I’m a primary teacher, teaching remotely at the moment. AMA.

[LemonsLemonsLemonsLemons]

AMA...about teaching, teaching remotely, suggestions for remote learning with your own children, my favourite kind of coffee...

are the parents supportive ?

What platform are you using? Is it working

Do you have DC of your own?

Are you setting work or teaching on a platform?

How are you teaching?

One of my children (college age) is being taught remotely over live videos. My other child (yr7) is being set work by teachers so isn’t being taught by anyone.

Purely speculatively, how do you think this period of homeschooling with school setting work will affect the children you teach?
Do you think there will be a rise in homeschooling afterwards?

Generally, parents have been supportive. I really appreciate emails and messages from them. There were a couple of teething problems before the break for Easter, but now parents seem happy.

We’re having a live daily Zoom with our class, and then recording lessons on video and uploading them for our classes, along with work. Feedback on the work on the same day, and then small group calls with children who have found concepts challenging.

We’re using a mixture of Microsoft Teams and Flipgrid.

Glittercandle - if your youngest is still being set personalized work by teachers, they are still being taught. I assume they’re receiving feedback, etc?

Live video calls for explaining new concepts are definitely not all they’re cracked up to be - for primary age, anyway. We’ve seen much more success with the pre-recorded lessons we’re now doing, and then following up with small group sessions afterwards.

That sounds really intense @lemonslemonslemonslemons!

Hi! Any tips for supporting my yr4 DD with the reading comprehension she gets set?

She's bright - working at GD across the board - but is not a reader. (She absolutely will not read for fun and we are now listening to audiobooks instead)

The comprehensions are causing meltdowns at home. She is reluctant to read the texts, and then claims to not be able to answer any questions. It's so painful. Help!

Lucinda- I’m a teacher here too - could you try echo reading- you read and she echos back copying your intonation whilst follow g the reading with her finger.

And yes, the platforms we’re using have generally been reliable, although Teams can be slow sometimes.

No DC of my own.

Beamur- such an interesting question. I wonder if, and I hope that, this period will allow them to become more independent learners, and more able to manage revision etc on their own as they move into secondary school. That’s certainly a skill I didn’t learn, and wish I had done, at school.

However, I do worry that it might have an adverse effect on some of the more vulnerable children. We’re trying so hard not to let any of the children slip through the net academically, but doing the pastoral remotely is hard. If I can see a child looking sad or quiet in a Zoom call, it’s really tough to try to offer the amount of support you would be able to in school.

In the future, I don’t feel it will have much of an effect on numbers of children being homeschooled: how would their parent work? This period has also shown me just how important all of the extracurricular, social aspects of school are, too.

lemons your model sounds like you are really keeping in touch with your class.

DSs school have a policy of marking work once every half term and seem to be upholding that policy so he’s only had to hand in two prices of work so far (except maths which is done online).

How have your school addressed safeguarding aspects - it really worries me that schools have rushed into live teaching with no written policies in place?

Lucinda, that’s a really good suggestion from Purplebirch. You could also try having her read the questions first, or reading the questions to her, before she reads the main text? Some children like approaching comprehensions in a topsy-turvy way, and then reading the passage is more like looking for clues.

Also, does she like sparkly pens, highlighters etc? If you’ve printed the comprehension out, underlining words as she goes along in a nice colour might suddenly make it a bit more interesting!

Just switching it up from the current routine can sometimes be enough. Good luck!

Do you teach in a private or state school Op?

I have a child due to start reception in September. He's usually at nursery a few days a week (but not at the moment since I'm not a key worker).

If schools and nurseries don't go back till September, what sort of impact do you think this'll have on this group of children starting school for the first time after being at home for months? Are you doing anything to prepare?
Thanks!

My children's school have sent no work home, just a couple of not very good websites, I have a year 5 year 2 and f1. Not so worried about the younger 2 but the year 5 is a little behind as it is, I worry about the pressure of catching up when they go back, will there be loads of pressure on the children to catch up on the missed curriculum.

Kindkylie - there was a big safeguarding review over the Easter break, with new policies being written, so live teaching didn’t start until the new term.

The Zoom calls are with the whole class, and we have the maximum security settings - passwords, waiting room, locked room etc.

Parents were sent the new policy, and have to agree to any extra 1:1 or small group calls. These calls are recorded automatically via Teams.

But yes - definitely a whole new huge area of safeguarding.

Thanks Purple and Lemons. We haven't tried reading the questions first, I think that could be a good idea!

Thanks. What happens to the recordings?! The whole thing makes me really uneasy.

One of the main issues with young children having social media is that the ability to leave school peers out of your home and safe place is lost, and I feel live teaching is doing the same. There are plenty of people my dc wouldn't want to have in their home, and there are lots of homes I wouldn't want my dc to go to and yet live teaching exposes them all to what's going on in each other's environments - younger & older siblings/parents' work/phone calls/arguments... Makes me really uncomfortable. Is it really of enough benefit to outweigh the potential issues?

Martha - independent, but I’m definitely not speaking on behalf of all schools in the sector. Friends I have working in state are providing similar content. Provision is differing wildly within and across sectors, so there’s a lot to compare.

Squeeky- please don’t worry. The first thing to remember is that everyone is going to be in the same boat in terms of missing this chunk of term. This will have to be addressed next year anyway, wherever children are.

There is a saturation of online resources at the moment, but the recently released BBC stuff has a clear timetable and looks good quality and easy to follow. If you choose just one online resource, I’d recommend this. It has sections and a timetable of lessons for every year group: www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/dailylessons - glittercandle would this help for your Year 7, too?

'Martha - independent, but I’m definitely not speaking on behalf of all schools in the sector. Friends I have working in state are providing similar content. Provision is differing wildly within and across sectors, so there’s a lot to compare.

Thanks Op, and I would agree

Our prep are sending work via teams but nothing interactive, no video's etc. Most teachers furloughed. I think the remaining teacher is great and certainly trying her best.

Our local village school offering much what you have stated which sounds as engaging as it can be.

Thanks Lemons we did have a look at the BBC bitesize last week. Will revisit on Monday. We have made sure we read every day and practising spellings.

Wow! Wish our teachers were doing that. Well done OP 👍👍👍