Parents refuse to allow learning robot in class

[Yabbers]

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Kier has an auto immune condition and can’t attend school when he is poorly which is half the time. A fantastic piece of kit, a learning robot, is used in 850 schools around the world, but 11 of 400 parents have refused to allow this into his school in Edinburgh. It is considered to be so secure it would take millions of years to break the encryption and there have been no incidents in all the years it has been used.

AIBU to assume these parents are Mumsnetters who bandy about “Data Protection” and “safeguarding” and because of this non existent risk have stopped this child being a part of his class.

As an educator I would be nervous about being filmed, but I would also welcome it as a way to shake up my practice and keep me right. It's easy for everyone to slip into bad habits and this could be a good thing in terms of upping a teachers practice.

I don't think that the fixed camera position is workable, BUT what if the teacher could wear a piece of technology that drew the camera to her/him. So that the focus was always on the teacher and she had more control of which children were in the periphery. This technology would also be able to mute the audio/video if an incident in class occurred as mentioned above - child having a melt down, or disclosing something suddenly that is sensitive information.

As for who is accessing it at the other end - this is more tricky. Perhaps the video link is both ways- a screen is installed in the classroom so that all the pupils and the teacher can see the remote pupil's face and some of the background so that id someone else enters the room the teacher can see who it is. Clearly parents can not be banned from their child's room (particularly one with health problems) but all adults living in the home should be vetted and asked to adhere to the school's privacy policy (that I'm sure they would have in place for parent helpers etc).

I think given the importance of including sick or disabled children in not just education but social interaction, we need to find solutions and not just problems.

Two way streams and the option to mute are actually really good suggestions.

I wonder if some of the complaints are from religious/ very conservative parents.

With the teacher being able to view the stream it would also pretty much remove the option for the robot to be fixed on something inappropriate (like a classmate's bum or something).

I wonder if they could also bring the robot to certain kids during lunch break or something just so they could chat, heck even Skype would be fine in my book.

My biggest issue with this personally is the one way spying. It's not a fair exchange. Like when one person has their face covered and the other doesn't.
Those in the classroom would not be able to zoom in and around and nosy around the child's room like he/she could possibly zoom in and out of their conversations and look at their books.
Being watched constantly is horrible enough without being able to watch back.

A fixed position/two positions to choose from would solve some issues: one view perhaps being the front of the class where the teacher will try to stand when addressing everyone and the other being that of a couple of children at a table, who are not subject to any safeguarding concerns and who would be encouraged to interact. A view of the sick child's exercise book should also be able to be shared with the children at the table, to assist group work. I'm thinking two screens and a couple of cameras. Scrap the robot completely!

I spoke to my eldest about this last night out of curiosity and they said while they would have full sympathy with the classmate they would hate it. They have found school a real struggle, had a history of selective mutism, have had panic attacks in class and really struggle academically too. The classroom is incredibly hard for them, putting their hand up to answer questions is relatively new and they often have to leave the classroom as they can't cope. There are frequent conversations to keep them in school and in the room and they are often in tears and full panic.
They said they would hate the idea that someone else's Mum, Dad, aunt, uncle or whatever would have access to view all that and even more so to potentially judge or tell others or the fact that they could be accessing it in a public place or that someone outside their trust circle would increase their anxiety massively.

Two screens where the child could see the teacher and the teacher could see the child would bother me less.

I haven’t read the full thread yet, but I’m confused as to what parents concerns actually are. I understand the (pretty rare) circumstances of a family hiding from an abusive ex partner, but your average kid doesn’t have these issues. Are people concerned that someone random looking at their kids will in some way harm them? Because even if some paedophile got access to the images there would be no harm to the child concerned (unless of course said paedophile then made a move to contact kids directly, but that’s a different issue)
Unless I’m missing something here I don’t see the harm to a child. Strangers see my child all the time at school, at the supermarket, wherever. I don’t feel concerned by this so what’s the difference with the robot?

"I haven’t read the full thread yet, but I’m confused as to what parents concerns actually are."

We haven't been told what the concerns of the Edinburgh parents were but if you read the thread you will see examples of the kinds of things that other parents and teachers are concerned about.

Maybe if you read the thread you'll find out?

www.noisolation.com/global/av1/

I suggest those against it or who want to see how it works in action go to the User Stories videos at the end of this page and meet kids in the UK who already have them, whose schools and peers have not vetoed it.

I used to teach secondary- as far as delivery goes and having to 'perform' more or be stressed out by constant observation, this is not that different from having a TA or 1-1 in the classroom, supporting SN. You might have that several lessons a week and you soon get used to it.
One could argue that a parent might be more 'judgy' than a TA, but by and large the kid at home is going to be the one watching while the parent/carer gets on with other things.

Primary it might be harder for streaming without respite but again, many have a TA and/or parent helpers in. The dynamic (differentiated tables etc) is different in any case.
There might be initial excitement/novelty but after a while, I could see the AV1 being a tool that could help: not only do the kids' friends get to interact but children could actually take turns to have the bot next to them - it might improve behaviour, empathy and relationships.
A class monitor might take the bot from assembly to class to canteen (the company have insurance) or the TA/teacher if pupils too young.

It's not a cheap solution if self-funding but I could see it working for home educators with children who cannot attend mainstream because of SN but who don't meet the criteria for special schools.
And it would be cheaper for LEAs than sending home tutors.

I did two days supply once in a hospital school and the expectations were low: I was told to ask each child if they had any school work I could help them with (they didn't, school hadn't provided them with any or they had not provided enough), no tech or books, most were used to saying no/too tired/ill (totally understandable but some were demotivated by system and bored with people like me coming in for a day, armed with word searches and little else because we had been told the people in charge had resources for each child - they didn't).
I ended up chatting/playing cards/taking in board games - socially it might have brought something but in terms of school continuity and enabling children to keep up with their peers - nope.

In short, OP...YANBU.

What happens when a kid in class damages/breaks the robot?

I would assume either it would be covered by some sort of insurance NotMySquirrel or otherwise you would have angry parents chasing other parents for thousands of pounds.

Who pays the excess? What if it gets damaged repeatedly and the insurers refuse ongoing cover? What if the insurer claims the teacher was negligent in supervising the kid who damaged the robot?

Allowing a very expensive piece of equipment into a class of young kids seems pretty fraught.