Outdoor lunch

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks I’m a DCPS elementary teacher and please know that outdoor lunch is 1000x better than our crowded, very noisy cafeteria, even on a cold day. Classroom lunch is fine on the freezing days. The kids truly are fine! There is no child abuse taking place. They enjoy their time outside. Truly, it’s okay.

So do you think the teachers who allowed kids a choice at our school this week had bad judgment? Because the alternative, at our school this week, was to have everyone to have lunch inside. No entire class ate outside, because clearly school leaders thought it was not fine for everybody to have lunch outside during freezing, windy weather. And our school is one of those that has tables and where everyone usually has lunch outdoors.

And for the record, I’m someone who thinks it’s fine to have recess outdoors in just about any weather. But sitting and eating is a different situation.

Yes, it was poor judgement, it was far too cold this week to sit outside for lunch.

Absolutely agree with the last comment. Recess and lunch are two different issues. Kids can have recess outside on cold days but sitting for 20 to 30 minutes on a cold surface is not OK. Having a choice is nice, but the school needs to draw the line. Would you let a child go out in without a jacket when it's 35? Should putting on a jacket be a choice for a child? Sorry, but that is the adult's job, the parent or the teacher to tell the child to wear a jacket outside when it's cold.

PP you are responding to here. In principle, I agree with you that adults should make this decision, but I think in this particular situation, it was fine to give a choice, especially in the older grades (which I think may have been the only grades where this happened). I certainly think giving a choice was better than making everyone eat outdoors, as Hearst did, when it was below freezing. At our school, the default was indoors, but some teachers allowed kids to choose the picnic tables. I think the teachers are in a difficult situation, because a lot of the parents are really anxious about Covid and really adamant about no unmasking indoors, and may freak out their kids even more if they heard they ate indoors. So allowing older kids to choose may have seemed like a good compromise to some teachers.

Also, as the PP who also responded to you illustrates, some kids get cold more easily than others. My kid chose the outdoors (not for fear of Covid, but to be with some friends), and was fine. My other kid was not given a choice but would almost certainly have eaten indoors. I was fine with either. Doesn't look like either got Covid from it.

[Anonymous]

I think one of the issues with providing choice is that a lot of schools are understaffed right now. Staff members are quarantining, or home caring for their own children who are quarantining/are in school districts that have gone virtual. There simply aren’t enough bodies to supervise students as is, let alone outside and indoors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think one of the issues with providing choice is that a lot of schools are understaffed right now. Staff members are quarantining, or home caring for their own children who are quarantining/are in school districts that have gone virtual. There simply aren’t enough bodies to supervise students as is, let alone outside and indoors.

That's a valid point, but then on a below freezing day, kids should eat indoors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think one of the issues with providing choice is that a lot of schools are understaffed right now. Staff members are quarantining, or home caring for their own children who are quarantining/are in school districts that have gone virtual. There simply aren’t enough bodies to supervise students as is, let alone outside and indoors.

That's a valid point, but then on a below freezing day, kids should eat indoors.

100% agree.

[Anonymous]

DCI does! Kids have a choice, and my kid and her friends eat outside.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think one of the issues with providing choice is that a lot of schools are understaffed right now. Staff members are quarantining, or home caring for their own children who are quarantining/are in school districts that have gone virtual. There simply aren’t enough bodies to supervise students as is, let alone outside and indoors.

That's a valid point, but then on a below freezing day, kids should eat indoors.

Turned out that our older Janney kid had a choice about whether to eat inside or outside on Tuesday (the particularly cold day in question here), and chose to eat outside because that's what their friends were doing. Younger kids just ate inside, no choice.

Older kid didn't report any difficulty or discomfort with outdoor lunch.

I have no problem with letting kids choose to eat outside in cold but dry weather.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think one of the issues with providing choice is that a lot of schools are understaffed right now. Staff members are quarantining, or home caring for their own children who are quarantining/are in school districts that have gone virtual. There simply aren’t enough bodies to supervise students as is, let alone outside and indoors.

That's a valid point, but then on a below freezing day, kids should eat indoors.

Turned out that our older Janney kid had a choice about whether to eat inside or outside on Tuesday (the particularly cold day in question here), and chose to eat outside because that's what their friends were doing. Younger kids just ate inside, no choice.

Older kid didn't report any difficulty or discomfort with outdoor lunch.

I have no problem with letting kids choose to eat outside in cold but dry weather.

I'm the PP you are responding to (also a Janney parent), and the exact same thing was true for my kid - got a choice, at outside because of friends. My other kid did not get a choice - the whole class ate indoors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where are you getting that lunch is 15 minutes? It’s always a solid 30 at our ES for k-5 and PK is 45 min. So that means tomorrow in the below freezing temps four year olds will be sitting on concrete for 45 min.

No they will not. They cannot.

Update: They were. All of the kids at Hearst were forced to eat outside and given no indoor lunch option. Parents were told to leave work and come get them for lunch if they wanted. Ridiculous.

The school was realistic about the science and the data and chose not to expose the entire community to more omicron spread. Bravo, Hearst!!!!

Amazing. Well done.

I hope you last two posters were being sarcastic.

No we were not. You deniers have mostly succeeded in chasing us from the board and probably enjoy your echo chamber, but some stick around and others come back. That was absolutely the right decision by Hearst. It will mean a dozen or dozens fewer omicron cases at Hearst.

You are losing your grip on reality. There is a difference between a covid denier and someone who thinks that outdoor lunch in January is too much to ask of very young children for not a lot of benefit. Stop acting like you are the last line of defense in an epic struggle of good vs evil.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Welp, they had indoor lunch at Janney today and my kid was told they weren't given an option. The ENTIRE GRADE was packed in the cafeteria shouting to each other. My DC said it was so loud they couldn't hear. Can't think of faster way to spread Omicron. Great job.

My kids go to Janney, and we'd wanted them to do outdoor lunch today, but... it was awfully cold, so it's kind of hard for me to really get that worked up about the fact that they didn't. Most of the kids in the school are vaccinated. Guess we'll just see what happens.

I think at this point we can say that this day of indoor lunch has not been a superspreader event. There was no noticeable uptick in case reports, only the usual trickle of 1 or 2 per week. I'm always glad when the doomsayers are wrong again.