Lockdown... let's call it what it is... #4

Lockdown

A rahui for papatuanuku. 

Self-isolation

Quarantine

My body tried filling up the hours. Made friit salad for breakfast. I talked with lots of people via video chat. Had a dance party with the dogs. Ate feijoas. Did some gardening. Fell asleep. Woke up. Picked Crystel up. Sung. A lot. Did dinnner. And now... Back in bed. 

It's monotonous. 

BORING

But we're safe. Here in our bubble.

How the hell did Anne Frank do this? Hide while in fear of her life?

I'm just here, in the safety of my own home. Food. Shelter. Water. Family. Sanity. Supposedly. 

Gratitude

I'm grateful for....

- a warm bed

- health

- safety

- food

- money in the bank still!

- my sister

- my dogs and cats

- my garden

- my diy fix it skills

- my grandmother

- my time spent with Uncle Ken at Xmas

- the plethora of books to read... And all the time ever to read them 😂

- ability to choose what I do with my life

Self-isolation #3

And just like that... The panic rises up into my puku, smothers me and then with a deep inhale breath, subsides. 

Relax. 

Remember everything is okay. 

You are in your own bubble. 

Your students will be okay. 

❤️🙌🏽

Self-isolation #2

I'm tired. 

I'm bored. 

I'm kind of hungry. But I don't want to waste the food. 

It feels weird being at home. 

Going to school this morning helped a bit with the transition from school to home to holidays and working remotely. 

The constant updates are intense. 

I kind of feel like just going to sleep and waking up when it's all over. 

Was good seeing my Tihi students and Y12 students collect their packs today. 

🙌🏽 

Self-isolation #1

Yesterday an announcement was made that we had 48 hours to prepare for nationwide self-isolation - a Level 4 Quarantine self-isolation. Students were sent home. Teachers were told to come back in the morning to prep resources. Luckily we'd done some of this earlier the week before.

Today was more of a planning and prep day at school. We hunkered down. Got the job done. 

And boy, was it a long job. I spent all day literally running to and fro from the photocopier to the DC to my computer in the resource room and then back again. I had some awesome help from my colleagues in the department and colleagues at kura. 

I'm glad that I had so many resources I could throw together and hopefully it is coherent enough. 

This really is unchartered territory. This self-isolation has never happened in my career as a teacher. In my lifetime either. 

I kept thinking today about my last lesson with my Y9Tihi students. I tell them this a lot - but they are honestly the best Y9 class I've ever had. Straight up. I've had some crazy classes over the past ten years but I am so grateful for the students in my Y9 Tihi class this year. 

They were so patient, nervous and scared. They wanted the info but also weren't really ready for it either. I asked them to do four things:

1. Read up about Covid-19

2. Write me emails

3. Write a daily diary of what it is like being in self-isolation

4. Try not to panic. Be safe. Be kind to each other. 

To keep the mood calm yesterday, I introduced them to The Game of Awesome. If it hadn't have been such a serious need to keep them calm, I would have enjoyed seeing them working together so well and creating cool stories so easily. I still enjoyed it. But there was still a definite need to keep calm in that moment. 

Yesterday a lot of them asked for LOTS of school work. Like weeks of it. 

I guess that's why I spent so long making the Junior English Covid-19 Homework booklets. I wanted to make sure the booklets were accessible for all students and also challenging too. 

I'm mindful that some of the resources there are what they have already covered. Some they haven't. Hopefully it all helps. 

It was really important to me that my students and those in English classes at OC would have the opportunity to grow at home, with their whanau. To have them share their learning and READ, WRITE and CREATE together. 

I'm hoping the students will come tomorrow and collect packs for home. I'm also hoping that everyone will be safe. 

Proper self-isolation begins tomorrow night at 11.59pm - Wednesday night. 

This means we won't be allowed out of the house. 

My sister works at Eastpac. She is deemed an essential worker. It makes me happy she still has a job but also scared. I worry that she will bring the virus home or that she will get sick herself. What will that mean for us in our house? 

I worry about whether our animals can get the virus or whether people not in self-isolation walking past our house will touch our dogs and the dogs bring it inside. 

Like I said, this is unchartered territory. 

I'm truly grateful for the awesome leadership and quick response from our Senior Leadership Team at school. Also grateful that we had time to prep work for students as we moved to Alert Level 4. 

As I asked my Tihi kids to keep a diary about their experiences - I'll write here too. Hopefully they get the chance to read these and respond 🙌🏽

2020: Pandemic Planning

Pandemic

Adjective:

 (of a disease) prevalent over a whole country or the world.

synonyms:

widespread, prevalent, pervasive, rife, rampant, epidemic;

Noun:

an outbreak of a pandemic disease.

"the results may have been skewed by an influenza pandemic"

I really didn't think we'd be getting right into Pandemic Planning at kura so early. I thought maybe we'd hit global Zombie Apocalypse first... but no. This is real.

I was in a state of panic yesterday.

I spent a lot of time in bed - worried, concerned. Sleepy.

Today, I got back into action mode. Lots of things were completed at school but there is still this overarching sense of impending doom to calculate and maneuver around.

My current thoughts are a resounding: We got this! But my internal conflict says... Do we? Like actually, do we?

It makes me think about how lucky we are here in New Zealand. We'd heard about it late last year, on into the beginning of this year.

One of my Y12 students even did her speech on this subject. Only slightly ironic that we'd then have a global pandemic on our hands...

Still, all the planning in the world couldn't prepare us for this. At present we have sixty-six confirmed cases of Coronavirus. This man in the video below is so clearly spoken, so relaxed and calm in this growing sense of panic that the rest of us are feeling. People are panic buying toilet paper. TOILET PAPER. Yes.... And not just here, either. All over. Sure, hand sanitiser and bleach sold out quickly too. They've only recently put a limit on how many loaves of bread you're allowed to buy. My friends are having trouble buying bags of flour. It makes me a tiny bit more appreciative of being gluten free.

Underneath all this bravado and my own sense of supposed calm. There is an overwhelming worry and concern for the people I love and care for. My immune-compromised colleagues are allowed to work from home this week according to Ministry of Education and Ministry of Health guidelines.

We're at Pandemic Alert Level 2 here in NZ. Our schools won't close until we are at Level 4. This is in itself quite a stressful time. We are on the frontline: teachers, nurses, doctors.

What are the symptoms again?

Coronavirus has spread fast. From Wuhan, China and then on throughout the rest of the world. We closed our borders relatively quickly. Thankful to have the cousin Jacinda as Prime Minister. She has truly helped keep the virus at bay. People traveling were meant to self-isolate. I'm guessing the 66 cases are people who did the travelling.

We are yet to move to community transfer. When that happens... I guess we'll be rising to the next Alert Level.

Italy has become the new epicentre of the virus. It is awful to think of the beautiful places I travelled to and visited in 2018 having their beautiful people getting sick and dying from this disease. Apparently the canal waters are clear. The sediment has not been disturbed. Fish and swans can be seen in and on the canal waters. Even dolphins have returned.

Some are saying that this is Mother Nature's way of putting us all into a time-out. Perhaps this is true. We were going to end up this way at some point, why not now?

It's hard to say what might happen next.

All I do know is that I have to keep a calm face and encourage my colleagues to do the same.

We're all in this together. Solidarity. Sick?

Whatever it means - we have to keep moving.

It is scary though to think of my students getting sick and coming to school, sick and then that virus transferring to others.

Usually when I start thinking of next possible situations, the worst possible situations, I feel a sense of dread, panic and fear.

At least with this pandemic of Coronavirus... I know the realities. Everyone I know and love could die. This might be a really morbid thing to say - sure. But I've actually never felt more calm. Because this is literally the worst thing that could happen.

And yet, I think the panic lies in what to sort out first. Which priority is more important?

Which task on my to-do list needs to be actioned first?

To Do...

• Ensure all classes in my department have Google Classroom set up
• Ensure that all students have access to wifi, data or other means to complete their work
• Check in with the immune-compromised teachers in my department. Are they okay? Will they be working at home this week? 
• Talk with immune-compromised students via email. Check that they are ready, and set up for learning at home
• Reassure students and teachers that it will be okay... 
• Find out more information of how dogs can get sick from the virus... 
• Buy more echinacea tablets ---- don't be overwhelmed if you can't find any...
• Try not to panic buy....
• Talk to Nan often and see how she's doing
• Create Zoom lessons and use Screencastify
• Prep resources that can be used online and offline
• Talk with students and check they're prepped at home with food and safe places
• Carry out duty at school -- enforce 2 metre separation where needed
•