Photo by: Bloomberg
While South Africa’s grade 7 and 12 learners are set to return to some form of contact learning from June 1, it will most definitely not be teaching and learning as normal. To build the confidence needed to begin phasing in the other grades, schools are going to have to institute entirely new protocols to maintain physical distancing and ensure regular hand washing and sanitisation. Learners and teachers will also wear face masks or shields and class sizes will have to be limited. Other countries have already shown some of what it’s going to take, including this Hong Kong secondaryschool shown here. An added difficulty for South Africa is that we are returning in winter, which can be brutally cold in some provinces, making outdoor learning all the more difficult. Photograph: Billy Kwok for Bloomberg