A WHOLE NEW WORLD

 

Thus, a new age has dawned: the post lockdown world where society strains to hold together while remaining apart, at least according to the latest, yet ever-changing, signage: ‘Stay Apart – Stay United’ and where distance learning has evolved into socially distanced learning. Can someone please nudge me awake and tell me this is only an Orwellian nightmare arising from immersion in too much dystopian literature? 

Well, the intrigues of semiotics and semantics apart, we’re all ‘doing our best’ to coin a phrase, amid unprecedented circumstances. As teachers, we have certainly had to make rapid adjustments to how we teach as well as what we teach. AQA embraced the new mercurial spirit of the age, having changed their minds on which elements of the Literature syllabus could be discarded within a matter of twenty-four hours. If only one had learned the lessons of the 2020 GCSE grades fiasco, and waited for the inevitable shifting of sands before cancelling the hitherto scheduled 19^th Century novel assessment… I may yet need to book a session with the school counsellor for my developing trust issues…

As if that wasn’t enough, I now find myself in a now unfamiliar territory: the classroom. While it is wonderfully liberating to be freed from the laptop screen and the days of what came to be fondly known as ‘radio quarantine’, there are multiple health and safety rules to remember and old memories to be expunged. Gone are the days of peer discussions where pupils could exchange ideas in the security of a small group; gone are the days of distributing purple pens for peer marking, gone the days of sharing out multi-coloured highlighters or a spare text! But old habits of what was once considered ‘good practice’ die hard. Thus, as the fateful words, ‘Now exchange books with the person sitting next to you,’ hover on my lips, glimpsing the grimace of horror on the face of the LSA, I hastily reform them into : ‘DON’T exchange books!’ intercepting that impending own goal by the skin of my teeth.

A whole new world, but not the one Aladdin dreamed of. This one has a whole new way of doing things. We must remind pupils not only to put away their books and stand behind their desks, but to, ‘Spray and wipe’, ‘Mask up’ and ‘Turn left’ on leaving the classroom, ‘Stay in your pod’ and ‘Avoid bursting other groups’ bubbles’ (which I confess to having done on the first day back when apparently dispersing at least four bubbles walking from one side of the playground to the other. This was not a wanton act of treasonous vandalism, but arose from a life-time’s habit of preferring to get from A to B by the most direct route and the fact that I wear a mask after the style of Jesse James proves nothing; it’s an excellent way to ensure you always have one ready when entering corridors or public spaces without either forgetting or dropping it on the floor. It’s also washable, which is clearly more hygienic, and supports the school sustainability policy.  I recommend it. I’ve got that part of the new rules now.

Mask aside (metaphorically, of course!), there are also phrases to avoid. For example, when encouraging a child to express their thoughts, ‘Spit it out!’, ‘Speak up!’, ‘Hand out the books’ or ‘Would you like a hand?’ might demand a Risk Assessment on their own. Similarly, the logistics of book collecting, worksheet distribution and marking demand either the strategical planning of a Chess Grand Master or the skill and sterility of a Louis Pasteur. Possibly both. Yet somehow, with mask and spray to hand, it’s happening: school is buzzing with activity, perhaps with renewed appreciation for the opportunity to learn as a community reunited once more.  And despite a few initial fumbles, we’re back in the classrooms, discovering we have more in common with Romeo and Juliet, and Renaissance Verona (aka Tudor England) than we may have ever imagined; a world where permission was needed to attend church, to get married, to protest on the streets, plagues were realities and laws draconian. Then again, it’s only fiction.