As a parent of a 3-year-old, I am very concerned about sending my toddler to preschool. As a teacher, I am concerned about ensuring the safety of the kids under my care. My toddler knows that Covid-19 is bad and must go away soon so that he can go to the beach, see a movie or visit a playground. While children don’t appear to be high-risk, they can be asymptomatic carriers of the virus. While we would love to keep our children at home on a full-time basis until a cure is found (and maybe even longer), some of us don’t have that luxury with work commitments or just not being able to focus while working from home. How do we then minimize the risk in our schools?
Best practices:
Parents should no longer be entering the school so drop-offs and pick-ups must be done at the entrance where a member of staff will be posted. These should also be staggered so there are no crowds at the entrance.
The school must provide hand sanitizer or, even better, hand-washing stations at the entrance so that children and staff can sanitize before entering. Mask-wearing should become mandatory for the teachers since physical interaction is unavoidable.
Health checks should be done regularly on the parent’s side and sick children (or children with underlying health issues) be kept at home. This has been a touchy subject even before Covid-19 but there is too much at stake now to be sending a sick child to school. Staff should also check the kids’ temperatures daily before entry.
Regular cleaning and disinfection of the premises along with devising a method of getting a greater supply of fresh air flowing through at any given time.
Fun and distracting ways of managing social distancing between toddlers. While it may be quite a difficult feat for that age group, it must be accomplished.
Does your preschool/school follow these best practices? If not, maybe this might be a starting point to get the ball rolling. As for us, at Nova Satus Private School, we’ve got you covered. We continue to closely follow the recommendations for the best possible experience for health, safety and well-being at our school. Reducing the maximum student intake by half, cancelling group activities, teaching kids about social distancing and proper hygiene are just some of the steps being taken to minimize the risk.
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