Being marked absent if not on zoom.

[Whattheactual20201]

I am for school closures and we are in London so school is closed we just got an email to say DC2 school are having a zoom registration every morning at 10 am where all children must attend for a morning debris tray in and half an hour lesson dressed etc.
Rules are
Quiet room, adult present, but no one else.
You must make sure your child is attendance otherwise they will be marked as absent.
Would be impossible for us to do
So will have to accept her being marked as absent on the days we can’t do it. Can this go down as official absence like a usual one would ?

If we have to have an adult present they will be disappointed because there won't be an adult in the house and I expect DS will be in his bedroom as he's more comfortable there.

@Facelikearustytractor

I would be as disruptive as possible. Let the younger kids run riot, the dog bark and they might realise how silly it is when they can't do their lessons.

You could also say you need to be in the same room to supervise your child while on work calls and they may hear confidential information if the mic is on and they are expected to participate.

What a pathetic example to set to children

Personally I think it's good your DCs school is making an effort to ensure they see all children every day and make sure they're engaged and know what they are supposed to be doing that day. That's a huge improvement on last lockdown on what many schools were able to do. I'm sure they will make suitable adjustments for your DCs additional needs but this has all been sprung on teachers at the last minute so of course there are blanket policies at the moment.

My DC (then y3 and y6) had online lessons from 8.30am-3.30pm throughout last lockdown, they had to be on their registration zooms by 8.30 fully dressed and ready for school, it was a good routine for them and they organised themselves to do so as I was (and still am) WFH in a stressful and difficult job and as a single parent need them to manage themselves. I could hear them in the other room if they needed anything. It worked fine and meant they were on live lessons with their various teachers throughout the day.

DC1 is now at secondary school, the info we've had from the school sounds like it will be similar.

Both DC are far more capable on zoom than I am, and younger DC quickly got the hang of it and was telling all his classmates how to use it.

It's good for them to have live lessons so they can interact with their teachers and with their classmates, of course it's no substitute for in person teaching but it's something and makes it easier for parents WFH too as they're occupied and engaged so I'm not sure why there seems to be so much criticism of schools for doing this.

If kids have no SEN and are in years 2 upwards, I don't see why they can't be left alone doing online learning. My daughter is in primary (albeit year 6) and her school doesn't ask for any adult to be present and I just leave her to get on with it.

Skimming over the generalisation that all dc are able to do this from age 6, surely you realise that there will be an issue with having the physical space for each dc to have a room to work in solo in many families? We are in a house and have two dc and could only just manage that alongside both parents working online with calls (2 bedrooms, living room and dining room). I imagine for people in flats or with more dc it isn't feasible.

@Facelikearustytractor

I would be as disruptive as possible. Let the younger kids run riot, the dog bark and they might realise how silly it is when they can't do their lessons.

You could also say you need to be in the same room to supervise your child while on work calls and they may hear confidential information if the mic is on and they are expected to participate.

Why? Seriously, why make an arse of yourself, disrupt other kids' zoom, & make someone else's job harder when you could just...send an email explaining that you can't participate because .

I don't know who you think you'd actually be sticking it to, but more to the point I can't see how you'd be better off on a personal level, tbh.

Just do your best and speak to school. They can arrange something else.
Online has no effect on attendance not does Covid absence or isolation.
It will be a safeguarding check to touch down with the child.
Child X not seen for 2 days and no contact with parents would likely be a reason for a home visit.

I would be as disruptive as possible. Let the younger kids run riot, the dog bark and they might realise how silly it is when they can't do their lessons.

There are mute buttons on zoom to deal with these distractions that teachers will be able to access, thankfully most dc have more maturity than this.

"Be disruptive"
What sort of damaging message is this?

The child get no education possibly until Easter and knows their parents encourage poor behaviour?

I am a school attendance manager.
As it stands
Children get a X mark if not physically in school. Any online registers are not official and are for school records.

Would be impossible for us, have one device for work and even if I took the time off for a registration everyday I have 2 kids in different classes so there would always be one absent. If they want to do zoom for long periods would seriously effect work and finances. Plus my youngest I could leave on his own for long because of SEN so he'd have to be there. Have messaged school already to say only have one device which I use for work for paper copies so hoping they take that into account if they decide to go ahead with zoom.

Would it really matter? Why get hung up on your child's attendance... Doesn't make any difference whatsoever once they've left school. My attendance record was far from perfect... But I still went to university and got a great job from it. Its all for ofstead.

@Lucyk1 I think people are more concerned about fines and if they'd come into this situation which would be what would worry me, have been threatened before with them and had meetings with attendance officers because of poor attendance due to a year of repeated tonsillitis and hogh fevers and then a year of ear infections and high fevers. Didn't go any further though because I had all the evidence.

I don't think it is legal to work from home while looking after young children. It's a safeguarding issue.

@Lovetoplan it is legal to work from home whilst looking after young children, it is not a safeguarding issue but is very difficult to manage, Have been doing it a few years now ;)

@lovetoplan even if ot was illegal how the hell would it be enforced? Or do you mean it should be illegal?

People seem to think it's schools being unrealistic and out of touch...it's really not. The DfE has insisted that remote learning is a minimum of 3 hours a day along with heaps of other requirements...video is best, live sessions are encouraged, schools must safeguard pupils, schools must ensure children take part, schools must ensure children have a device, schools must blah blah blah...
Ofsted are visiting schools in a fucking pandemic to inspect the quality of their remote learning and how well children are engaging.
Blame the government, not schools who've had a few days or less than 24 hours to 'switch' to remote learning...

@Lovetoplan

I don't think it is legal to work from home while looking after young children. It's a safeguarding issue.

Where did you get that from? Loads of people work from home with kids!

We had to fight to get my daughter into school, with me being a keyworker. But recieved a similar message, expecting us to homeschool, be on uniform and to be there for morning and afternoon registration. With both myself and husband working, it was impossible. We were told if we missed registration, we would be contacted by my dd5 teacher to find out why we were not following home schooling and live lessons. I work in a care home and husband is an insurance broker dealing with clients paying upwards if £500,000 a year. He can't just drop his clients or work, to homeschool, but neither of us can be furloughed. Luckly we got a place at school for her, but a feel for the parents who haven't and are under such pressure from school and work.

We have the registration meeting on teams and another one at the end of the school day.

NO requirement for parents to be present. That's just ridiculous.

They will be marked as absent if they miss the registration meeting though

Goodness knows whether Dc has registration or not. I am too busy taking the other one to school.

My ds teacher is lovely, even been around every house today to drop off books. I appreciate the effort he is making, so want to do what we can to ensure his efforts arent for nothing and of course so ds doesn’t fall behind.
We are expecting some online work but won’t be taking part. It’s our home not a school, they cannot enforce anything.
I have way too many other responsibilities and ds has additional needs and doesn’t want to be on a camera.
Just don’t do it. You won’t be fined.

This would be impossible for me too. We live in a flat so unless I should lock everyone else in a bedroom while this is done it wouldn’t be possible.

Also we have one device for 3 people, which is already enough of an issue since for our schools they are using MS teams to deliver live lessons and children are expected to attend to their regular timetable.

@PlanDeRaccordement

Why is it impossible? I’d set the child up and then pop in now and then or tell child to shout for me or DH if the teacher HAS to spot an adult at one point. I certainly would not be sitting by my child for a full half hour twiddling my thumbs when I should be working.

During the summer I had foster brothers, one who attends special needs school. I had to sit on average from five to six plus hours with them, as otherwise they didn't do their work or pretended to. Also with my nanny charge his mum was so stressed as he just wouldn't do his schoolwork (he was young) I managed for a while to get him to do for a while, before I said no more because he got so upset. I feel for parents especially those who have to work, have multiple kids and those that are special needs, as it's pure hell for many.

Think it's brilliant idea lol

Registration for my child during lockdown 1 was to say hello to teacher on a teams registration post at some point throughout the day. Work was issued daily on teams to be handed in by start of following week and there was usually a teams call on a friday afternoon for a class catch-up - though school has a policy of no cameras on for pupils which I do agree with.
Some days a 9am (or 10am) registration would simply not have been possible if I was on a work call.
Do what you can and i personally wouldn't worry a jot about attendance records - with what you've explained so far about your situation etc, in the incredibly unlikely (damn near impossible) event of you being fined, let it be decided in court because someone is going to have to seriously embarrass themselves in trying to present their case against you.