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What is classed as remote learning now?

35 replies

newyeary · 29/12/2020 19:59

I'm just getting my head ready for inevitable school closures and wondering what the current guidelines are for primary?

Is it remote learning? What does that actually mean? Does it mean schools should provide online taught lessons? Or uploading worksheets for parents to complete? Are there minimum standards of what we should expect this time around?

Last lockdown there were a few worksheets put on the school website each week but nothing more. I'm hoping for more but not sure how feasible it is and we've not heard anything about remote learning plans if required etc. Thanks.

OP posts:
TheSilentStars · 29/12/2020 20:03

Each school is now required to have a "Covid ready plan" which should be available (school website etc) There should be no "just" sending out of worksheets. Lots of schools point parents in the direction of Bitesize and Oak Academy. What the latter has is good, but it's mainly a case of "here's a video" and there isn't much for each subject. But it's certainly better than in the spring.
Your child's school will have something in place.

Thatwentbadly · 29/12/2020 20:07

In the spring the government told school to not teach anything new now they should be providing the full curriculum. What is available will depend on the age of your child, my DD is in reception so I can’t imagine it will be much more than the stuff already available via the school websites for children self isolating.

newyeary · 29/12/2020 20:19

I can't see anything on the school website so far....

So is the school still responsible for teaching the curriculum albeit remotely or for providing the materials for parents to teach the curriculum? Or is it not that clear and specified in the guidelines and up to the school? (Child is year 5 btw)

OP posts:
TheSilentStars · 29/12/2020 20:22

Tbh, it still seems to be up to individual schools- how much is done, and there's still a lot of responsibility being handed over to parents which (as a teacher) I find atrocious. It's not the parents' job to find materials, it's ours. Confused

Thatwentbadly · 29/12/2020 20:23

There was new legislation past in September. Who knows how it will work in reality as issues like lack of access to IT and other materials has not been resolved.

year5teacher · 29/12/2020 20:25

I don’t know if there is any official guidance about the minimum of what needs to be provided.
We will be on Zoom daily, teaching a mixture of live lessons and playing video inputs. Work we would have done in the lessons will be set, uploaded and marked the same day according to our usual marking policy. It will be the usual working schedule, just much shitter for everyone. I don’t honestly believe many schools will be giving out worksheets, especially to year 5. They would be insane if they did especially since we’ve all just done assessments and the data, I imagine universally, is not quite where it would normally be. They only have one year until SATs so I know I’ll be going through the curriculum as normal with my lot.... but hopefully it won’t come to it!

newyeary · 29/12/2020 20:31

@year5teacher that sounds so good what you are providing. It must be so hard with 30 x 10 year olds on the other end of the screen!

DS has SEN and just won't sit in front on zoom etc maybe for a few minutes but not for long. That said, he won't engage in worksheets either!

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year5teacher · 29/12/2020 20:34

@newyeary I think if it does come to it it’ll be tough (hoping I can mute them if needed on Zoom to avoid constant shouting out?? 😂) but if it does have to happen I need to make sure they’re making as much progress as physically possible... easier said than done!

year5teacher · 29/12/2020 20:35

With SEN it is so, so hard. I really hope schools do stay open.

Dontlickthetrolley · 29/12/2020 20:40

We've had 2 lots of online learning due to cases in the class. One text came through at 6pm on Thursday evening and by 8.30 the next morning the full days teaching was available including attending assembly and completing a PE session. The mornings were Google meets English and Maths. With a 15 minute discussion, sent off to do work and then teacher available for any questions. Then reading after lunch followed by geography, science or art. Again, logging in and out of Google meets through out the sessions. It will be tough if both are off at the same time as the house isn't big enough for 3 people to be on a laptop constantly. Y4 and Y5.

StacySoloman · 29/12/2020 20:47

Yes, there is government guidance on what should be provided, and schools have to teach the curriculum.

I'm a governor at a primary school and we will be offering two online lessons a day that can be joined live (on Teams) or watched later. Plus worksheets & tasks uploaded.

Theimpossiblegirl · 29/12/2020 20:50

I teach primary and would rather be in, but the way cases are going am getting quite worried. If I have to isolate I either plan for supply or shift to remote learning if my bubble is off. For individual children we can't do much as we're still teaching.
If schools shut we'll be looking after keyworker/vulnerable children so would struggle to do remote alongside.
If the teachers are ill, they can't set work. They're no easy option.

Theimpossiblegirl · 29/12/2020 20:51

*there's

Scarby9 · 29/12/2020 20:57

@Dontlickthetrolley Did your Y4 and Y5 DCs manage all the logging on and off and submitting work independently?

newyeary · 29/12/2020 21:00

@Theimpossiblegirl as DS has SEN and is quite vulnerable, he could probably go into school but I don't really understand how staff are going to be able to supervise and teach KW and vulnerable children in school and teach children virtually at home - surely something will have to give.

I'll have to discuss with them which would work best for DS...he won't learn anything remotely if the last lockdown is anything to go by but I don't see any point in him sitting in a room with a TA and all the other SEN children getting frustrated at the difference in school and also not learning.

OP posts:
MrsHamlet · 29/12/2020 21:02

newyeary in my school he'd be with his TA in a room accessing my lesson which I'll be teaching over teams.
KW students will be supervised elsewhere. No one will be in my room with me.

Scottishgirl85 · 29/12/2020 21:13

Our experience is the same as yours OP. With a 5 year old the teaching was completely done by me and husband whilst both working full-time in highly responsible jobs. A few twinkl worksheets put on school website, that was it for 3 months. We had to source other stuff, it was dire. We worked 6am until midnight every day to take turns of working then teaching. It really annoys me when it's called remote learning/online learning. For those with young children, it is parents making huge sacrifices and struggling through it themselves. There was no support, my daughter actually taught me what diagraphs are! I'm not sure there is an alternative, but I would hope for pre-recorded lessons or something to teach a new element, then worksheets to practice with. I am dreading living through it again, I aged several years last time! We also have a toddler which doesn't help matters!

lavenderlou · 29/12/2020 21:17

There isn't one prescribed way of teaching set out in the guidance, although there are certain expectations. It refers to good quality online resources or good quality printed resources for those unable to access technology. Unfortunately the guidance covers all remote education from ages 5-18 and does not clarify much about the differences between ages. What it does say is:

recognise that younger pupils and some pupils with SEND may not be able to access remote education without adult support and so schools should work with families to deliver a broad and ambitious curriculum -

Obviously this is deliberately vague. Most primary schools will by now have surveyed their families for their preferred options for remote learning and found out what access families have for online learning, so different schools will have different plans based on families responses to this. For example, I teach in a deprived area and 25% of our families said they couldn't access online learning. This makes an option such as Zoom lessons impossible for our school, whereby they might work well for a school where the majority of families have good online access and technology can be provided for the minority that don't.

As a KS1 teacher, I say for this age range it is very difficult to provide anything that doesn't require at least some adult input. Even live lessons will require some adult supervision. A friend's reception child had a full timetable of live lessons but his Granny had to sit with him all day for him to be able to access them.

In my school, during isolation periods last term, we found shortish video lessons to be the most workable, especially for things like phonics. We can share them via YouTube links so they can be accessed on any device and if they aren't too long they don't use up too much data if parents don't have access to WiFi. I would set an activity as far as possible that could be shown on the screen and then the video paused while the children completed it. I tried not to send things that required printing, although some parents chose to print things.

We also have an online learning platform with some online activities - a lot of Upper KS2 children who were more likely to have their own devices accessed this. A large number of parents in my school just want packs of paper-based work though, as they find it easier to sit their children down with that and work through it. The difficulty with this is that it's very challenging to set new learning this way as it always requires explanation that the parents don't always have either the time or the capability to do.

I think there is a big difference between primary and secondary. DH is a secondary school teacher. Most pupils seemed to have better access to technology at that age and the school had a larger pool of resources that could be loaned out if not. In my school, we have just 15 laptops for the whole school, which are used for teaching computing for all pupils. He found it relatively easy after a bit of practice to do live lessons across Teams and the vast majority of students accessed them.

Anyway, that was a bit of a long-winded way of saying that primary provision will vary by school and probably by age group and will likely be based on what schools have found out by surveying parents and finding out what the majority can access.

Schools are required to publish information about their remote learning provision on their websites by 25th January.

lavenderlou · 29/12/2020 21:21

And to add to previous posts, yes I agree that the provision of online learning will be affected by how often teachers would need to be on-site with key worker/vulnerable children, which will also vary by school, and no they cannot set work if they are ill themselves. That's probably not a problem in larger primaries where there will be more than one class and teacher per year group, but is a problem with smaller one-form entry schools like mine.

However, I really think there won't be a blanket closure of primaries. Continued isolation of bubbles remains more likely.

newyeary · 29/12/2020 21:24

@MrsHamlet what about the children who don't have TAs? DS doesn't have a 1:1. There are some in the school but they are attached to particular children so I assume they would be working with those children, not all the SEN and KW children?

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RuleWithAWoodenFoot · 29/12/2020 21:26

We're doing what our parent community preferred.

Video lessons (by us, not Oak) - no more than 5 minutes instruction in total, uploaded to school webpage and to YouTube so they can watch on a device or on a TV. Option to take a photo of the work to be emailed for marking. We then do smaller ability groups for discussion once a day on Teams for around 15 mins for feedback/general wellbeing etc. I've got children working 2 years below their age - no point in them watching the videos I'm doing in some subjects, I'd rather we had a chat about what I've sent home for them to do.

We're recording 'lessons' for every academic subject (not PE or PSHE in the same way) and uploading them all the time anyway since September - lots of individuals isolating and quite a lot of nervous parents not sending children in. Would rather they do what we're sending, than random nonsense. We also nearly always link to BBC Bitesize, or other good vids if appropriate as back up/extra.

If a whole class goes off, they get a pack for collection that contains everything they need to complete the work. Basically a workbook for English writing and one for maths (that we've printed out, not bought).

We did that all through lock down - I looked earlier actually, and my first video lesson was recorded on 2nd April.

My own child's school did basically bugger all through lockdown 1. They are using google classroom to set work for any future stuff though, and have an 'open hour' to join in a class chat in the morning for explanation of the day's activities. Not had to do that in practice yet, but no doubt will this coming term. It won't be me though, I'll be at school, it'll be my partner. We spent £130 on a tiny laptop for her in the sale over the summer, and taught her to use a mouse/open google classroom etc. She'll still need massive support to actually do anything.

RuleWithAWoodenFoot · 29/12/2020 21:29

Oh we also bought in to Big Cat book stuff, so they can read stuff online. Although we are doing a class novel and other stuff on video anyway, so some access to reading/books.

My school sounds very similar to lavenderlou's.

RuleWithAWoodenFoot · 29/12/2020 21:30

I should also say, that this is a fuck-ton of work - far, FAR more than it would be to just be in class. Anyone who bangs on about lazy teachers just wanting the time off doesn't get it at all.

lavenderlou · 29/12/2020 21:34

@RuleWithAWoodenFoot

I should also say, that this is a fuck-ton of work - far, FAR more than it would be to just be in class. Anyone who bangs on about lazy teachers just wanting the time off doesn't get it at all.
Agreed! I dread being told we have to switch to remote learning again. Not to mention we have to phone round everyone each week. 30 phone calls takes half the day.
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