How much contact has your primary school aged child had with their teacher?

[georgedawes]

Please can you tell me how much contact your primary school aged child has had with their teacher since March. I'm specifically asking for kids not yet back in school and not about emails with work set etc, but actual direct contact (telephone, zoom etc etc) with their teacher.

I’m a primary teacher in Scotland. In my school, clear expectations of communication were set out when schools closed. School said we must phone vulnerable children once a week, so I did. Some other members of staff initially did this too, then stopped because union advice was that we didn’t have to. I am actually our union rep, but I interpreted the advice as SMT not being able to compel us to phone, others seemed to think we should not be phoning. Two or three weeks after school closure, I had a late night panic about one of my very middle class, well supported pupils. She had submitted no work that week, with no explanation. I knew it was perfectly possible that the family had chosen to take a week off, which IMO is perfectly acceptable, or maybe they had a bad week at home, or perhaps something dreadful had happened and I was just punting out work into the void. After that, I phoned every pupil every week. I know some parents, and probably pupils, found this a bit much but they didn’t need to pick up the phone and I sent a message if they didn’t answer saying please just message me and I’ll phone again.

It was good speaking to them all every week. It took ages and for many 7 yo kids it was like pulling teeth. But I got a chance to catch up with parents, offer support, reassure and hear some of the wee stories I miss so much.

@switswoo81 My apologies.

I’m used to rural areas being ignored in favour of provision being focused on Dublin and the main cities.

Apology accepted . I know it's often Dublin centric but we were lucky to have a very motivated staff.( All their children attend the school which helps!)

We’ve had work set online for the children so we’ve had online feedback for this a few times a week. I’ve also had a phone call from each teacher although only once. Had twice weekly emails from the head and pastoral lead also with updates and pastoral links reminding us they’re there as needed also. 2 children are back now. I couldn’t fault the school at all but from friends I see how different things are in schools.

Basically Irish Primary school teachers have been off school for 15 weeks and have been required to do fuck all.

Irish primary teacher here, I did daily live lessons with my class as well as setting and correcting work (all tasks uploaded weekly with a suggested daily schedule). Unless you've experience of every school in the country, don't tar us all with the same brush, thank you.

Y5 - one phone call in June. work sheets collected from school every two / three weeks with a request that nothing is handed in, therefore not one piece of marking or feedback.
Large primary (3 form intake) 27FTE teachers, 7 TA's, Deputy Head, Head Teacher...approx 10 key worker kids attending March - July. I happen to live next door to the school and the car park has been empty. I understand teachers have children too but many parents are wfh and teaching.
I'm so disappointed.

Y7 - brilliant! Phone call to check on well being, lots of messages to parents and children, work set to timetable from the beginning and every submission marked with feedback and lovely words of encouragement provided. Recently introduced 5 x live webinars per week which appear to be well thought out. For example Geography - one teacher in class and one teacher 'live' from the river estuary or 'live' in the nearest city to help show types of buildings. My dd loves these lessons.

I have 2 primary age children. Y5 teacher calls us every week and asks about other, Y2, child, too. Talking to other mums, it seems teachers shared families with siblings in different classes and only one teacher calls that particular family.
Homework- minimal and they do not need to send it back.
I am disappointed with our school somehow.

The UK seems to have a big issue with muddle in general, and I'm seeing it here.

On the one hand, "The curriculum is suspended", and no actual expectations or minimum requirements issued to schools.

On the other hand, teachers are still being paid over this period, and both they and the kids are expected to be taking summer holidays as usual.

EITHER the UK government should have said "Business as usual" and instructed schools to carry on with the usual curriculum as best they could (with very clear expectations about setting work, contact, delivering feedback), OR the government should have said "We are shuffling the holidays round this year. Teachers and kids are all off school for the next three months. They will work through the summer instead."

One or the other, please!

What happened in the UK has been a right mess. Some schools have done a lot of work with the kids, most have done "some" and a large minority appear to have done very little indeed.

What happened in the UK has been a right mess. Unfortunately that true. In my opinion we have a incompetent Prime Minister and government who couldn't make a decision and stick to it.

With education, we had 2/3 weeks of schools 'maybe' closing then they were given 2 days notice of closure, and no actual advice of what the expectation for learning was.

My reception child went back beginning of June and year 4 this week . Before that though until May half term year 4 child was getting weekly zoom calls and comments from teacher on google classroom on most things she handed in . After may they had one teacher across all of year 4 so less comments but she still did get some .

Whole class video call every morning, detailing the work for the day, and then another one at 3pm when they do a quiz and have a chat. DD is Year 6.

@Clutterbugsmum

What happened in the UK has been a right mess. Unfortunately that true. In my opinion we have a incompetent Prime Minister and government who couldn't make a decision and stick to it.

With education, we had 2/3 weeks of schools 'maybe' closing then they were given 2 days notice of closure, and no actual advice of what the expectation for learning was.

I have to say that I think that it is more than incompetence. I think it is a deliberate policy to be vague, thus allowing the government to blame schools for not doing things right.

We’ve already seen this strategy with care homes. BJ said they “didn’t follow procedure.” Yes, he’s back tracked for now but I think when criticism flies in the direction of the government again, he’ll double down. The seed has been planted.

People on here have blamed lazy teachers and interfering unions, instead of directing their ire at the government for lack of proper, workable guidance. A win/win for the government, no need to come up with a proper plan, no need to worry about public criticism.

One phone call.

Taxpayer money very badly spent.

Dinoctoblock Thank you put it better. The government have been deliberately vague.

I have a small hope that Dfe and teacher union are able to come up with a better national scheme that if schools do need to close for a long period that children in all school years from reception to final years of university can have a proper online teaching.