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Teachers must not be allowed to 'put their feet up and watch Netflix' during future lockdowns, ex-head says

Pauline Wood was head of Grange Park Primary School
Pauline Wood was head of Grange Park Primary School
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Teachers who fail to pull their weight with remote learning must not be allowed to “put their feet up and watch Netflix”, a former headteacher has said.

Pauline Wood, who was suspended earlier this year from Grange Park Primary in Sunderland for remarking that some teachers had been “sat at home doing nothing” during lockdown, has spoken out about her concerns for future lockdowns.

She said that rather than “shoot the messenger”, headteachers must face up to the issues they faced during the last period of school closures and make sure lessons are learned from it.

The majority of schools across the country reopened this week for the first time since March, with the remainder opening by the start of next week.

But, according to official public health guidance, if a school has at least two cases of coronavirus within two weeks it could be viewed as a possible outbreak. In such cases, a year group – or possibly all pupils in an entire school – may be told to stay at home and self-isolate as a precautionary measure. And in such cases, pupils' education would need to continue remotely.

On Friday an academy in Staffordshire became the first school to shut down this academic year after a single case of coronavirus. The JCB Academy in Rocester, which welcomed pupils back at the end of last month, told pupils to stay at home on Friday following advice from public health officials.

Jenny McGuirk, principal at JCB Academy, said it closed "as a precaution" after one pupil tested positive for Covid-19 and that the school would reopen on Monday for all but 100 pupils who have been asked to self-isolate for two weeks.

“Remote learning will still be important,” Mrs Wood said. “In some cases the lazy schools will still use excuses like ‘we can’t mark homework because we might transfer some germs’. If some teachers treat “remote learning” as an excuse to put their feet up and watch Netflix, children will suffer.”

She said that a difficulty heads encountered during the summer term was that “teaching unions had made it clear they would defend to the hilt any teachers who were disciplined for refusing to do any work”.

But attitudes have to change if education is to continue during future periods when large numbers of pupils are told to self-isolate at home or entire schools are closed, she said.

“If we hit another big crisis like in March, I would say if teachers don’t buy into the work, they should get put on unpaid leave,” Mrs Wood said. “This would free up a lot of money for pupil interventions and catch up activities.

"I am not a teacher basher by any means – but there are a lot of people who have enjoyed being paid to do nothing. Why keep everyone on full pay?”

Mrs Wood, who is now an education consultant, said that schools must have proper systems of accountability in place to ensure that teachers are pulling their weight.