Thread by @adamboxer1

Today a colleague called in with a temperature - she had two triple lessons, first lot with Y8 and second lot Y7. We decided to bunch the classes together and teach 60 kids in the hall. I'm fairly confident this will happen again, so here is a short thread with things we learned:

1. This does not work if you don't have a strong curriculum (obviously). All our classes learn the same content in the same order so it was pretty easy to just jump straight in seamlessly

2. You must have miniwhiteboards at every seat. Students were distanced on exam desks, which means that the furthest students were far away from me and I didn't circulate. Only way to ensure they were thinking during questioning was to do the whole lot on MWBs

3. Name tags on a big piece of paper. Can't cold call to a class you don't know without name tags. Totally ruined the flow that I neglected to do this. Daft error, and I'm annoyed at myself over it.

4. I put the class I didn't know at the front and my class at the back. I *think* this was the best way to do it, as I know which members of my class I need to laser in on, but didn't know the other class. It's worth thinking about.

5. Make it mega clear to students why you are doing what you are doing.

6. MASSIVE projector screen is a big help.

7. If you don't know how to speak from your diaphragm, get your music teacher to show you how. If you use a normal voice for that long in that big an area you will really strain yourself. Not worth it.

8. Make the students project as well. Insist on it. Every student needs to be able to hear every other response, and tell students they *must* speak up, using scripts like "it isn't fair that Daniel at the back can't hear your brilliant point" etc

9. I think that's the lot. Hope it helps, sadly it will have to remain an option for us, and it may for you too. Saved 60 kids from having to stare at a textbook for 3 lessons straight.

Oh one final thing, I'm tired, but actually ok. I think that's a testament to our students who adapted brilliantly and to our leadership team who were in and out throughout the day to check all was good. /actual end

Nono one actual final thing. Bring spares of everything: books, booklets, pens, paper etc. You don't have time to have The Chat with students who don't have their stuff. Just throw things at them and get moving asap.

Update in advance of spring term 2022, where things like this may have to happen again.

We ended up having to do this quite a bit last year. it was very much not enjoyable, but it was the least bad alternative. Some additions:

get your weakest students right at the front. when you do mini-whiteboard work, pretend to look at everyone's but really just look at the ones at the front. the point is to get everyone writing or thinking, not to actually check each answer.

an extra pair of hands like an LSA or a technician can really help. if you can, get someone like this into the room.

entrance is really important. Have a seating plan, call out the students row by row from outside. have someone inside (SLT preferably) just put them into those seats. maintain that seating plan as much as possible, as it helps with routines and getting them started etc.

behaviour: go hard, go early. most students will rise to the occasion once you have explained things to them, but if someone steps out of line jump on it immediately and come down hard on them. it is unacceptable to disturb that number of students.

I used a simple radio mic. it's weird at first, but everybody gets used to it and makes a big difference. it was like 40 quid. get IT team to sort it out for you.

your behaviour routines like 3:30:30 and Pastore's Perch are even more important here. There may be entire lessons where you don't circulate at all. That's fine, this is an imperfect situation so you are just trying to do the best you can.

If you aren't familiar with those terms, go here achemicalorthodoxy.wordpress.com/behaviour/

I'm sure I'll think of more but my son just started crying so I will check back in later if I think of any others