To wonder why teachers are not teaching my child?

[Nickynackienoo]

I am a nurse redeployed to itu. Doing 13 hour days and stressed up to the eyeballs at the moment. My children (12 and 8) go to school on my work days and on my days off i keep them at home with me according to the government guidance. As far as I can tell, the teachers at school are just childminding and not teaching anything. How is it that they can have just 4 kids in the school and not manage to get them to do at least some work? How can I possibly do the job of a teacher on my days off? They have send so many links via email that I can’t make sense of, it’s so overly complicated. Surely as key workers they should be doing the job they are being paid to do? I must be missing something, can someone fill me in?

PrivateD00r
I don't think they are missing the point.

The OP could have said:
My child is in school because I'm a key workers and school are setting remote learning. I thought that they'd be working through the same work in school but when they're in school they're not doing it and I'm finding it really difficult to keep on top of everything at home. Would it be unreasonable to ask school if they can get on with some of the work that's set? I'm not asking for additional teaching, just that they have some time on the remote learning work.

That would have got a very different response.

Instead we got why am I doing their jobs? They only have 4 children in. How about teachers actually teach. And they email instructions for work in a way I don't like, and the work is confusing. And I'm not teacher bashing but how hard is it for them to do their job?

He he he. This hysteria is ridiculous😂

Just looked at news this am. Read something about situation not changing next week, not 100%sure
I’m a teacher, I’ve decided that from now on I’m going to wind up all the nasty posters on these threads. Hysteria🤣

Well I’m sorry but if the teachers are not actually ensuring that the children present are doing their homework, then yes Imo they are not doing their job.
They are teachers. The same ones who, apparently, are ok to teach any subject because they are trained in teaching (many threads in here saying it’s ok for a history teacher to be called to teach French or science for example. All of which my own dcs have had at their secondary). So why is it suddenly an issue for them to tell those dcs to get on with their homework and to support them if need be?
Same with primary school. They aren’t asked to teach. They are asked to ensure the dcs sit down to do some work at some point. And to help them if need be. Surely that should feasible if parents, who can’t be assumed to know to teach or the subjects taught, are supposed to do it??

Thank you for your well considered judgement on us not doing our own jobs👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼😂😂😂😂😂😂

@QuestionMarkNow

If you like it or not, the job has been stated by government as ‘childcare’ so if they are providing this, they are doing their job. My school is providing the academic work set by class teachers too, but, notably;

1. We know the kids
2. We’re not (yet) a hub
3. We have manageable class numbers
4. We’re all primary trained (we’re not 6th form sociology caring for 3 year olds)
5. We know the building
6. We have adequate access to technology
7. We know all the teachers who are setting the work - so it’s far easier to manage

@QuestionMarkNow
How can teachers ensure that children are being homeschooled?

Or have I misread?
Are you asking about children at school? They are there so their parents can go to work, that’s pretty much it.

Ours have been asked to email in any work they would like us to look at.
I've received replies from precisely 4 children.

If you like it or not, the job has been stated by government as ‘childcare’ so if they are providing this, they are doing their job.

I think this is at the heart of the 'patchiness' of provision.

Emergency childcare in school was a really early announcement, as soon as the schools were told to close.

Since then, provision of home learning has developed, both nationally (BBC Bitesize, Oak Academy) and within every single school.

However, the original announcement on school-based childcare provision HASN'T changed or developed to keep in line with this. Where the childcare is based in a single school, for that school's children and supervised by that school's staff, provision for the home learning may well have developed along the same lines as the home learning for other pupils. Where there is a hub, or where some primary schools have stuck very closely to the original line of 'in school childcare is just childcare', or even where different children are attending every day so spending a minority of their week in school, there may well have been less of a change.

So in fact, schools where the 'daily childcare' includes daily completion of home learning tasks are doing 'more than their job', rather than schools doing pure childcare doing 'less than their job', if that makes sense?

I do also think there is HUGE variation in home learning provision, as there is so little guidance nationally about what that 'should' look like, and schools are making their own decisions based on their interpretation of guidance and knowledge of their local community.

Yes, this is a failure of national strategy from the government down. There is no good reason that schools shouldn’t be providing each individual child with specific work on a daily basis. Of course the same standard as offered by a typical school day is not possible.
Even if there was a national strategy implemented and a website where the worksheets are available across the curriculum at various levels for each year group and then teachers/pupils/parents/carers could access a basic level of information more easily.

What’s offered now is inconsistent and inadequate. Leaders in education are in the media stating how a long term impact this break in education will have. But it doesn’t need to be as dire and unreliable as it currently is.
Of course the bigger picture is a failure in national leadership on this matter and teachers are just following their leaders so to speak. Yet some individual teachers and schools are doing better jobs and this is unfair and will lead to further inequalities and gaps in education on a national level.

Unchartedsea

There is no good reason that schools shouldn’t be providing each individual child with specific work on a daily basis.

You want schools (actually teachers) to provide specific individual work daily to (at secondary) approximately 120 to 150 pupils per day?

Or do you mean that all children from every school shoul dbe supplied with work?

Because there is a huge difference and only one is possible.

@Unchartedsea

I’ll just leave this here for you

www.thenational.academy/

I think this is a reasonable question op. It's not teacher bashing ffs.

I think this is a reasonable question op. It's not teacher bashing ffs
Reasonable question: I'm a key worker and finding it hard to keep on top of remote learning. I've realised my children aren't doing any of the remote learning tasks in school. Would it be reasonable to speak to school to have them complete some of the work in school?

Unreasonable: Why am I basically doing teachers' jobs? They only have 4 students so it's not too much to expect they actually teach. And I dislike how many emails I have, and I think the work and instructions are confusing. I'm not teacher bashing but why aren't they doing their jobs?

Even if there was a national strategy implemented and a website where the worksheets are available across the curriculum at various levels for each year group and then teachers/pupils/parents/carers could access a basic level of information more easily.

Oak National Academy
BBC Bitesize daily lessons.

Both set up at great cost by the government for exactly the reason you suggest.

@Howaboutanewname

Thank-you! I’ll have a look. My school hasn’t told us about this.

@DippyAvocado

Thank you.

I hadn’t heard about the oak academy - so I look forward to having a look. Perhaps it has everything provided in an accessible way which would be amazing. 🤞🏻
It’s a shame that our school hasn’t pointed us in this direction.

@FrippEnos

Hi. Well my kids are in primary school so my thoughts are with that mainly. So usually when a child is in school the teachers will have a lesson planned and work for the pupils everyday.
Why doesn’t each teacher retain that obligation (they can rotate amongst themselves or share work too) and provide work loosely based on the typical weekly lessons? At least in primary they could simply focus on supplying good maths and literacy guidance? It’s easier to freestyle the rest with normal play at home.

I am not teacher bashing. I simply don’t understand.

Teachers have been instructed not to teach in school. We are there to look after children only.

Why is that so difficult to understand for some people?

@Pinkflipflop85

But what about those teachers who aren’t childminding? Our school has a handful of kids and the teachers rotate.

@Pinkflipflop85

Have some teachers actually been told they should NOT use their time to provide work for their usual class?

If we are not in school on rota, we are working from home, doing a gazillion unseen tasks, not least of which is setting accessible, meaningful and manageable Home Learning tasks.

Have some teachers actually been told they should NOT use their time to provide work for their usual class?

I highly doubt it. Where did you get that idea from?

Why doesn’t each teacher retain that obligation (they can rotate amongst themselves or share work too) and provide work loosely based on the typical weekly lessons?

That is exactly what, in my own school, we are doing.

Activities are set and communicated via a weekly document on school website, organised by subject. All are available at any time, because we have circumstances where e.g. several children are sharing a tablet and work in shifts. Some activities are online, others are offline. Some are printable or 'write on paper after reading on screen' worksheets.

Online tasks to be submitted via a couple of platforms (essentially 1 for Maths, 1 for everything else), then there is a mix of self-marking, automatic online marking and teacher comments on submitted work. Not every piece of work is marked - but that's the same as in school, where for example i wouldn't mark artwork or a plan for a story.

Children encouraged to do some work in the key subjects every day, and other activities as they wish. I am available via e-mail from parents, via the platforms on which they submit work, and by a safe child-accessible forum too.