Schools

My comment is not about safe return but concerns around socially distanced learning.

For over a decade, teachers have worked hard to implement the values and principles of Curriculum for Excellence. To have primary pupils return in small groups to work individually on their own at a desk is to go against the whole fibre of our curriculum in primary schools. Schools are no longer didactic models of chalk and talk. We know that our children learn through experience and play and the teaching profession has worked their socks off to implement this. Please consider this when planning a return. To teach is not to sit children at a desk and stand back and model. We will turn our children OFF learning. We have to consider the long term learning impact this will have on our young learners. In your decision making, please remember the purpose and values of Scottish Education - isolating young children at desks does not align.

This is important to primary teachers, primary aged children and their families. It could have a long lasting impact on all.