It was exactly ten minutes that Clara sat in class without a mask on Monday last week. Then the first grader and her classmates at the Schwabinger Wilhelmschule had to put the masks back on. Because a child’s self-test showed two lines: positive. So they all put their masks back on, even though it was the first day that elementary schools had officially lifted masks in class.
Abolishing the mask requirement in class was still overdue, says Clara’s mother, Katharina Rücker. Now that the clubs and bars are open again. “The children learn to read and write, they should get to know the other children and their teacher.” All of this is much easier without a mask.
Mother Katharina Rücker is behind the release – even if daughter Clara was only allowed to sit in her class at the Schwabing Wilhelm School for ten minutes without a mask.
(Photo: Florian Peljak)
Since last Monday, elementary and special school children no longer have to wear a mask in their seat, only in the corridors or on the toilet. Or if a child in the class has Corona: Then the mask requirement applies again for five days. More than four months ago, the mask requirement was introduced once again, it should initially apply for one week in primary schools and two weeks for fifth graders. However, it was then extended until further notice for all students.
According to the teachers’ association, one could have waited at least until the Easter holidays
As of this Monday, the time has come for the fifth and sixth graders, they too are no longer required to wear masks if the pupils take part in PCR pool tests. Many welcome this. But not everyone is happy about the timing.
“Of course it’s better for the children without a mask,” says Martin Schmid, chairman of the Munich Teachers’ Association MLLV. “But we find the timing very unfortunate, now that the incidence and number of infections are going through the roof.” At least until the Easter holidays, he thinks, the mask requirement could have been retained.
“Now my teacher understands what I’m saying much better”: Max thinks it’s great without a mask, mother Amaya Schönborn feels queasy.
(Photo: Florian Peljak)
Amaya Schönborn, who is just picking up her son from elementary school, sees things similarly. “It’s a strange feeling that the masks are now being left out when the incidence is highest,” says the mother. Her son Max sees it very differently. The fourth grader thinks it’s great to sit in class without a mask. “Now my teacher understands what I’m saying much better. And I understand the other children better.”
Sandra Martin, the mother of seven-year-old Jakob, also thinks the end of the mask requirement in class is coming too early. Her son complained about the mask at first, but then quickly accepted that it had to be worn, she says. Jakob himself says: “Now I can breathe much better again.”
Jakob quickly got used to the mouth cover, says mother Sandra Martin. For them, the end of the mask requirement comes too early.
(Photo: Florian Peljak)
The omission of the mask requirement is classified and perceived very differently, says Steve Gebhardt, deputy chairman of the joint parents’ council of primary schools. “Some children continue to wear the mask, for example due to previous illnesses, others are happy that they no longer have to wear it.”
Ute Hartmann heads the elementary school on Wilhelmstrasse. She thinks it’s basically good that the children are now learning without masks again. “When learning to read, you work a lot with the position of your mouth. The children have to see how the mouth is open and what the tongue is doing in order to produce a certain sound. That is much more difficult with a mask. Especially for the children, whose mother tongue is not German.”
National youth games and excursions are also planned again
The fact that masks are no longer compulsory in class is a step back to normality. They have also planned a summer festival for this year, national youth games, excursions and a school camp for the fourth graders. “We’re doing it in a reduced and careful way, but it’s starting again,” says Ute Hartmann.
The headmaster of a Munich high school criticizes the fact that masks are no longer compulsory in the fifth and sixth grades because these students take part in the PCR pool tests. If a student has Corona, they only find out about it in the evening after sitting in class with the other children all day without a mask.
“We all really miss the laughter and the facial expressions,” says Alexandra Hallweger from the school administration of the Erasmus Grasser Gymnasium. Everyone was looking forward to normal times, she says. But at the moment there are so many cases at the school, the children are so used to wearing masks – she assumes that some children will continue to wear the protection voluntarily in class. That’s how it was at the beginning of the school year, when there was no obligation. Half of her class still wore a mask. And at Ulrike Winter, head of the elementary school on Rotenbuchstrasse, the pupils of six classes were allowed to take off their masks last week – there were corona cases in the other 20 classes.
There can be no question of normality in the schools. In many classes, the children wear masks, voluntarily or after a Corona case. And in the stairwells and corridors, the following still applies: wear a mask.