To dread homeschooling

[Johan23]

I’m in Scotland where the schools don’t go back to the 11th, and for a week it will be remote learning (I imagine it will be longer). In the last lockdown my son was still at nursery, so we didn’t have to homeschool.

It was still a freaking nightmare working from home as he wanted our attention all of the time.

Our work is going through a ridiculously busy period, and we are all expected to just “get on with it”. But, I am totally stressing as I really can’t bear to go through all this juggling again.

I did seriously consider private.

But the DC have really come on since being back in school. We've had no isolation periods so no idea if the school have improved in that area.

And as others are saying even when provision is good, homeschooling and trying to work from home is beyond shit.

Whattimeisdinner

What on earth are you 'agreeing to disagree' with?

The government suspended the curriculum. Schools were explicitly told not to teach the keyworker and vulnerable children that they had on site. They were not instructed to provide no teaching.

There was nolegal obligation to provide home learning.

Christina
The pastoral side of things exploded.
Until lockdown I hadn’t realised fully just how little support some students get at home.

christina

We were told explicitly to provide work for home learning in all subjects and for all students. We were told to assess and provide feedback.
We did this.
Face to face teaching was suspended.

Frankly I don't care whether the government suspended the curriculum in the summer term. That is no excuse for our school to suspend all forms of teaching, which is exactly what it did. In the end we resorted to using the National Oak Academy a lot. This was a good resource, but I just cannot understand why my children's teachers couldn't provide something similar at least a few times a week. My neighbour is a teacher, but he was out most of the day during lockdown building an "art studio" in his garden or going for a bike ride.

Requirements for home learning weren't mandated by the government., that's the point I'm trying to make.

There was no legal obligation for schools to provide anything in the face of a suspended curriculum.

Hence the very divergent provision between schools.

The pastoral side of things - rightly - took up huge amounts of staff time. It's largely invisible work, which might be why so many people honestly don't understand what teachers were doing during lock down.

(And still refuse to believe it when they are told, but that's another thread...)

@christinarossetti19 it sounds like the people you know worked incredibly hard, too hard. That’s not the overall experience for quite a few people. My DC received nothing - there was no contact for 4 months. Do you think that was adequate?
Teachers were on a 1 day in every weeks rota. The leadership team were defensive when we did get a response. So yes poor leadership, were the teachers happy to go along with this ?

The area I live in sadly isn’t very diverse so no language barriers etc to contend with. Only around 20 pupils with additional needs so not as much pastoral care here as inner city schools which I imagine was incredibly stressful.

I have no idea what the teachers in your school were doing Pomegranate.

In the same way that parents don't know how much staff time went on sorting out school vouchers, delivering food, doing welfare checks, referring to social services, doing social services' job for them.

When I was concerned about the leadership in one of my children's schools (way before this) I contacted the governors.

Were they also defensive?

And as for the pastoral side - my son could have been dead and buried under the patio for all our school cared. We had no personal contact from his teacher or another staff member to check on his welfare from April to September. And maybe that's because the school didn't consider us a "problem family", but circumstances can change, and it shouldn't be assumed that all is well.

Having read some of these posts, I am genuinely shocked at the petulance and immaturity even whilst trying to understand that some people react aggressively when they are scared and anxious.

The first thing I would say is that I am amazed that some of you have stayed with the schools you despise. If I felt the anger some of you do with a bank or restaurant, I would have taken my business elsewhere. More importantly, the petulance isn’t going to have any effect. You can scramble and push for key worker status and put your children into school to make ‘lazy’ teachers work ...but you will end up infecting your communities and make teachers ill with this virus and the schools will close anyway. You can moan and groan about the provision...but if the government say that is what is happening, you are going to have to get on with it. It is far from ideal but so is the service that shops, doctors, dentists, banks and cafes are providing.

There were many, many sensible posts about how to keep schools open and I’m afraid Us4Them types stopped those ideas being out into place. Now you (the parents) and we (the teachers) have to live with the consequences - I provided a full timetable online last time and believe me, it’s bloody hard work and we would much prefer being in school. It’s those people who are teachers and parents who I pity.

It’s been raised with the governors. Ive been happy with school since return in September, a return to the very good school it was. I’ve always been so happy with the school it was surprising what happened or didn’t in lockdown.

Yes, as I said upthread, one of the worst things about suspending the curriculum for me was that schools had no frameworks for identifying and acting on concerns about children.

You are right, ichundich, which is why our school didn't assume this and phoned every single child (or their parent) twice a week for a check-in. It was much appreciated by most, though some said it was too much and asked for weekly or fortnightly instead, and if we knew enough of the family, we were happy to go with their preferred timescale.

@Whattimeisdinner

Christina The pastoral side of things exploded. Until lockdown I hadn’t realised fully just how little support some students get at home.

Also I think that people in situations with more flexibility, more funds or older/more amenable children have no insight into how much support is needed for home learning for some, and how impossible it is to provide for many families.

Education is really important to me, I make sure that my kids read and get read to every day, do homework etc - but I'm also a full time working single mother of 3 aged 8 and under, one of whom is autistic.

I tried SO hard and took calls early and worked late and did 18 hour days of work + childcare, but my performance took a huge hit and I was ultimately made redundant later in the year when they had to make cuts, reviewed the team and kept only the top 25% (expectedly enough, all the working mothers and most working fathers of small children were among those cut).

Even now with more time, I cannot focus on being a homeschooler because benefits won't cover my housing, I have no family support (they're overseas) and minimal from my ex who is very unwell, and need to apply for jobs, though god knows how I'll find something that covers childcare. And ultimately I'm still one of the luckier ones, with laptops in the house and money for essentials plus Christmas.

I know there are those who think the closing schools is hard but a choice we might have to make, and I respect that. But those like @LynetteScavo upthread who briskly suggest using a timer system, as if that would solve anything, are shockingly unempathetic to what they are condemning many families and children to.

The message really has to be: it's coming. If you don't like the provision, contact your school, but be prepared to accept that there are good reasons why it is the way it is and you might have to accept that home learning comes in many forms, not just the one that suits you.

Generalising anecdotal pap about teachers going for bike rides is really offensive to the teachers here who worked hard, just as it is when you post the same stuff about dentists, EPs, doctors and health workers except nobody does

Final word on the subject is my tribute to the parent who, having downloaded my videos, handmade worksheets x3 and read all my marking, commented that she really didn't know why I wasn't just posting up the "lovely Twinkl worksheets" that she'd just discovered. I'll be sending them her way next time :)

@OverTheRubicon absolutely - it's just one of those times when "good enough" for you and yours is going to have to do, and that's really annoying about the decisions around promotion that you faced. Shame on your employer.

OvertheRubicon yes this pandemic has been shitty for women, especially those with young children.

I wish more people had got on board with teachers campaigning to make schools safer. If the virus had been less rampant in secondary schools in particular, there would have been less community transmission.

Even permitting schools to move to online/distanced learning when they judged the tipping point was right for their population would have helped.

Also I think that people in situations with more flexibility, more funds or older/more amenable children have no insight into how much support is needed for home learning for some, and how impossible it is to provide for many families.

Very very much agreed. And all the "well you'll just have to get on with it" in the world does not actually make it doable.

Also I think that people in situations with more flexibility, more funds or older/more amenable children have no insight into how much support is needed for home learning for some, and how impossible it is to provide for many families.

I agree!
With older DC myself, I was in the position whereby I was able to do my job and more.
I have tears from teacher colleagues who found trying to work alongside caring for infants & young children hell on earth.

There have been tears...

@OverTheRubicon that’s so tough. Hoping for brighter times for you.

Yes to safety and funding - god I couldn’t dislike this inept government more.

A lot of people forget hat teachers also have family responsibilities and their own children who were also at home.

Ok let's try this another way.

What are people - particularly teachers thoughts - on the best way to support their DCs through home learning, bearing in mind most DPs will also be working themselves and are not teachers so not au fait with all aspects of the curriculum?

If we as parents have concerns, what's the best way to raise them ? I hate to be seen to be going above a teachers head, but if they are too busy to discuss things, then is it ok to go to head or governors? Or how long should I allow best endeavours to continue?

@BustopherPonsonbyJones

Having read some of these posts, I am genuinely shocked at the petulance and immaturity even whilst trying to understand that some people react aggressively when they are scared and anxious.

The first thing I would say is that I am amazed that some of you have stayed with the schools you despise. If I felt the anger some of you do with a bank or restaurant, I would have taken my business elsewhere. More importantly, the petulance isn’t going to have any effect. You can scramble and push for key worker status and put your children into school to make ‘lazy’ teachers work ...but you will end up infecting your communities and make teachers ill with this virus and the schools will close anyway. You can moan and groan about the provision...but if the government say that is what is happening, you are going to have to get on with it. It is far from ideal but so is the service that shops, doctors, dentists, banks and cafes are providing.

There were many, many sensible posts about how to keep schools open and I’m afraid Us4Them types stopped those ideas being out into place. Now you (the parents) and we (the teachers) have to live with the consequences - I provided a full timetable online last time and believe me, it’s bloody hard work and we would much prefer being in school. It’s those people who are teachers and parents who I pity.

I agree with all this.

Why are some many people chosing for their children to be educated (or not as many of you claim) by people you think are incompetent at their job? Move on, find a new school. There are plenty out there. Mine is fantastic. So are the two schools my children go to. All full of great teachers doing their best in a shitty situation.

Some of you sound like complaining broken records. Move on. Stop moaning. Be kind.