Jonny McCambridge: The more I hear about reopening schools, the less I understand

I’m sitting at the long table where I used to eat my meals, but which is now dominated by the large, clunky work computer.
Schools are preparing to reopenSchools are preparing to reopen
Schools are preparing to reopen

My old analogue radio, with the bent aerial and the round dial, is on in the corner. A newsreader is reciting headlines but I’m not really listening (when you spend all of your working day in the news environment, sometimes you have heard enough).

My son is sitting beside me. I’m keeping one eye on my computer screen, watching the progression of tomorrow’s newspaper, while the other is on my boy who is doing maths exercises on an iPad. I have a feeling that this is work he should have completed already, perhaps yesterday, or last week, or last month.

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There is no fluency to our labour. I help him with a couple of sums before my attention is inevitably hauled in a different direction because I get a message from work or there is an article which I have to read. During these moments of neglect I can sense my son becoming detached, his attention floating away like the seed of a dandelion being carried on the wind.

Education Minister Peter WeirEducation Minister Peter Weir
Education Minister Peter Weir

I am trying to bring his focus back to the homework when my own concentration is fractured by something I hear. The education minister, Peter Weir, is to be interviewed on Evening Extra. I turn the volume up a bit, fiddle with the aerial and then move the wireless left and right in search of a better signal.

‘Hang on son, daddy just wants to hear this.’

On this day it has been agreed by the executive that social distancing will be reduced from two metres to one metre for children in an attempt to facilitate the reopening of schools. I have a professional and personal interest in what the minister has to say.

My impression is that he is defensive and tetchy from the first question. I feel a stab of sympathy and empathy and wonder if he has been having a tough day. The minister tells the interviewer that the measures announced by the executive will ‘mean that for many schools they’ll be able to get every pupil in’.

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The interview goes on, my son pulls an expression of impatience. I hold up an apologetic hand.

The questioner raises the fact that some teachers are dubious that the plans mean all children will be able to return to school at the same time.

Mr Weir responds by saying that ‘the vast bulk of pupils will be able to be accommodated’. I immediately write this phrase down in my notebook. Then I turn off the radio and go back to helping my son with his mathematics.

The next morning we are up early. I have always envied those people, such as my wife, who are able to wake, turn over and go back to sleep. For myself, and my son, it is a one way process. Once we stir, no matter how early it is, the day has begun.

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We trundle downstairs and I sleepily pour some Coco Pops into a bowl. Then I snap the radio on again. It is so early that Radio Ulster has not yet begun and a national broadcast is on. My son munches his breakfast beside me while I check news stories which have developed overnight.

When Good Morning Ulster starts, one of the first things we are told about is Arlene Foster and Michelle O’Neill’s appearance the night before on the politics programme which I’ve never watched because I can’t stay awake that late. Mrs Foster talked about schools. It is reported that she said the executive’s objective ‘is to get everybody back to school in September’.

Then I have to turn the wireless off for a bit because I want to make a pot of coffee and I don’t have enough plug sockets in the room. As the black liquid bubbles in the machine I gently encourage my son to read me a story, assisting him when he encounters an unfamiliar word.

When I turn the radio back on there is a teacher being interviewed. I don’t catch his name but his frustration is evident.

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He tells the programme: ‘It’s really important that communities don’t listen to yesterday’s comments and think children are going to be coming back to school as normal in September.’

I look up when I hear this, as if I expect the teacher to materialise in my kitchen. Then I write down what he said in my notebook.

My son climbs onto my lap and looks at me with a timid smile.

‘Daddy, just if you’re not too busy, would you be able to play with me?’

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I fight hard to ensure that there is no negative expression in my face, nothing dismal that he might pick up on. I have so much that has to be done today. I run my hand through his hair.

‘Of course I can son.’

It’s close to lunchtime and my son is in the car with me. We have no destination, we’re just driving aimlessly. The day is wet, which prohibits him from playing in the garden and there is nowhere that we can visit on a rainy day. So we just drive to get out of the house. I feel anxious about being away from work.

I’m flicking through radio channels when I come across a voice I think I recognise. Soon I realise that it is Peter Weir, this time giving an interview to Talkback.

I hear him say that his aim is to ‘maximise the amount of time that children will have in the classroom’ but adds it will be a ‘practical impossibility’ for some schools to have all pupils in.

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The host asks him a question about whether it is realistic that all children will be able to return in September. The minister is beginning to answer when his line goes down, leaving dead air. I turn off the radio.

I glance at my son, who is sitting in the back seat, watching the fat rain drops run down the window pane. He smiles when he sees me looking.

‘Were they talking about schools on the radio daddy?’

‘They were son, yes.’

‘And what is happening anyway?’

Now it is my turn to look out the window. I really wish I knew what to tell him.

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