. Those of us blessed with loved ones know that it is only they who see the version of us with the filters removed. It is they on whom we rely for patience and generosity as we gripe and thrash against the padded-cell walls of our existence. Usually, this heroic tolerance is a team effort; sometimes, however, one person is doing most of the heavy lifting. And so this ubiquitous micro-conversation – and the most common lie in the English language – reminds us of those who keep us going, and all-too-fleetingly we feel commensurate gratitude for their presence in our lives. 

(In my case, she’s called Silvia.)

Christopher Such – @Suchmo83

Senior leader, Primary school

Peterborough, UK