2nd Grade Teacher wears a mask

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a teacher.
I’ve just been diagnosed w leukemia and some other autoimmune thing is going on as well.
I just want to finish out the year do I can retire. I’ll be wearing a mask so I can do that.
Take. A. Seat.

Nobody is talking about you. We’re talking about the health anxiety types. Best of luck with your treatment.

The thing is, you don’t know the situation of the OP’s teacher. We had a teacher mask last year—she was very private but it turned out her DH was dying of cancer and she was told by his doctors to mask to protect him. I know another teacher who was told by her doc to mask once the fall/winter illnesses start spreading, because of her propensity to get a cold that turns into a monthlong battle with bronchitis and pneumonia and she keeps running out of sick leave and must take LWOP.

Speaking as a teacher, it’s annoying to mask all day, and I don’t know many who would do it without a darn good reason.

I know a teacher who has this issue, and you know what she did? She transferred to a non-classroom position within the district. Instead of being an obnoxious martyr wearing a mask and hindering her students' ability to learn -- while not significantly reducing her exposure to germs AT ALL! -- she instead got an office job far away from germy kids and significantly reduced her exposure to germs. What a genius.

Protecting your health or that of a loved one is not “being an obnoxious martyr”. You have no empathy for anyone but yourself, and it really shows your lack of character. No one is required to transfer jobs because you are an unhinged anti-masker.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a teacher.
I’ve just been diagnosed w leukemia and some other autoimmune thing is going on as well.
I just want to finish out the year do I can retire. I’ll be wearing a mask so I can do that.
Take. A. Seat.

Nobody is talking about you. We’re talking about the health anxiety types. Best of luck with your treatment.

The thing is, you don’t know the situation of the OP’s teacher. We had a teacher mask last year—she was very private but it turned out her DH was dying of cancer and she was told by his doctors to mask to protect him. I know another teacher who was told by her doc to mask once the fall/winter illnesses start spreading, because of her propensity to get a cold that turns into a monthlong battle with bronchitis and pneumonia and she keeps running out of sick leave and must take LWOP.

Speaking as a teacher, it’s annoying to mask all day, and I don’t know many who would do it without a darn good reason.

I know a teacher who has this issue, and you know what she did? She transferred to a non-classroom position within the district. Instead of being an obnoxious martyr wearing a mask and hindering her students' ability to learn -- while not significantly reducing her exposure to germs AT ALL! -- she instead got an office job far away from germy kids and significantly reduced her exposure to germs. What a genius.

So an experienced teacher left the classroom altogether leaving the kids she otherwise would have taught — what? with a new grad teacher? with a longterm sub, that may not even have a teaching certificate? getting divided up between the remaining classes, which are consequently larger?

You may consider the above options a win, but I’d much rather have the teacher in the classroom wearing a mask.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a teacher.
I’ve just been diagnosed w leukemia and some other autoimmune thing is going on as well.
I just want to finish out the year do I can retire. I’ll be wearing a mask so I can do that.
Take. A. Seat.

Nobody is talking about you. We’re talking about the health anxiety types. Best of luck with your treatment.

The thing is, you don’t know the situation of the OP’s teacher. We had a teacher mask last year—she was very private but it turned out her DH was dying of cancer and she was told by his doctors to mask to protect him. I know another teacher who was told by her doc to mask once the fall/winter illnesses start spreading, because of her propensity to get a cold that turns into a monthlong battle with bronchitis and pneumonia and she keeps running out of sick leave and must take LWOP.

Speaking as a teacher, it’s annoying to mask all day, and I don’t know many who would do it without a darn good reason.

+1 There's a shortage of experienced classroom teachers. If OP feels so strongly that her child is being harmed because an experienced teacher is wearing a mask for whatever the reason may be, she should home school.

[Anonymous]

You know what protects your delicate health better than a mask? Not working with young children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know what protects your delicate health better than a mask? Not working with young children.

OK, you go ahead and tell your kid's 2nd grade teacher that she should leave her chosen profession mid-year because you're offended by her wearing a mask. And then wait and see how quickly that teacher reports you for being a psycho to the principal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know what protects your delicate health better than a mask? Not working with young children.

So you would rather have experienced, accomplished teachers quit?

I’ll take the amazing teacher with a mask over the rotating door of long-term subs without masks.

But mileage varies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has a teacher who wears a mask daily in high school. I thought it was odd as well, but he hasn’t complained about being able to hear her so it hasn’t been an issue.

Good thing he already knows how to read and spell. Unlike a second grader

As long as the second grader can hear the teacher, I don’t see the issue. If your child can’t read in second grade there are larger issues. Get a tutor. A kid who can’t read in second grade may have learning issues that go beyond whether a teacher wears a mask. And what the hell does spelling have to do with mask wearing? Spelling is written.

lol

How do you take a spelling test PP?

DP.

The teacher says “please spell the word ‘popcorn’”.

And then the kids spell “popcorn” to the best of their abilities.

I don’t see the problem? You can say “popcorn” through a mask. (I can put one on and try quickly if it would help, but I’m fairly certain it’ll work.)

The teachers pre-record the words and the kids listen with headphones. There are so many spelling groups (7-8 per class) that it would be a mess to administer the test live for everyone.

Ours does it out loud:
Group A: spell “this word”
Group B: spell “that word”
Works just fine, even with a mask I suspect.

And if you’re in FCPS, you’re in luck - they don’t do spelling tests!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has a teacher who wears a mask daily in high school. I thought it was odd as well, but he hasn’t complained about being able to hear her so it hasn’t been an issue.

Good thing he already knows how to read and spell. Unlike a second grader

As long as the second grader can hear the teacher, I don’t see the issue. If your child can’t read in second grade there are larger issues. Get a tutor. A kid who can’t read in second grade may have learning issues that go beyond whether a teacher wears a mask. And what the hell does spelling have to do with mask wearing? Spelling is written.

lol

How do you take a spelling test PP?

I listen to the teacher or lip read. Then spell it out on paper.

Ooops!

[Anonymous]

My heavily-accented ESOL TAs in college may as well have put 10 masks on. No one knew wtf they were saying ever. Such a waste of time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should consider getting your hearing checked, OP, if you can't understand people who are wearing masks. It sounds like you have hearing issues and use lip movement to provide context clues.

+1

I have truly never had an issue hearing any adult or child who was wearing a mask

Hearing loss is a pretty common long term complication after having covid. Perhaps you also need to be wearing a mask

As someone who also struggles to understand people wearing masks and for sure has some hearing (fairly minor) hearing loss, I find the glibness here really rude.

And first, to be clear, my hearing loss is not Covid related. I had Covid for the first time in fall of 2022. I experienced hearing challenges before then and specifically challenges understanding people in masks.

But second, telling people to "get their ears checked' like this solves the entire problem is incredibly rude. Addressing hearing loss is more complicated and can be expensive. Also for some people the problem is not their hearing specifically but auditory processing which is specifically impacted when listening to voices without seeing lips move or being able to read expressions. I have become the issues and the advent of widespread mask wearing made me realize how much I rely on visual cues to help with understanding people

Anyway the upshot is that even with my hearing aid I still sometimes can't understand people in masks (or who have heavy accents or who speak without moving their lips much). If the mask muffles their voice and covers their lower face then turning up my hearing sometimes just makes something unintelligible, louder.

This doesn't mean I think no one should mask. I dutifully wore a mask through the pandemic and still do when it's appropriate (I'm sick or someone close to me is sick or risk of getting sick is very high). But it's so rude and selfish to write it off when people talk about the challenges of communication with masks, especially in a setting like school where communication is very fundamental.

And stop telling people "get your ears checked." It's rude and betrays how little you care about people with hearing loss, as well as how little you understand what it means to have hearing issues and how they are treated.

And stop telling to stop wearing masks cause you have hearing issues. It’s rude too. You never know what health issues the person wearing the mask has. It goes both ways.

I literally said that I am not saying people should not wear masks because of my hearing issues. And that I myself mask when appropriate.

It obviously does NOT go both ways because a lot of people expect me to just always defer to someone's mask wearing and no one gives a crap about those of us who struggle to understand people who wear masks. If this was really something that went both ways then people would have said things in this thread like "that sounds hard even though the teacher has a right to wear a mask -- have you considered asking about masks with clear panels or seeing if there is some other solution that could meet everyone halfway."

Instead people who said that they or their kids struggled to understand someone in a mask were called names. Because apparently mentioning one of the obvious and unfortunate downsides of masking is the same as being an anti-vaxxer or a Covid denier.

So yeah it should go both ways but it very much doesn't.

Dp. I agree that there have been some callous responses to you. But OP said that OP struggles with this, not their kid. If OP had said the child is having difficulties and complaining, perhaps more people would have responded with suggestions instead of anger at OP’s anger.

OP is worried about her kid understanding because she struggles with it. Kids don't always voice difficulties like this because they don't know better. My 2nd grader had bad vision decline between 1st and 2nd grade but never once mentioned having difficulty seeing at school. We caught it with a routine eye exam. Then after she got glasses she noted how much easier it was for her to know what was going on in class because apparently the teacher had been placing instructions for certain things around the room and DD was not even aware of this until she could see better.

So it's perfectly normal for a parent to wonder whether this might be impacting their kid even if the kid has not expressed a problem.

Agree.
A 7 yo doesn’t even know what pronunciation and enunciation is. Let alone how debilitating a masked teacher is at teaching it

Whatever.

They can catch up next school year when they have a homeroom teacher who doesn’t always wear a surgical mask.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has a teacher who wears a mask daily in high school. I thought it was odd as well, but he hasn’t complained about being able to hear her so it hasn’t been an issue.

Good thing he already knows how to read and spell. Unlike a second grader

As long as the second grader can hear the teacher, I don’t see the issue. If your child can’t read in second grade there are larger issues. Get a tutor. A kid who can’t read in second grade may have learning issues that go beyond whether a teacher wears a mask. And what the hell does spelling have to do with mask wearing? Spelling is written.

lol

How do you take a spelling test PP?

DP.

The teacher says “please spell the word ‘popcorn’”.

And then the kids spell “popcorn” to the best of their abilities.

I don’t see the problem? You can say “popcorn” through a mask. (I can put one on and try quickly if it would help, but I’m fairly certain it’ll work.)

Poplearn? Raccoon? Popcoon?

What did you mumble under your mask?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has a teacher who wears a mask daily in high school. I thought it was odd as well, but he hasn’t complained about being able to hear her so it hasn’t been an issue.

Good thing he already knows how to read and spell. Unlike a second grader

As long as the second grader can hear the teacher, I don’t see the issue. If your child can’t read in second grade there are larger issues. Get a tutor. A kid who can’t read in second grade may have learning issues that go beyond whether a teacher wears a mask. And what the hell does spelling have to do with mask wearing? Spelling is written.

lol

How do you take a spelling test PP?

DP.

The teacher says “please spell the word ‘popcorn’”.

And then the kids spell “popcorn” to the best of their abilities.

I don’t see the problem? You can say “popcorn” through a mask. (I can put one on and try quickly if it would help, but I’m fairly certain it’ll work.)

Poplearn? Raccoon? Popcoon?

What did you mumble under your mask?

And that can happen just as easily without a mask. I did poorly on spelling tests in the 80s, long before masks became a thing.

And if it’s such a huge deal to you that you prioritize a spelling test over another human’s health, then just ask to have the words recorded and then played in class.

Be a problem solver instead of a heartless complainer.

[Anonymous]

All of you people thinking your kid is attentively staring at their teacher’s mouths while a lesson is going on.

Ha!

Their attention is everywhere but. They may be looking at their paper/assignment, they may be looking at the board, they are looking at their friends, they’re playing with their shoe laces, they are fiddling with the stuff in their desks…I can guarantee that the actual amount of time spent looking at their teacher’s mouth formation isn’t as much as you want it to be.

And fwiw your liberal allowance of screen time at home is what is destroying their attention spans and affecting their learning potential, not a teacher’s ability to show what their mouth looks like.

—a teacher who doesn’t wear a mask but absolutely understands why some teachers choose to do so

[Anonymous]

All they do is show slides and videos on the promethian board anyway. It’s cute that so many of you think the teacher is actually teaching your child to read.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a teacher.
I’ve just been diagnosed w leukemia and some other autoimmune thing is going on as well.
I just want to finish out the year do I can retire. I’ll be wearing a mask so I can do that.
Take. A. Seat.

Nobody is talking about you. We’re talking about the health anxiety types. Best of luck with your treatment.

The thing is, you don’t know the situation of the OP’s teacher. We had a teacher mask last year—she was very private but it turned out her DH was dying of cancer and she was told by his doctors to mask to protect him. I know another teacher who was told by her doc to mask once the fall/winter illnesses start spreading, because of her propensity to get a cold that turns into a monthlong battle with bronchitis and pneumonia and she keeps running out of sick leave and must take LWOP.

Speaking as a teacher, it’s annoying to mask all day, and I don’t know many who would do it without a darn good reason.

I know a teacher who has this issue, and you know what she did? She transferred to a non-classroom position within the district. Instead of being an obnoxious martyr wearing a mask and hindering her students' ability to learn -- while not significantly reducing her exposure to germs AT ALL! -- she instead got an office job far away from germy kids and significantly reduced her exposure to germs. What a genius.

Omg you’re stupid.
How does a teacher go from a classroom to an office job