Hospitality and Economy: NHS Praise:

Unfortunately, pubs and restaurants had to wait to reopen until 4th July 2020. We had to stay two metres apart and you could not stand at the bars!

When we went back into lockdown after Christmas, we all went back to square one. All nonessential shopping was to be done online - if it was done at all.

Emily

During the first lockdown, a lady called Annemarie Plas, decided to show her appreciation to all essential workers who risked their lives for the sick and vulnerable during the first pandemic. She did this by standing outside her house and clapping every Thursday at 8 o’clock.

This trend quickly caught on with he rest of the nation. And from that day on, until the end of the first lockdown, everyone, including the Royal Family and Prime Minister, stood outside their house and clapped.

My Mum, a Consultant of Elderly Medicine and founder of the FIT team at Hull Royal Infirmary, said that the clapping made her week every time she got home from a stressful day at work.

Oscar

At the start of lockdown the government was very hesitant to close schools, as the education sector knew it would impact many students’ learning.

COVID-19 got so bad they had no choice but to close schools until further notice. We were locked in our houses for months on end. I, for one, thought we would be out of lockdown by Easter and I know many others thought that too: that was not the case! We all had to adjust to the drastic change of events. No one had yet used Zoom (what even was Zoom?) so it was new technology that we all had to get used to as well. At first, we struggled a bit, but we soon got the hang of it with the help of each other and the patience of the teachers!

One thing throughout the lockdown that all of us experienced on Zoom was not being on mute and the rest of the class hearing our family in the background or our secret ranting about the lessons! Or little siblings screaming at each other or wanting to listen in on the Zoom. The mini Munkleys appeared in several TCC Zoom calls!

We were very fortunate that our school adapted very well to lockdown learning, but we knew that so many children around the UK were struggling to cope. Lots of people, like me, didn’t mind lockdown learning too much, but with Wi-Fi cutting out and a lack of devices and other technical difficulties, times couldn’t have been harder for many families. There were times when you would get fed up of doing Powerpoint after Powerpoint, but we powered through and eventually were allowed to go back into schools under certain conditions and circumstances.

Keira