Children across the country returned to their classrooms, friends United after months of isolation, teaching and learning back on track- but will this be the new normal? After months of National school closures and children doing online work, they were finally allowed to return to school and continue their learning. Whilst the COVID-19 pandemic still takes place, children continued to show communication with their classmates. Now schools have almost completed their first half-term, it is coming to a successful end. Although not having to be face-to-face, children can still find fun somewhere in their imagination. But will this last forever?

On March 20th, schools across the United Kingdom were forced to close their doors to students as the nation went into lockdown due to the travesty of the CoronaVirus pandemic. Many people had the feeling of trepidation because they didn’t know what would happen further into the future. Although many children were able to online school work, some children, whose parents were key workers, were able to return to school before the summer holidays. Boris Johnson insists that, “Keeping schools closed was economically unsustainable and morally indefensible.” Thankfully, on September 2nd, children across the country were allowed to return back to school, however, being at school did not feel like the normal the pupils were used to. With the return back to school, the children had to follow some new rules and safety measures such as, children being required to wash their hands regularly across the school day, following the social distancing rules around the environment and trying their best to not be in face-to-face contact within the corridors and classrooms. However, now the first half-term is coming to a close, how have parents, teachers and students found these changes?

After the prolonged period away from school, many children were initially anxious about their return to school with most being passionate about seeing their friends again. When the pupils returned back to school, many parents were disquiet about their children’s safety but some were happy for them to be properly educated again. Here is what some parents have to say, “ I felt relieved after such a long break from school, it would be good for my children to get back into a structured learning routine. Working from home whilst also juggling school tasks was becoming a difficult balancing act, I have respect for teachers!” One teacher stated, “I was looking forward to having a whole class of children again, however, I did feel nervous about keeping the children safe.” A student replied with, “I believe that returning back to school was easier than home learning because if you were stuck you had a larger variety of people to ask such as peers and adults. It was also much more fun because you got more communication with other people and you could actually talk to your friends face-to-face instead of on a screen.” Now that routines are in place for children, parents and teachers it seems that education is resumed and children are making excellent progress to close any gaps that home learning may have created.

Overall, pupils, parents and staff are all incredibly positive about the return to school, with everyone sharing how fantastic it is to have children back on the classroom with their teacher. Hopefully in the future there will be more good news to report with.