School only providing 1 hour of live interaction a day!

[NotLookingTooGood]

What is everyone's school experience? I am going a little crazy. We have live online learning of 2 increments of 30mns (maths & english) a day + homework that we have to supervise.

What is everybody else's experience?
The school is relying entirely on us to do the work.

Tyrionsbitch I hope at least a few of those emails and phone calls have had parents who’ve told you they appreciate you’re doing a ridiculously hard job at short notice under extreme pressure and they appreciate everything you’re doing.

15 minutes of pre recorded lessons with some worksheets

Thank goodness we will get no live lessons for my kids. They will be doing their learning when I am not at work as at grandparents otherwise.

All my class are in so I am working as normal.

My kids are 8 and 10. I’m furious with their school, no contact at all just a big dump load of worksheets and ‘see you when we reopen’ attitude. Last lockdown they were so unhelpful. I didn’t know I could complain to ofsted I think I will. I’ve lost everything due to lockdowns, my life savings, my business is on the brink, our future will never be the same and I’m trying to stay afloat doing what i can from home - I don’t have any time at all to teach them... yet teachers are on full pay and don’t even have to teach them for an hour day? It’s a disgrace. Private schools are doing it no bother, it’s pure laziness

When did providing live lessons be mandatory?? And I can’t see how they can be practical. Not every child would necessarily be available at the same time? They may need to share the computer with other family members. They may need help setting it up from a parent who is working at that time.
Why such the anger for ‘only getting’ the chance to have 10 mins a day live interaction? Sorry but what are you expecting??? A full days teaching on zoom??? !!!!

@mamaduckbone

My secondary age dc are both getting a full timetable of lessons via teams. Ds1 15 is coping. Ds2 who only turned 11 in July was in tears today because of the pressure of completing all the work before the next Teams session starts. He only had half an hour for lunch and was still working at 4.30 to catch up on what he couldn't get finished in the lesson.

If your dc are primary age be careful what you wish for.

That’s horrible , your poor DS.

Ours have had zero live/interactive teaching, it’s the same as before but more pressure it complete it

@Twtls123

My kids are 8 and 10. I’m furious with their school, no contact at all just a big dump load of worksheets and ‘see you when we reopen’ attitude. Last lockdown they were so unhelpful. I didn’t know I could complain to ofsted I think I will. I’ve lost everything due to lockdowns, my life savings, my business is on the brink, our future will never be the same and I’m trying to stay afloat doing what i can from home - I don’t have any time at all to teach them... yet teachers are on full pay and don’t even have to teach them for an hour day? It’s a disgrace. Private schools are doing it no bother, it’s pure laziness

That's why I was asking about private schools. Not sure if they are doing it no problem. March lockdown- year 2 and Reception-no live lessons but year 2 recorded videos for core subjects like maths, English, science and also PE. Then worksheets. Reception- recorded lessons maths and English most days.

This lockdown- year 3- live lessons x 3/4 hours a day. Very good quality but needs two iPads! Year 1- two half hour live chat sessions. Recorded videos for maths, English and one other subject.

@tubbycustardtummyache

Sounds reasonable. I’m not a teacher (other frontline worker) but I can well appreciate the pressure they must be under. Trying to set online learning plus teach in school (they seem to be teaching this time round at school) following a term of doing their normal job plus also setting remote learning for children who are isolating. All of this without being allowed to wear PPE in class or without prioritising them for a vaccine. And OFSTED seem to be encouraging parents to report distance learning when it is perceived to fall short. I think teachers need to be given a break before there’s a mass walk out. Morale must be very low currently

I'm amazed anyone wants to join the profession! There won't be any teachers left to teach after they've been knocked out by Covid and reported to Ofsted!

Ours is providing a 30 minute check in and chat at 9, they they go and do Maths, another check in at 10:45 then they do English (all from PowerPoint and links to
videos etc)

The afternoon is the other subjects, teachers available on email but no live lessons, but I'm ok with this as the school sent a letter outlining its position. They explained how the nuances of how different children learn are impossible
To work with online and the speed children work at is different so it really doesn't work, plus everyone has different schedules and it may mean some children miss out completely. Am happy with their reasoning and quality of work

@ivfbeenbusy

Lots of people work infront of screens all day 🤷‍♀️

I would absolutely complain if i thought teaching wasn't up to par? Not like they will be paid proportionately less for providing 1 hour of teaching and a few worksheets compared to a normal full 6-8 hour day?

Except that they are also doing a normal, full 6-8 hour day on top of that. Give them a chance. They had since 8pm Monday to put this into place. Yes there was a requirement for remote learning to be ready before this but until very recently in light of the new strain it was unlikely that whole schools would ‘close’-it was more likely that work would have to be provided for bubbles or isolating individuals for short periods-not the entire curriculum.

And ofsted absolutely aren’t encouraging parents to report poor quality remote provision-that’s all Gavin.

Secondary school dc have 4 hours of live lessons a day. Family members not allowed in the room when zooming going on. Primary school dc have 1 or 2 lessons a week which has to be supervised by an adult. The rest is oak academy, white rose maths, bbc bitesize etc.

No live interaction for us at all, they upload the work onto Google classroom ready for them logging on in the morning and they've to follow the school time table and complete the work set. It's working perfectly well for us, I know the teachers are busy with the kids who are actually in school. We are getting a call once a week to check everything is ok and they have an IT helpline manned by the computing teacher.

The kids can contact the teacher by messaging on Google classroom if there are any difficulties and they reply.

Why do people think that live lessons = always best?

Some subjects may be suited to that, but others are better suited to the student being engaged in other ways. Online lessons can turn into lectures which is just the child writing what they hear with often limited engagement.

I feel sorry for staff in schools having to deal with complaints of this nature when in many cases the teachers are probably working hard to get the children engaged in the best way pedagogically, which may not always be a live lesson.

I don't think live is necessary and certain not the best way of teaching. Much better to have something pre-recorded that can be watched a few times if needed.
Schools (not necessarily teachers) can regularly check in on pupils by phoning or Zoom/Teams etc

Why do people think that live lessons = always best?

I think they mean best for them because they can put a kid in front of a laptop for 6 hours.

Not necessarily best for the kid. Or the best way to educate them.

DS1 is yr 8 and last lockdown had three subject lessons per day. None of them were live apart from his language option which sometimes was live (that was optional, they sensibly realised not everyone would be able to log on at the right time). I did wish he had more F2F contact with classmates and teachers but appreciated that this was all put together on an ad hoc basis.

This time, he has his regular full timetable, minus a few things like P.E. and it's meant to be done in 'real time' if possible, so they can message teachers during the lesson slot if they need help. One or two sessions are sometimes live. I think this is pretty good going on the part of the school, who have had to plan ahead for constantly changing contingencies and are also teaching in school those students who have to be in. We've been finding that he still overruns his sessions (probably because he gets distracted by the cat, the hamster, his lego etc) so is taking longer than a school day, and that they haven't restored the pre-Covid timetable where everyone had lunch at, well, lunchtime (before Christmas, DS1 was having lunch from 11.20 to allow for other sittings and social distancing, and this still seems to be his lunchtime slot).

I've got no complaints though, and every respect for his teachers who are working under huge stress.

@noblegiraffe

Why do people think that live lessons = always best?

I think they mean best for them because they can put a kid in front of a laptop for 6 hours.

Not necessarily best for the kid. Or the best way to educate them.

This is absolutely not true from my point at all. I wouldn't want ds in front of zoom lessons all day but I would love him to have that interaction with his teachers and peers at least once a day even if just to quickly cover what they have scheduled and then it's over to parents to teach.

For me it's from a socialising point of view I have an only ds and if I'm being honest if it went for his x box chat and the odd video call with a friend he would have no other child to speak to. You need understand not everyone situation is the same

My kids school are doing none, links on their portal, a pamphlet sent home and weekly worksheets and that's it, so don't any teacher come on here trying to defend this, it's unacceptable that your getting paid full pay for doing jack shit.

@MsJaneAusten

There are also at least three threads with complaints about too much live content...

There are You can pair up the threads "my child has too much live teaching" v "my child has no/too little live teaching"

My advice to all parents who start these threads is to talk to your school. If there's a specific issue then I'm sure they'll help you to address it.

But an hour a day sounds fine to me, a good balance actually. I'm offering that amount to my SEND children who would struggle to focus for more.
Ds' school offer weekly zoom chats only. He's pleased as he hates zoom with a passion.

yet teachers are on full pay and don't even have to teach them an hour a day
I understand that you are frustrated and that your finances are causing you massive concern, but please understand that teachers are working incredibly hard at the moment. The guidance is constantly changing, and our SLT spend their whole time in meetings sorting it all out (and most of the have classes to teach as well). Between a quarter and a third of the DC are in school where I work (including most of those with EHCPs) so the teachers and TAs are juggling dealing with the DC who are there and teaching them, marking work sent in by email/answering queries, and making sure that the learning grids for the next few days are ready and accurate with all the correct links etc. It takes almost as long to present a lesson to 9 children as it does to 30 and while it takes less time to get round the class and answer questions, there's all that extra planning to do. Marking online takes longer than on paper (yesterday I had the perfect storm of slow internet, fogged-up glasses due to my mask, and work that was sometimes sideways or tiny that I couldn't rotate or enlarge).

Believe me, we are doing our utmost to provide an education for everyone's children while keeping safe (with handwashing and bubbles and temperature checks) the ones we have in school.

@24HoursInPoliceCustody

My kids school are doing none, links on their portal, a pamphlet sent home and weekly worksheets and that's it, so don't any teacher come on here trying to defend this, it's unacceptable that your getting paid full pay for doing jack shit.

Take it up with your school. Perhaps they are limiting contact with you because of your attitude.

Absolutely naff all contact for my kids.

State secondary teacher here, full online timetable via Teams.

@24HoursInPoliceCustody

My kids school are doing none, links on their portal, a pamphlet sent home and weekly worksheets and that's it, so don't any teacher come on here trying to defend this, it's unacceptable that your getting paid full pay for doing jack shit.

First of all, that's demonstrably not "Jack shit" Secondly, take it up directly with the head. It's not good enough, no. So ask for more.