Longer school days to make up for lost learning

[StitchInLime]

Source: Various newspapers, give it a Google (admittedly with a right wing lean)

Apparently one of the options being considered, nothing set in stone of course but for the purposes of discussion...

AIBU to feel both joy and sadness at the prospect of this (joy for me so I can claw back work hours, joy for children so they can claw back some school time but sadness for my teacher friends and all teachers who will need to add more hours to already heavy workload).

Teachers are already working full time.
They'll need to find and pay other staff to run this horseshit set up.
Where will that money come from, then?

It won't work and it won't happen.

My school made staff redundant and cut the hours of some staff at the end of the last school year because of lack of funds. They cannot afford to pay for extra hours. I already do several unpaid hours a week over my contracted hours - I’m not willing to do more, sorry.

It really is time certain members stopped lying about what's happened in the past. Either they are stupid or deliberately goady.

The comment about the unions are total bullshit and the poster knows that full well. Just stirring the shit.

I'm pretty sure Us4them were recruiting a parent army a month or so back to get schools reopened- with or without teachers. I bet they got tons of volunteers so government could use them to run extended school day provision?

Ugh imagine those idiots in charge😂

Civic duty

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

It’s not conscription.

I agree with people saying social skills and sports would be a better focus. I don't want some unqualified stranger messing around with my daughter's education, so I hope it will be optional

I trust our headteachers to make the best, informed decision for their students.

Until then will wait and see.

@FizzyPepsi 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
So they'll be no teachers to teach. That should solve it.
I'm currently working 11 hour days and I'm knackered - as are the kids. Longer days are not the answer. Really stupid idea.

Forget who would or wouldn't do it. This is NOT what children need.

Children need play, fresh air, exercise and friendship. They need to recover their childhood - they have lost a year of vital development - we know - ALL the researh shows - the children develop through PLAY.

We could see this as a wonderful summer of play for kids of ALL ages - and I include teenagers - they all need to socialise intensely, get time away from parents and adults! They need to be self directed, free and joyful.

IF we let them do this they will return to their 'learning' in a far far better and more receptive state.

No. Stupid idea. Kids and teachers are tired enough with the current school day.

The school days in England are far too short.

You’d hate it in Cyprus then (school finishes at 1:30pm and they have longer holidays than we do too!) and in Finland, (schools generally start at 9:45 and finish at 2pm, with an extra week’s holiday to us). Although France’s school day is 8:30 to 4:30, the breaks are longer and usually no lessons on a Wednesday or at least Wednesday afternoon, so has 24 hours of lessons per week. Kids in U.K. usually have 25 hours or so per week. Denmark elementary schools do 7:45-2pm Mon-Thurs and 7:45-12:45 on Friday but no homework is set which balances out the hours to ours.

In short schools days in England are not too short and in fact, longer than other countries who have better Pisa outcomes.

My 15 year old's school day is already 8.30 - 4.30...

I won't be agreeing to this for my teenagers unless it is run by their usual qualified teachers in their usual school. Even then I hope it doesn't happen because it's not fair on the teachers and TAs. I doubt the government would make the money available to pay an increased salary anyway.

We could do with a child-centred, not curriculum-centred approach to this.

so less physical social art ect activity that the children have been missing (badly)
less time to do homework?
Can't use teachers (surely?)& more random volunteers? & schools make money (they desperately need!) from out of hours hire.
To teach/support children to catch up what they have missed on a strictly individual personalized level - you will need someone who knows & has a rapport with the child. They have to have specific training & skills & be up to date with the current way of teaching &the syllabus.
The better way, surely, is to invest in training & getting extra support assistants IN the classroom - extra finance for school & smaller class groups & although its not popular either more building or using other unused venues or temporary classrooms
We have to examine all alternatives
This is particularly relevant for deprived areas/children/ & those with ANY learning difficulties etc who have had least access to education or the type of education they need. These children already were likely to have lower attainment & this discrepancy is worse because of covid

[quote FizzyPepsi]@BonnesVacances

neu.org.uk/media/13906/view

This is the long list of demands that the NEU has- including teachers 'not being subjected to excessive screen time' and 'pre-recorded lessons are the NEU's preference'.[/quote]

How are you understanding "online" lessons as I don't see anything there that supports what you're saying? Are you in fact conflating live lessons/ online lessons/ virtual lessons?

The unions were advocating against face to face lessons on site in school. In fact, iirc they wanted blended learning with a mix of virtual and f2f lessons with smaller classes sizes to permit social distancing between students and staff.

I can't see how this fits in with your narrative of unions wanting schools to be closed for months and for NO education to take place, so they have to now suck it up and put the extra time in now to help kids catch up.

No thanks. My child is not behind so I won't have him forced through this, nor mandatory schooling through holidays.

@Wondergirl100 well said- couldn't agree more!

(It does occur to me that it might be possible to extend teaching hours by one hour per day without increasing teacher workloads, if the government and SLTs were prepared to be bold and bin a lot of unnecessary stuff. Example: get rid of almost all marking, and replace it with whole class feedback. Most marking has no impact on attainment and is done largely to please parents, and it takes up hours and hours of teacher time. Tell parents to mark their own kids' work if they are so set on marking! A lot of paperwork that teachers are expected to spend time could probably be junked as well....)

@FizzyPepsi this is irony right?
Or you are an idiot or a troll?
Please telI I would love to know

@GinAndTonicOnIt

Contrary to the governments belief, you can't just stick any old volunteer in-front of a class and expect to 'make up for lost time'.

I'm a teacher, I wouldn't want my own children to do this without more information about who these people are who would be teaching these extra hours. I've experienced a few trainees who were awful, and it took more time to undo the poor teaching as the students had gained many misconceptions.

This.

I’ve stopped teaching now but I wouldn’t want my child being taught by a random person. I’m imagining teacher having to undo damage done buy those won’t understand phonics or know the exam spec and that’s before I start thinking about pedagogy.

Kids are knackered after a full day of school. It's not fair to insist that are working longer hours....

Great post @Wondergirl100