Coronavirus lockdown: Schools could reopen with smaller classes and staggered timetables Gavin Williamson said he would examine the experiences of other countries which are reopening their schools

Britain’s schools could reopen with staggered timetables and reduced class sizes, the Education Secretary has suggested.

Gavin Williamson refused to name a date for English children to go back to school and apologised to pupils who have seen their education disrupted by the coronavirus crisis.

He confirmed that officials are examining the experiences of other countries such as Denmark where schools are already reopening as the first step in the easing of lockdown restrictions.

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Children there are being taught in smaller classes and are prevented from socialising outside their immediate group. Parents are banned from entering the premises and the school day is staggered so that large groups of children do not mix and risk spreading the virus.

‘Lessons learnt’

Asked by i if the Government was considering adopting similar measures, Mr Williamson said: “Are we looking at other countries and learning from them? Absolutely.

“And we’re seeing a few examples of countries opening up their schooling system and we’ll look closely as to how that works, how that goes, and what lessons can be learnt from it so we can benefit from that.”

The Education Secretary led the daily Downing Street press conference after official statistics showed another 596 Britons had died of Covid-19 in hospital, bringing the total to 16,060.

So far 120,067 people have tested positive for the virus with the number of tests being carried out per day at 21,626 – still far off the 100,000 daily target. Around 0.6 per cent of the UK population has been tested for coronavirus since the start of the outbreak.

‘Sorry your education was disrupted’

Mr Williamson said: “People are anxious to know when we’re going to relax restrictions, when schools are likely to be fully back and open again.

“Of course, I want nothing more than to see schools back, get them back to normal, make sure the children are sat around, learning, and experiencing the joy of being at school. But I can’t give you a date.”

He added: “To any young people watching, I wanted to say to you how sorry I am that you’ve had your education disrupted in this way. I know how hard it must be, and I’d like to thank you for making the adjustments that you’ve had to make.

“I know you will be missing your friends, your teachers, your lessons. I want you to know that you are such an important part of this fight too, and I cannot thank you enough for all that you are doing.”

Need for transparency

He said there were no plans to open schools over the summer holidays in order to make up for the time missed during this academic year.

Paul Whiteman of headteachers’ union NAHT called on ministers to be transparent about the next steps, saying: “Instructing school leaders and their teams to return without including them in the planning stages or sharing proper safety arrangements would be extremely reckless.”