Thionville. Behind the mask, the schoolchildren tell about life under covid

They believed they had got rid of the covid and the obligation to wear a mask in class. Well no. With an incidence rate above its alert threshold (ie 50 cases per 100,000 inhabitants), Moselle schoolchildren had to wear a mask to go to class.

At the Victor-Hugo school, it was a bit of the topic of the day.

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Automatisms taken

In Julie Him’s class on this back-to-school Monday, the joy of finding friends overcame the constraint, but that does not prevent everyone from having a clear opinion on the subject. “Everyone is well aware of the need to put the mask back on, but I know they would have preferred not to have done so. The week before the holidays, we all breathed, them and me. We could read happiness on their faces. They quickly get used to it again; the automatisms had been taken, ”slips the teacher.

Samuel admits that the mask gives him headaches at the end of the day but “maybe it would have been better never to take it off because during the holidays, the contamination resumed. As in every holiday period. It’s always like that, in fact… ”

The theory defends itself but the majority of the friends seem nostalgic for the class under “normal” conditions. “It was weird to see us without the mask before the holidays,” says Mathilde. Same feeling with Asma, “actually, I felt like I had always had it.”

On several occasions, during this week of total freedom, several schoolchildren found themselves bringing their hands to their faces as if they wanted to put the mask back on their noses. “We all got used to having it and even when we don’t wear it, we make this gesture…” Incredible.

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Temporary annoyance

The announcement of the new sanitary screwdriver momentarily annihilated some on November 4. Kylenia has gone to take refuge in her room; others say they felt “disgusted”. In Stephanie Leick’s fourth grade class, Ashley says: “When I heard that we were going to have to put the mask back on, I almost dropped my head on my plate of soup! »Kiara said to herself that it was all over again for the fog on the glasses and Hanaé immediately thought that she would have to speak louder to the teacher again to make herself understood. Only Naël did not ask himself so many questions because, at the request of his parents, he never gave up the mask at school.

Luckily, schoolchildren still have a little breathing space during recess. “This is the only place where they are not required to wear the mask. For the rest, we have never changed our habits: washing hands when we arrive at school, the courtyard divided into two, staggered entries ”, indicates Christelle Petermann, the director. Life under covid continues for the moment.

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