To ask what happens if you don't home school?

[Chalkcheese]

What does happen if you don't homeschool during lockdown? Is it mandatory? Is it enforceable? Could someone be reported to education welfare or social services? Or is it voluntary?

My child is in year 1 - a register is taken for every online class and parents called if the children do not attend. They’re expected to wear uniform for each session. Twice a week my child has 3 separate online sessions, the other 3 days it’s 2. They send out about 14 pieces of offline work a week, for which completion is also monitored. This is a state school.

They have also gone against Govn guidelines and will only accept children for in school teaching who have two, rather than one, critical worker parent. So whilst her father is a critical worker, myself and my partner are mere key workers who are not deemed worthy.

I’m at my wits end between trying to home school and work 50 hours a week outside the home.

The parents working from home have to concentrate totally on their job so the home schooling often has to take a back burner or be muddled through at various times through out the day evenings and weekends. They are still getting something of an education so I don’t think the authority could do much.

The tech surveys also didn’t make it clear that kids would be expected to be using them 9-3. That’s why a lot of parents suddenly find all their DS need to have the devices at the same time and it’s causing problems. Whereas before they would’ve taken in turns.

I normally let Dd use iPad as she’s secondary school and just let Ds do his online tasks in evening after I’m finished work using my work laptop. During the day he does hand written worksheets at a time convenient to us ( usually my lunch break) and we send photos to teacher.

@Chalkcheese

What does happen if you don't homeschool during lockdown? Is it mandatory? Is it enforceable? Could someone be reported to education welfare or social services? Or is it voluntary?

Your kids pick you a shitty retirement home?

I think there needs to be massive investment in education when they return. This current situation is exacerbating existing inequalities and putting enormous pressure on families which is unsustainable.

@caringcarer

I'd be saying if you don't do your school work no devise for games/sweets/TV whatever they like the most until they complied.

Some children are easier to bribe than others. Mine are very internally motivated, which is great when they are engaged, interested, have clear goals in mind. They will plug away at something for hours just because they find it fun. It is also great in the teenage years in terms of not giving in to peer pressure. Their Christmas lists are tiny because they don't really want or need much. I was similar and yes it made me a bit geeky, but in my current job it is great as I set my own deadlines, the work is challenging and I find it internally rewarding, but other people might not. I don't feel the need for much in the way of material stuff.

On the other hand they are much harder to bribe than some of their friends. They would just sit for hours doing absolutely nothing in a battle of wills than do something they hate or see as pointless. They just escape into their own little thought processes, but that isn't actually helpful to sit for hours on end doing nothing. I doubt they actually do nothing, they just think, plot, plan, daydream but I can't stop them doing that. For one of them the work is pointless, work that they could do easily two or three years ago, the others are engaged, challenged and happily learning. If we made them do all the schoolwork against their will they would just sit for hours doing nothing, we tried that in the first lockdown. Instead they are fully engaged in educational pursuits all day long, just not school work. Tell them that electronic devices are banned (and we do depending on the 'crime') then they will just say ok and skip away, or stand and argue their point (because they feel that they were right) and then skip away. They have fairly strong moral codes but again it is internalised, they don't say something unpleasant because they don't want to upset the person rather than because they want to avoid punishment. They are not disruptive children in class, they are motivated by teacher praise but that is not as effective when they are not in class. Positive praise works to an extent and we do use that but generally they are just hard to bribe.

I think both extremes of this trait have their benefits and disadvantages. I imagine my children are not unique.

As a teacher the biggest regression we saw was in Maths. Forgetting stuff they knew well before lockdown as well as not picking up new stuff. So if you have time to only do one thing do Maths and constantly revise stuff they already know well to keep it in their heads. A lot of this can be done orally in bite size bits throughout the day. I'm talking Primary here.
Reading any book is helpful too. Outside of that if its causing family chaos l wouldn't stage a war every day.

This just illustrates why schools need to be open ASAP. Children’s education is being seriously damaged by this. Online learning/home-schooling is not good enough for the majority of children. This will be impacting this generation of children for years to come, the longer it goes on the worse it is. It’s a tragedy.

The thing that really angered me about schools after the return last time was the way those children who had knuckled down and worked hard were then essentially told it was pointless as they would just have to do it again/mark time so that those who had not/could not do the work could catch up. I heard that from several different people with children at different schools, so not just one isolated incident. And both primary and secondary. I know several parents contacted the school but were told they needed to focus on catching up, so that was it. For most of those children it has now put them off doing more than the minimum, as they think it’s pointless. I am astounded schools and teachers allowed that to happen. There must be better plans in place to cater for all children when they get back to school this time.

Simply cutting down the curriculum or making exams easier in the future is not a solution, in my view- it is an easy option and I understand the attractiveness of it. But it will just lead to less well educated children. This will be a monumental task to overcome. Hope we have the leadership, both political and educational, to do it. I have my doubts, TBH.

My eldest is participating and getting a full day of education each day which is brilliant but my reception child just doesn’t like the online lessons etc and although I’m trying hard to do the work with her I’ve also got a job which normally takes about 9 hours a day to do!

I’m failing at both and I feel so terribly guilty when I see the difference between her work and that of her peers with sahms. It doesn’t help that school do award assemblies showing off the great stuff or commending children when realistically for a 4 year old it depends how much work I put into it and it makes her feel worse when she’s not recognised.

I just don’t have a solution - even if I quit my job my notice period means it would be weeks / months before I could give her my all. It’s a terrible situation for working parents who can’t be furloughed or have time off

@2pinkginsplease

I think parents at least have a duty of care to engage with the school and do some school work or their child will fall further behind with their education.

I wouldn't expect a child to be doing on line learning from 9-3 as being behind a screen for that length of time is wrong but some engagement each day should be happening .

Exactly, some of these comments are awful. The attitude seems to be they’re doing the school a favour by having their children complete the work.

My six year old refuses to sit in front of a device for the google classroom meets and so this time his teacher/ta has not seen him. We have submitted no work and all I had was an email asking if we were having trouble accessing the online classroom, I responded but so far have heard nothing. The kids attending school are being taught the full curriculum by their teacher and I get the feeling that is their focus.

We are struggling here, my year 6 just gets on with it independently but my year 5 needs constant supervision and there’s normally at least one meltdown. Yesterday I gave him the afternoon off because I simply couldn’t cope with the meltdowns anymore and got a shitty note from the teacher asking where he’d been and asking that he not miss anymore lessons.

@landofgiants

I think schools differ a lot in who they consider vulnerable. That's the problem with schools being shut though - some kids are missing out big time for a variety of reasons - whilst others are getting along fine.

I agree. Ds2 who is yr 2. He’s 6, youngest in the year, has adhd and dyslexia, he cannot do any of the work they set independently and only about 2 things they set with my 1-1 support. He has the learning level of a reception child. I try my hardest every day. I speak to the school regularly. They understand he can’t do it but won’t give any different work as they are worried he will be behind when he goes back. But if he’s not doing any of the work surely he’ll be even more behind? I have started doing what I can with him from the set learning and then, do things I think are more beneficial.

I also have ds1 in yr3 who has asd and dyslexia who refuses to do work because home is not school and I’m not a teacher. I get literacy and numeracy done but it takes the whole day with a series of meltdowns.

Add my 4 year old who has her own issues and a few hours of work a day and it’s so hard. I try every day and every day I end up in tears. I lay awake at night thinking up new and creative ways I can get them to learn.

I certainly don’t think I’m doing the school a favour. The school are already under strain with all the key worker children (lots who are much more able to learn independently and have parents working at home but the rules are what they, are which I understand because you have to draw a line and it would be impossible to assess each on need). It means my already disadvantaged children will go back to school even more behind than they were previously.

@MrsKoala don’t your children qualify for a place at school?

Can you imagine how the Radford family cope?!

Do the sanctimonious posters think they are being helpful with their, "you are letting your child down" posts?

Today I have meetings back to back from 9am to 3pm. My kids are pretty good and fairly self sufficient- but I literally can't answer their questions and help them if they get stuck or if there are tech issues. Or if they have a wobble and decide they just can't do the work. They are 6 and 8, those wobbles happen, especially when it's something new they are learning.

I'm incredibly lucky in that both kids have a device, and they are both quite self sufficient with no additional needs. So I have less to juggle than a lot of others, and I am struggling, really struggling.

I have to prioritise work, my kids education is important, but honestly the bills and affording food are my priority.

No. I asked and they aren’t considered vulnerable. They already are over subscribed and send emails once a week pleading with people to reconsider whether their children could work from home even if they are key workers. They know there are lots of parents at home working and the children are able to work independently. But what can they do. I understand the rules but it’s crappy that children like these fall between the cracks.

Not sure my son's secondary school knows which kids attend the live lessons tbh,I get my son up every morning make sure he logs on and yet I had a welfare call from his for teacher yesterday asking if he's managing to do the lessons 🤷

@CostaDelCovid

Can you imagine how the Radford family cope?!

I thought that the other day

When you look at the millions of threads on here, and newspaper articles, twitter feeds etc, about how hard grown adults are finding working from home - missing the incidental social interactions, esprit de corps, collaborative working, spontaneity, ability to focus and the craic - I think is is extraordinarily unreasonable that young kids are supposed to just knuckle down to online content, for hours, often unsupervised.

The your kids will fall behind lot also don't know much about pedagogy, or mapping educational progress.

Heyho at least the poxy pointless SATs are cancelled.

I have

a very sad and demotivated GCSE year teen - who is finding it a slog, and worse slog than it would have been in class, where he thrives, gets great grades and participates.

You just need to realise that not all children's experience is the same. The entire world has not come to a standstill.

Other schools are doing better, others (most private but some state schools) are offering a full day of teaching and the students are flying ahead.

It's all very well to mop around saying kids will catch up and everybody is the same, but if you look at the big picture, at some point your teens will be in competition with others who are on a completely different level.

It might be less of an issue in Primary, unless you intend to go for a Grammar or an oversubscribed school who checks their level, they can catch up indeed, but but secondary school students? Much less so.

A month or 2 don't matter, we are coming fast to a full year. Depending on the plan for your kids, some of them cannot afford to waste so much time and get behind.

@Ihatemyseleffordoingthis

When you look at the millions of threads on here, and newspaper articles, twitter feeds etc, about how hard grown adults are finding working from home - missing the incidental social interactions, esprit de corps, collaborative working, spontaneity, ability to focus and the craic - I think is is extraordinarily unreasonable that young kids are supposed to just knuckle down to online content, for hours, often unsupervised.

The your kids will fall behind lot also don't know much about pedagogy, or mapping educational progress.

Heyho at least the poxy pointless SATs are cancelled.

I have

a very sad and demotivated GCSE year teen - who is finding it a slog, and worse slog than it would have been in class, where he thrives, gets great grades and participates.

Its very true what you say and I can't believe how accepting people are about this. If it wasn't women and children there would be uproar. My impression is that the general attitude of the media and politics is get them free WiFi and a device then all will be fine. It's not an education and it's absurd to expect this of anyone under 20. Im sorry for your kid but it's neither of your failings

I also have a who Y9 is loving it because she is simultaneously on facetime with her mates

@pollylocketpickedapocket well I kind of am doing the school a favour. Ofsted have instructed schools to deliver 4 hours of learning to KS2 a day. The primary school doesn’t do live lessons, so they send the resources and expect me to deliver/teach/guide/IT troubleshoot, so that my child actually learns something. So in effect I am doing a fair percentage of a teachers job for them. So the teacher doesn’t have to, and can spend time with the children in school. And I am doing this for no pay. I’d like to see how primary schools got on with the children’s home learning if they lose the parents goodwill to input anything into the homeschooling process.

Are the school doing me a favour? Well they’re not offering to do any of my job in return. They are paid for the work I am putting in .

So yes I think I am doing them a favour in many ways. Its not like they are doing what they’re doing for free.

Homeschooling happens when families decide to educate their children at home. This is not homeschooling its emergency schooling.
Schools are bvu to expect complete cooperation and 100% completion of work.

@spanieleyes

We have been told by our local authority to issue fines for non attendance!

The cheeky beggars! Honestly Without any idea of peoples home circumstances How dare they We have crap internet Home eddding would be horrible here