School not teaching key worker children

[Frenchcroissant]

Hi all, my two dd are going to school everyday as both me and my partner are key workers. One is in reception and not bothered about her, but older is in year 5 and she's told me that they don't do any learning at all. I told her she can do the same work as home children but at school, but apparently that's not allowed, teacher said she's got to do all learning at home, she's just playing, colouring and watching Disney movies. That's not right, is it? Why is she not doing same as the children at home?

My sons school is doing he work with them that they have set the children at home.

@Beautiful3

Schools are only open for child care. Many classes are mixed age groups and staffed by TAs. The TAs cannot teach.

This!!

The kids in the background in the school classroom when my children's teachers are just sitting and colouring, because the teaching has 20 kids on zoom to teach.

Mine sit at a computer in the morning and do the same work as those at home, supervised by TAs while the teachers do the live lessons.

In the afternoon they are either with teachers or TAs (seems to be a rota), reading, playing outside or drawing.

So no ‘benefit’ to being in school in that they’re not being better taught, but no disadvantage either.

I’m so appreciative of it!

My DC school has published a home learning offer schedule and the DC in school follow the same schedule as those at home.

We teach from the classroom, directly to those in school and via zoom to those at home. All these get the same, just either directly or remotely. The ones that don't have remote access are provided with printed out copies of the work which isn't ideal but the best we can do.

It has been made aware to our parents regularly in our newsletters that we are only providing the same learning experiences to those in school as those at home. It would be massively unfair to provide key worker parents not only with childcare that others who still also work can't receive but then give their children an advantage too.

We have teachers in the room with the children and a ta. And they complete the same Google classroom tasks. They can just ask me for help personally rather than via email.
The biggest advantage the in schoolchildren get is social. They still get to see and play with their peers and have a routine.

At our school the kids in school are sat on computers logged onto the same teams as the kids at home and there is a TA in the room just to make sure they're not causing mayhem. This was made clear in the letter inviting applications for key worker places - that there would be no live teaching in school and the provision would be identical for kids at home or in school with the exception that school babysits them and serves lunch! I believe you have to send a device in with them with headphones as well.

Thanks everyone for the replies, my dd is 10 so I do believe what she tells me, she likes learning and it's bored at school. There's only 2 other boys with her, so no friends either. I just thought she'd have access to the same work as the children at home, her teacher as sent me everything via email to do, but how!?? I can't do 5 days worth of lessons at the weekend, plus she's going to miss zooms with her class, etc...

I haven't spoken to the school about it, don't know what to say, really!! They know I'm at work as I work at the preschool attached to them, we are open as normal.

@FraggleShingleBellRock

I thought it was common knowledge that schools are opening simply to provide child care. In my daughters senior school the teachers are ash at home and it's just TAs in school.

I don’t think this is the case this tone around.

My daughters (primary) school wrote & said although it was childcare last time, this tine it’s the full curriculum.

My daughter (year 6), logs into teams lessons each morning so the school kids are doing the same as home kids. Home kids are set work fir the afternoon. Can’t comment in what the school kids do in an afternoon as my daughter is at home.

Kids in school are absolutely meant to be accessing education this time around. That’s why the expanded the definition of vulnerable to include those who are unable to learn at home (no device, nowhere to study etc). They shouldn’t be getting more education than those at home, but they should be able to access the same, and be supported in doing so.

DS is younger so at nursery, but lots of my colleagues (frontline keyworkers) are reporting the same, it was the same last year too, so not only are they rushing their safety daily, and putting their children in school when they might well prefer not to (we cannot be furloughed in our roles), their children are not even getting access to the same learning as the children at home, some of whom also have furnished or SAHP to support their studies.
It's disgusting and it's things like this that make clapping on doorsteps an insult.

I think we’ve established on the copious threads covering this, that each school is doing something different. I wonder if you could approach the school and ask what is happened and their expectations in regard to whether they’re expecting you to home school in your free time?

*furloughed

No, schools are NOT just "open for childcare."

The curriculum is not suspended this time. Government instructions are very clear. Normal teaching is not to be expected, but the kids should at least have structured hours for sitting and working through the same packs of work as the kids who are at home, and teachers should be supervising and circulating while this is going on.

It is NOT appropriate to expect kids to be spending their evenings and weekends catching up on schoolwork.

OP, can you talk to other parents and to the school and verify what is going on? If the kids really are just getting Disney videos and coloring etc. this is not appropriate. If that is the case, you need to complain to the school and demand that they create work packs. If they don't do this, escalate to OFSTED.

Schools have had very little notice about all this and I think it's completely understandable if the work packs are not brilliant to start with. But I'd expect the schools to be at least trying. Even if they have not had time to create proper work packs, they could at least sit Y5 kids down to spend some time on silent reading, on worksheets of some kind, or even just sitting them down with their notebooks and instructions to write an essay or story.

I had zero homeschooling instruction for the first few weeks back in the spring and I still found some schoolwork around the house for my child to do, and I am not even a trained teacher.

And "there are mixed ages of kids together in the same room" is not an excuse to fail to set schoolwork. I've been in parts of the world where a single teacher has to handle kids of all ages in a one-room schoolhouse set-up. The teacher puts kids in groups, sets different work and goes around the room helping out kids in term. It's not ideal but it's not an excuse for having kids watching Finding Nemo all day instead of school work.

It’s not wrong. If they teach key worker children then suddenly it’s an ‘advantage’ to be a key worker child and in school. They can’t actively disadvantage all the other non attendees like that.

They should be allowed the same work sheets etc as home school kids but I don’t think it’s fair they have a teacher helping them on tap. You think a teacher should be teaching/helping/focusing on your child all day because you’re ‘key workers’ but at the same time half the county are also having to work all day but in non ‘key worker’ roles and no one is teaching/helping/focusing on their kids.

Your key worker status entitles your kids to a baby sitter not an education!

They should be allowed the same work sheets etc as home school kids but I don’t think it’s fair they have a teacher helping them on tap.

The OP said in her first post that her child has been told that they are actually not allowed to do any schoolwork during the hours at school. The OP Is not demanding regular classroom teaching, she is saying that her child should at least have hours for sitting down and doing schoolwork packs during the daytime, like the kids at home.

The thing is, if you asked the children I’ve had in school they might say something similar.

Watched Netflix (true, at lunchtime when it was fleeting outside), played with Lego (also true, during a bitterly cold playtime as they were shivering outside after 5 minutes), watched YouTube (30 minutes a day for exercise routines) and played on iPads (used to access the school learning platform, includes teacher-set maths, grammar and spelling games).

They might forget to mention the hour spent on long division, similar on reading comprehension and grammar and the afternoon of science and a class reader.

The expectation is 3 hours online teaching for KS2 and 4 for KS2.
But if you haven't got the staff you will struggle with this.
Equally some schools took longer to get organised the first week So I would not judge them too quickly.
The expectation is to provide an education, not child care.

My dd said they've got a big monitor with Disney movies on all day in a class, children can choose to be there or in another class where there is colouring or reading. As I said no work, the online learning was all sent on Thursday, so she asked to do it at school on Friday, teacher said not allowed and to do it at the weekend.

Deputy head at a primary school here. That is totally not on, she should certainly be doing the home learning as the others are doing whilst at school and given the resources so she can.

Agreed with the PP that schools absolutely are not just providing childcare this time. They need to be enabling the same provision educationally in school as those out and any school refusing really should be reported to ofsted. Its not fair on the kids in.

And kids at home have teachers available too. Its not fair for the kids in school to have no teacher support.