If the schools close there should be no pretence that they have switched to "online learning".

[Billie18]

If the schools close they are shut. Schools are not equipped to deliver teaching online. Teachers have not been trained to teach online. Children are not equipped to learn online. The curriculum has not been designed to be taught online. If schools close then children will not be receiving an education. It is dishonest to pretend that they are.

So if the schools close then teachers should be furloughed and children's education should be paused at the point of closure. Closing schools should not be disguised as something it is not. This would allow the damage to continue indefinitely. If schools remain closed for a longer period then teachers should be made redundant so that they are free to do other work. This of course would be terrible and would hopefully not be allowed to happen... But then schools have already not been fully open for nearly a year.

My DC has had 4 periods of online learning since Sept, all lessons taught online by her current teachers ! They did an excellent job and whilst it's not ideal she did really well with it , so some schools are managing just fine with online learning

@Scottishgirl85

I agree with the 1st part of your post. My 5 year old relied solely on us as parents to learn anything during school closures, and we both work full-time in highly responsible jobs. It was an utter nightmare. The school uploaded worksheets from twinkl, and no other input for 3 months. If this happens again it will be detrimental to our health. There was no online learning, it was parents becoming teachers in our case. It just doesn't work for primary aged kids.

Agree.

To be fair, I believe that the support provided by my DC's (now) school was excellent but she is just 4.5.

Reception learning is so interactive, play-based and a lot to do with building and developing relationships with peers, which can't be replicated online.

During the last lockdown, her reception teacher did actually record loads of videos going through phonics, maths, some fun history lessons, French basics, even little science experiments.

We watched about two minutes of one - that's how long her attention lasted. Yet in class, her teacher has praised her aptitude, attention and called her a class role model.

@AccidentallyOnPurpose - ZERO shade from me on staff or schools I am 100% sure that everyone was doing their best.

But the fact your school managed to be open, doesn't disprove the fact that none of my 3 kids' different schools were not.

The point is an equitable accessible standard of education was not and is unlikely to be provided for young people through this time. And we should all stop pretending that it's fine because really it isn't.

@Scottishgirl85 I agree with the 1st part of your post. My 5 year old relied solely on us as parents to learn anything during school closures, and we both work full-time in highly responsible jobs. It was an utter nightmare. The school uploaded worksheets from twinkl, and no other input for 3 months. If this happens again it will be detrimental to our health. There was no online learning, it was parents becoming teachers in our case. It just doesn't work for primary aged kids.

This is exactly the same experience we had. Add in newly diagnosed dyslexia and it was a complete nightmare.

Plus yes, both DH and I will be wfh. Not entirely sure how home-schooling will work (plus also looking after a pre-schooler).

@Frestba I think from this thread we have to acknowledge that some teachers did indeed put in huge amounts of effort and went above and beyond to provide online learning but also that in many cases they didn't and parents were left to try to do the teacher's job while also doing their own.

I agree for young children, there is no way my 4 year old will do online learning and i can't teach her. My husband can't cover the work either as he's about to enter his busiest time at work and absolutely cannot not do it.

@PeachiceT

My DC has had 4 periods of online learning since Sept, all lessons taught online by her current teachers ! They did an excellent job and whilst it's not ideal she did really well with it , so some schools are managing just fine with online learning

Which, for me, begs the question why not all schools?

In our area it seems like it's local authority issues rather than individual schools who are deciding online policy, but that just seems to be a little worksheet work. No online lessons at all. They didn't even ensure all staff had adequate it.

It's so wrong that education is even more a postcode lottery than it was before. The government (including devolved governments) need to ensure all kids are being treated equally. The whole "girfec" (getting it right for every child) policy in Scotland has long been abandoned. The government though seem to throw these policies at local authorities then offer no support in how they are implemented.

I don’t even think the criticism is with the teachers. Most of us are just sick of the dogma regarding online learning as being an acceptable alternative to school/classroom learning. They are not comparable.

One takes place in a setting solely based for education to take place where the person leading that education is trained and skilled to do so. The other takes place in a setting which is primarily used for fun and recreational purposes and is led by either no one or a parent who is in trying to concentrate on work/hasn’t a fucking clue.

Let’s just accept our children are on track to lose a years education . Let’s own it. There’s no point in pretending we’re doing okay and we have super powers. Parents aren’t teachers and houses aren’t schools.

Both my dc’s schools have provided online learning, during the first lockdown and when they had to shut for a deep clean, teachers are prepared to provide online learning. I do agree that not all children can learn from home, I have one that refuses to engage in any school work at home and as a result she is now behind, my other dd finds it hard but as the actually had to do much yet as she was doing GCSE during the first lockdown, she’s now doing A level and if she can’t manage to work/learn from home her grades will drop. It is worrying but I will support school closures if that’s what needs to be done.

Re primary age kids, I don't know what ages yours are but mine was 7.

She was doing really badly at school and could barely read, she's on the sen register.

The school were verging on belligerent when I tried to get direction, support an idea of what to with her and in the end I found my way, whilst simultaneously working.

Many of her peers parents expected several hours a day work... I did about 2bx 20 mins everyday, I must admit, also Saturday and Sunday... And brought her on to a great degree!..

Maybe expectations need to loosen a little?. At primary age it's pretty basic stuff and core concepts isn't it.
Age 7, 8 I can't see where several hours a day of work would come from?

Love it has to be a knowledged that many don't learn in school either.

No online lessons at all. They didn't even ensure all staff had adequate it.
Online lessons are neither mandated nor recommended.
My school can do them because all teaching and support staff have laptops issued by school. We have had for twelve years. We also already had MS Teams in March and we're pretty au fait with using it.
Many schools don't have the equipment to do that.

[quote mynamesnotsam]@Frestba I think from this thread we have to acknowledge that some teachers did indeed put in huge amounts of effort and went above and beyond to provide online learning but also that in many cases they didn't and parents were left to try to do the teacher's job while also doing their own.[/quote]
Agree with this. Some schools and teachers have done great things, but equally many didn't.

Not sure it can be put down to teachers, but the lack of support from local authorities to schools in some areas has been very poor. But the government needs to step in and ensure all kids have equal educational opportunities otherwise the attainment gap is only going to get wider and wider

@mynamesnot... in which case you can't make a blanket statement like the title of this thread. It worked for some, not others. What was the alternative? I'd like a system where those that need to, go into school.

[quote Ihatemyseleffordoingthis]@AccidentallyOnPurpose - ZERO shade from me on staff or schools I am 100% sure that everyone was doing their best.

But the fact your school managed to be open, doesn't disprove the fact that none of my 3 kids' different schools were not.

The point is an equitable accessible standard of education was not and is unlikely to be provided for young people through this time. And we should all stop pretending that it's fine because really it isn't.[/quote]
I actually agree.

Some of the issues however are to do with the poor guidance, the curriculum being cancelled, poor funding, unsuitable facilities (that might be ok to muddle through year after year but not in the pandemic) and so on. Some of those things couldn't have been sorted even with the best will in the world.

I honestly don't think there were many schools that went woohoo we're shut and off on an extended holiday, and even if there were any that decision was made by heads not actual teachers. The terms of what they could/were allowed to do were set by others.

I think the real issue was that the bare minimum was absolutely not even near enough(for the few schools that went for it) while there was no maximum and a complete lack of support for schools who struggled logistically and financially. This left many parents overwhelmed,disgruntled , they felt abandoned etc and a lot of teachers overwhelmed,and exhausted while also reading about how mean and lazy and awful teachers are and how everything is their fault.

I agree with part. The on line teaching has been poor from 4 local schools I know. And they are very good schools.

On another thread one poster said that as a teacher getting an online lesson ready was really hard and totally different. I suspect many teachers don't have this skill.

@justanotherneighinparadise

I don’t even think the criticism is with the teachers. Most of us are just sick of the dogma regarding online learning as being an acceptable alternative to school/classroom learning. They are not comparable.

One takes place in a setting solely based for education to take place where the person leading that education is trained and skilled to do so. The other takes place in a setting which is primarily used for fun and recreational purposes and is led by either no one or a parent who is in trying to concentrate on work/hasn’t a fucking clue.

Let’s just accept our children are on track to lose a years education . Let’s own it. There’s no point in pretending we’re doing okay and we have super powers. Parents aren’t teachers and houses aren’t schools.

Totally agree with this!!

I remember in the first lockdown my third year son asking for help with his physics work - I would have loved to help him, sadly though he is really good at physics and I really wasn't even slightly ok at it when I was at school and only managed to 2nd year and sadly it's been 1 or 2 years since then! I honestly felt I was doing him a huge disservice but he deserves access to qualified teachers to teach him not a parent who has no clue.

@PandemicPavolova

Love it has to be a knowledged that many don't learn in school either.

So very true.

We've worked incredibly hard to produce a remote curriculum, a mixture of work set on line, recorded lessons and live lessons, with teacher support available in the scheduled slot, just as it would be at school. Paper packs for those who need it. We've also provided equipment and wifi for some students.

Of course, some children engage better than others just as they do in school , but it's not nothing. For some children it actually seems to be preferable and they're producing more work than they ever have in school.

Some schools have undoubtedly done better than others, as is also the case for regular school. Do take it up, in a constructive way with the governors, if your child really is getting nothing, but be prepared to hear the work and support is there but not being done.

@Manteo I was starting work at 6am-9am I then home schooled my children and then was back to work again from mid afternoon into the evening. I had some teaching sessions sprinkled in too. If I went for a walk with my children I had moved my hours around. I was certainly putting the time in.

I think many parents did this 🤷🏼‍♀️

Totally agree @justanotherneighinparadise .

DS has come on so much since he has been back at school, I'm so grateful he got his first term of Nat 5s in a school setting and is now -hopefully- sufficiently engaged with his subjects to manage a reasonable job of studying from home .

However if it's more than a few weeks - I've mentally psyched myself for Feb half term - I simply fail to see how they can cover everything they need to in order to be in a good position for the exam year.

I know we just need to make the best of it and I know the majority of teachers have been working really hard - just like the majority of DPs - but as a parent my natural instinct is to do the best I can for DS14 and online learning is very far from that. Nobody's fault I suppose.

Yay I love it when teachers and schools are all thrown into the same pile

Sorry but not all teachers (by a long stretch) used the school closure as a long holiday.
The teachers in my (primary) school provided a full curriculum. 4 or 5 pre recorded lessons a day. We didn’t do live due to some child protection issues that prevented some classes from being allowed to go live - so each day the teachers recorded their lessons from home - two or three videos for maths and literacy to allow for differentiations, plus the rest. All work that got sent back in was marked and feedback and targets were set. We sent online reading books and children were asked to film the reading once a week so that parents could get detailed feedback on what to work on. This continued for children who’s parents had decided they weren’t returning in the summer on top of the normal day. Plus this term, for anyone who has had to isolate.

I’m fully aware that not all schools did this but why do teachers and schools always have to be painted with the same brush?

I could paint all parents in the same light based on who actually did work with their child. From keeping track of work coming back, about 50% of my class did the majority of tasks.
From the other 50% about half of them only did the maths and literacy and were essentially “hot housed” in the traditional subjects. Another chunk did the reverse and only did the more fun projects, such as the craft and the exploring tasks. And then another group did absolutely nothing and parents said as such.

And funnily enough, all the children who did absolutely none of the work in my class had stay at home mums or both parents furloughed.
So if I’m going to act like some posters on here (not everyone by any stretch) I could lump all furloughed parents and stay at home parents together and say I hope you enjoyed your nice long time off doing sweet bugger all! What exactly were you doing? Laziness. Except of course I’m not going to do that, because I don’t believe that at all and I know it’s not true and everyone has their own separate circumstances.

Stop putting everyone together. Some schools didn’t do the online learning well at all and should be held accountable but for crying out loud, making all teachers redundant? How is that going to help? And what jobs in the shattered job market exactly are we going to do instead? Don’t think universal credit will go down well with people either.

I have very mixed views on the schools closing again, largely because I just don’t know what is best for the situation we are in.

All schools and teachers are perfectly capable of doing an online curriculum, and I support parents in demanding it. My school did, I know plenty of other schools that did, there’s no reason why not. Of course online is not as good or as motivating as being physically present in the classroom and having the teacher right there to help or steer in a different direction.

The problem is more at home. Some families have one computer screen between them and more than one child and more than one parent. Some have no screen or internet or printer and no money for simple resources like their own pens and paper or a calculator etc. Younger children will need support and supervision which is damn hard if parents are working. Some children just won’t connect school and home. Some parents can’t be bothered. Some parents just don’t know how to help them themselves. Some homes don’t have adequate space to do work.

The problems with online learning are different from home to home, child to child, school to school. I don’t think anyone truly wants the schools to shut but OP your solution is very extreme. If we do what you say, trust me they won’t be open again!

Also can we not present that the ‘oak national academy’ online resources are really suitable for young primary children. We were asked to do a fire of London one by our school abs it was god awful. Bored me to death and was worse than doing nothing with my 6 year old. I’d read to think how much it cost!

I preferred the activities the school prepared themselves. Our school provide a range of suggested activities linked to numeracy and literacy etc and parents could do as many as they wanted/could. I think that was enough really.