BBC being forced to remove BBC Daily Online Lessons on 27th July

[Worriedmum999]

I’ve just found out that the BBC are removing their Daily Online Lessons on 27th July. I am absolutely shocked. Apparently BESA who represents online providers have kicked up a fuss and threatened them with legal action. You would have thought that, in the middle of a pandemic, they could have let it go until at least September. Lots of children haven’t managed to access this during term time due to parents working all the hours god sends on the front line and were going to catch up over the summer but now what opportunity will be gone. Another way the children of keyworkers have had their education fucked over for 3 months. There is already an article about this online, saying who it will disproportionately affect the children from poorer families.

Not sure if the collective power of Mumsnet can do anything about this to keep the content available until September? The BBC have offered to put something there for the children to do over the summer but it will be shit compared to what is there now. Alternative is Oak Academy but I find the children struggle to get on with that themselves and I still haven’t worked out how to print off the linked resources!

I have tweeted by disgust to BESA. Not sure what else I can do

I’m not sure how to protest against this. I’ve tweeted BESA and the BBC to voice my disgust. Not sure what else to do.

I know it’s the summer holidays but a lot of people have had crap support from schools and have been working for the last 3 months with no time to homeschool. This hinders them being able to catch up over the summer.

This x 1000.

Excellent thread OP. It’s shocking that commercial competition seems to be trying to kill this off.

Of course we get it that the school summer holidays are about to start and the first wave and immediate response to coping with that has now abated somewhat.

But planning for the next one goes on and many businesses have been damaged severely by it and are still working flat out on restart, economic survival and recovery.

That means that many many parents of kids who have been working throughout this crisis (including key worker parents of kids in school, because schools did not teach them normal lessons) will have to find some way of trying to catch their kids up on learning over the school summer holidays.

Any free-to-access high quality resources that would make this easier should be continued until schools go back full time. Whether that’s September this year or later if we get a second peak.

YANBU at all OP.
Fine not to add new material, but removing existing one is a shame.

Not all key workers were accepted at school for a start, some didn't open, some did not have space.
Children of full time workers, maybe not "key workers" but workers nevertheless exist too btw! Many parents have been working FT!

Yes, it's the summer holiday, but not everybody is renting a villa on the beach for 2 months, or having meaningful and rich "family days" - people still WORK and have no childcare.

Doing a bit of holiday homework 1 hour a day instead of doing nothing for 2 months at home is not a bad thing for anyone. Some kids in England are not back at school until early to mid September, some schools are staggering the reopenings.

It's not a HUGE deal but it's a ridiculous move.

I do think one of the greatest failures of this debacle was the decision not to educate children of key workers while they were in school.

depends on the schools. Some schools have been manned by teachers who have been doing full teaching and the children have studied loads and kept with the curriculum that was planned in the first place. Having smaller groups meant they ended up working better than in a full class of 30.

It's actually shocking to see the inconsistency across state school in this country!

I do agree that it's a waste to get rid of a valuable resource that has had a lot of thought put into it. If it remained I can see both teachers and parents making use of it. However I don't realistically think it's going to make an enormous difference to children's learning either way.

The Bitesize lessons are only links to other resources. They aren't lessons as such. Oak Academy is content created by Oak Academy and so more structured.

They are not taking them offline to update them. Why would they do that? BESA is threatening them with legal action (as they have done before). There are articles online available about this.

The article also says they are looking at provision into the autumn, so their statement about updating the lessons is not necessarily rubbish - although it will be linked to BESA.

In principle I’m all for state-funded BBC education for all, available as enrichment material to schools. But you have to recognise that this does impact on other educational providers trying to stop their businesses imploding. If high quality ‘BBC brand’ educational content is available permanently for free those businesses are screwed.

It’s like all the authors and celebs reading books aloud on video during this pandemic. Those licenses were granted temporarily- the videos will disappear by September. No one will pay for something they can get for free, and that has a knock-on effect on the economy.

Politically I’m all for more state-funded stuff and higher taxes to pay for it, but most of the country definitely prefers the free market and lower taxes, and this is the consequence.

I'm a teacher and have dipped into Bitesize for one or two of the Home Learning tasks I've set (in Literacy). I would like to be able to continue to do so next year, as there's some nice stuff on there.
Is there any way of bookmarking any of it?

I have loved BBC bitesize. What a shame to take it down 😔

They should leave the exisiting stuff up at least.

There isn't a summer holiday this year for most people. We have no where to go and nothing to do. And I'm working. My kids would give their right arm to be in school. I can't stand this "but it's the summer holidays anyway" attitude. Rant over.

IME key worker children in schools got on with whatever home learning had been set by their teacher but with an adult to facilitate e.g. giving encouragement, explaining if they were stuck, printing things out etc. With the addition of arts and crafts/playing outside/the occasional film in the afternoons.

If it is BESA ,why aren't they also going after Oak? Friends in high places?

Tbh the use of expensive, overrated paid for educational resources is minimal (at secondary level) as there is so much free content on YouTube, Bitesize etc. It looks like some educational suppliers are rather cynically suing the pandemic as a cover to promote up the aganda a longrunning sulk.

If online providers feel threaten, they should work on the material they offer instead of trying to get rid of the BBC lessons.

The fact is many parents feel great pressure to help their kids catch up as best they can in the annual leave that parents can take during the school summer holidays.

Even if affordable summer holiday childcare is available, which isn’t the case everywhere because of provider closure and limited places available because of social distancing, holiday child care will not be teaching kids or catching them up with school work. Obviously.

It is down to parents to deal with in their annual leave. Who aren’t teachers, so anything to make learning a bit easier should be left up freely available until schools go back.

I understand that online providers are trying to look after their businesses just like everyone else. They lose my sympathy by not waiting until September when children can go back to school.

How do we get MN HQ to consider a campaign? They’re about ‘making parents lives easier’, isnt righting this an example of that?

The competition and markets authority are the regulator and could look into this. Suggest the BBC refers it to them (or parents ask them to take a look) and the resources are left up until they decide.

But ultimately, deciding if this school summer holidays is an exceptional situation and if working parents should get better support is political. I will write to our local MP. I feel like the kids of working parents and poor parents (and of parents who are both) have been totally left behind educationally in this lockdown situation. This is just another example. Commercial competition should not be cited as a reason for taking down this content. This is not a normal summer holidays.

I agree OP, it would have been hugely helpful to have that to touch on over the summer. I was using the phonics lessons over lockdown to help my Reception age child. Having the option to continue when you can would've helped hugely to catch up a bit. Dc enjoyed them but with another younger dc we didn't get enough time to do as many as he would've liked. Luckily he's not struggling but if he was he would have been able to carry on with the momentum of the online lessons.

Is Oak Academy still available? I found that better.

Yes OP! How do you print out the Oak Academy resources? I just can't figure it out! I can't even find them.

We mostly used BBC Bitesize as my son could access them himself while I was working f/t.

Can anyone provide a guide to finding and printing the Oak Academy resources in case we have to swap to that one please? It seems a few of us are struggling with it

My children haven't liked oak academy or BBC iplayer lessons but have been doing the daily BBC on-line lessons.

They don't take long but it was that bit extra.

I wasn't expecting more lessons over the summer - but had hoped eldest Y10 who hasn't been as consistent as younger children at doing them might go through the English ones.

They've also been doing paid and currently free apps and lesson type on-line programs so not sure the BBC stuff was any real competition.

That you for making me aware.

I'll try and get eldest to do relevant english one before the end of the month and maybe see if other bitesized resource are still avaliable over summer.

I much preferred bite size to oak academy which was full of errors and the geography was dubious in terms of stereotyping. It’s fine that they don’t do anymore but I do think they should leave what has been done. I have serious concerns about oak academy. It’s led by multi academy trusts (which are morally corrupt) and i am concerned we’ll all have to deliver this tripe.

With younger children, BBC is so much better than oak academy. You watch a short fun explanation, and they get the concept in a minute. It makes the oak academy boring video a lot more bearable, if you bother with them at all that is.

Glad it isn’t just me who can’t print off oak academy - I tweeted and email and no bloody response.

YADNBU op - ridiculous to waste this resource. Just leave it up till Sept!