If the school does virtual lessons do the kids have to attend?

[LittleBoyBlues]

My children and I find virtual school abominable and largely a waste of time. Most of the day is wasted on trying to manage the technology or waiting to ask simple questions and very little learning seems to happen.
Last lockdown the school didn't do virtual classes so we taught them ourselves and they thrived on it. I was really positive about doing even better this time and trying to use more of the school resources but then they sprang Teams on us at the last minute.
It's just sitting infront of a screen all day, very little actual work and no exercise or outside time (or time for it as the schedule blocks out the whole day until the light's almost gone).
Am I legally obliged to make my children attend the virtual classes?
I'm in England and my kids are 8 and 5 in case that makes a difference
TIA

That’s a really good question was pondering the same. I think you need to show some sort of “attendance” if they raise lack of contribution cite your concerns and that your kids have benefitted from home based work which will actually contribute to learning/testing/exams. Teams has caused faffing and caused the kids to lose their flow. Today was a shit show, but I expect that in time it will get better. I am also against the waiting around. It’s great to see the teachers but more than one live lesson is hard to keep the kids interested. Funnily enough I was more prepared this time around.

Just my musings, but I can’t think where the legal obligation to sit through online classes would come from. You have a legal obligation to ensure that your children are educated. Usually you delegate that to a school. You then commit a crime if the children are on the register but don’t attend ‘regularly’ which means ‘on every occasion that the school requires it’ (see the Jon Platt litigation). Obviously if the school authorise an absence for illness or whatever then no crime is committed.

But, the pandemic has changed everything. The government has made it impossible for your children to physically go to school! The question is, as you are still on the register, is your legal obligation to ‘attend regularly’ (a) extinguished by the fact that you cannot physically attend, with the right to decide what they do returning to you, or (b) transformed from physical attendance to whatever activity the school specifies, here, virtual attendance?

I think the answer is clearly (a) and that if you can’t physically attend school, then the legal obligation to ensure they are educated rests on you, but you don’t have to do anything specific. However, some schools and the insane and incompetent education secretary might perhaps disagree with me and feel you are legally required to do anything they feel like telling you to do 🤷‍♀️ no matter how changeable and unhelpful.

Anyway I certainly would not be doing online schooling of the type you describe, it sounds actively harmful. In your shoes I would write to the head saying that you have tried it but it does not work for your children and no genuine education is taking place, therefore you will be educating them offline and are happy to send weekly reports. If the head doesn’t like it you can just deregister now (a one line email to head will suffice) and reregister when schools open (application form).

It's been 3 days. Abonimable.

Anyway no, no one can make you do anything.

This is a tough one.

As a teacher, I am required to keep track of who is engaging with home learning and report this information to the headteacher. If you disengage I.e never attend and do you own thing without chatting with your child’s teacher/ never replying to emails etc, it’s likely you’ll end up being pestered by the teacher/head teacher/pastoral team as they have a duty of care to ensure you’re all ok and that education is happening. Of course, that being said, you may be disengaging with home learning from school because you are doing your own, much better, more tailored learning at home, which is great. I’d have an honest conversation with your children’s teachers and I’ll almost guarantee they’ll be happy to come up with a plan that allows you to largely get on with it whilst also giving them the feedback they need 👍

On a side note, please be patient with home learning. It’s a nightmare to plan, deliver and assess and yet again the government gave us no time at all to completely radicalise how we work as the expectations are so different from last time. Give your schools some time, this week might have been crap as anything was done just to get something out there to parents whilst frantic planning for better learning was happening. I know I worked 12/13 hour days all this week so lots might be happening behind the scenes :)

At our school they are definitely contacting those who are not engaging with the home learning.

We are using Dojo to share the work we are doing. Yesterday a parent came and collected a school laptop for example as the child could have access to their own device.

Next week we are making packs of printed material so that parents can collect those and not have to print things at home. We didn't have time to do this for this week. Obviously.

I'm in year two and part of the issue is that we were already doing catch up work that they missed in year one and now they are missing that too. We are doing seasons in science for example which is a year one topic. We should be doing the Great Fire of London. And that's replicated across all of the curriculum areas.

The maths that the school is asking your child to do now, should have been done last April. So when are they going to learn it now?

My son (age 7, year 3) has one zoom lesson a day but absolutely hates it. He can't get to grips with learning on a screen and just doesn't listen, gets very agitated and angry and verbalise just leaves half way through. I've talked to him about it and he says he finds it really hard, it's not the same as being in class, it's boring, he struggled to hear /understand etc. I've spoken to the school and said it's actually really counter productive and we've agreed he is not going to do it at all. I will just work through the work we can do at home with him. They do put all the work and resources on to their website to access. This is a win for us, DS is a lot less stressed, as am I trying to get him to do it. This is only one session... I can't imagine if a while day was online learning! Good luck.

How are the school using teams in lessons? I mean for interaction? I started off letting them ask me questions in the chat. But found by the end of the week, it was much easier for everyone if I asked them to raise their hands (their camera and mics are off) by using the hand button. Then I say their name, they unmute their mic and ask their question or give their answer. It feels much like the classroom and my lower ability and younger classes are finding its working.
This is secondary, so obviously different. But so far, I think it's working well. As pp have said, if you don't engage without an explanation, you will get the pastoral team pestering you for safeguarding reasons.

Our lessons are recorded so that you can watch them at a time that suits you.

My ds is struggling with the sheer amount of screen time that online lessons involves. I'm thinking of doing something like the morning sessions live, a different activity in the afternoon and then catching up with the afternoon lesson at a different time. One of the lessons is guided reading, so I figured he could just read his book in that slot.

The school have been fantastic though. It's just a long old day in front of a screen for a 7 yo.

Ultimately, schools want children to be happy and engaged. They don’t want stressed and upset children and parents.

Talk to the school and come up with a plan. I’m almost certain they’ll go out of their way to support you and come up with a solution that works for all. Make sure you do engage with them however, as if you don’t it will probably just create difficulties all round.

Perhaps not the most professional thing to say but also there is nothing more infuriating than parents who don’t engage with school but then complain later on. Not saying this is you AT ALL but bear in mind schools deal with this a lot so may not have much patience with those who go MIA.

How can they even enforce online learning? Not everyone has a laptop that is available for children's continuous use - especially in families with multiple children of school age.

I would question whey they are on a screen from 9-3.39 without a break.

Are they expected to sit and stare that the screen whilst those in school have breaktime, lunch and play?

I think not?! So use that time to kick yours into the garden, go for a quick walk around the block and then another quick trip out after school ends.

If most people are honest we loved not having curriculum last time because the weather was amazing and we were quite happy to sit in garden. (Although I was working because I alternated in work and wfh even I had the flexibility to have a few hours off in day to enjoy the sunshine when wfh!)

@BatleyTownswomensGuild

They can’t.

However, schools can enforce some kind of engagement with them. At a last resort (and after multiple failed attempts to contact families) this would mean a well-being home visit which I’m sure everyone would rather avoid.

Legally, parents have a responsibility to make sure their children are accessing education so schools have a duty of care to make sure that is happening. But what that education looks like can be agreed upon between individual families and school, providing parents continue to engage with school :)

We’ve been told from Monday full school uniform must be worn and camera on at all times. Those not in lessons repeatedly will have to go into school.

Do they not have lunchtime to go outside? Our local parks and streets seem to be full of school kids enjoying outside time at lunchtimes.

My instinct would be to push through so they get used to it; and it’ll be refined, simply because while you’re happy to home school now, you might not be happy or able to down the line... and who knows how long this will last, really. I don’t want to be pessimistic and I really hope it’ll be “over” to some extent too; but if schools are shut again next winter, for example, that’s a lot of learning pressure for you to take on.

@Angel2702 Wow! How old?

our private, sec school does full timetable with the same breaks as they normally have. No uniforms. And they have to have their camera on. And be in a public part of the house not in their bedroom :)
I love this last one.

@Angel2702

We’ve been told from Monday full school uniform must be worn and camera on at all times. Those not in lessons repeatedly will have to go into school.

That's residual is when the governments guidelines suggest schools relax uniform in schools because they should have windows and or doors open at all times.

I despair at stupid rules that have no benefit to children during this difficult enough as it is time.

@TheSunIsStillShining

our private, sec school does full timetable with the same breaks as they normally have. No uniforms. And they have to have their camera on. And be in a public part of the house not in their bedroom :) I love this last one.

Not in their bedrooms is preposterous. It could well mean two siblings (or more) would have to be in the same living room with their teachers virtually talking over each other.

in our house it could be: living room with DH and DS talking both at once. Or DS in kitchen with washing machine or cooking or dishwasher noises... :)
So "poor thing" has to do it from bedroom.

My three kids in the US are all having great difficulty with virtual school. The youngest is the worst. He is 13 and absolutely refuses to turn his camera on ever for any teacher or for any assignment. So if an assignment requires a video of himself talking (think German class) he simply takes a zero rather than do it. I've consulted with every one of his teachers, his advisor, even the vice principal and they are all variously supportive but I feel like I have to almost strap him down to a chair to get him to actually do the work, and that is separate and apart from the camera anxiety. I think 75% of the work is STUPID but if he doesn't get most of it done I fear he will have to repeat his grade level. I don't think they are being reasonable to expect the children to do the same amount of work 100% from home especially if a kid cannot organize himself. My kid cannot organize himself. He does not stay on task. He has a horrible attitude and says everything is too hard. He really really really needs to go back in person because I and his father cannot monitor him every day (we both work but have a day here or there to "help" him during live stuff). I end up trying to catch him up in all the stuff he failed to turn in during the week on the weekend and that stresses out the entire household and drives the kid to tears and rants, me to yelling, and the downstairs neighbor to complain we're being too loud. It's no way to do it. I feel like the entire family has been driven into various states of clinical depression and anxiety. I cannot rely on any one of them to just take care of their own work. It's awful.

PS I blame Trump and his minions and the daft anti-maskers for us having to do school online. My own state wouldn't mandate masks because "freedom".

It's a Child Protection issue.

My sons school - year 9 of state comprehensive is full timetable on Microsoft Teams . Camera must be on. Full school uniform must be worn. Background must be neutral and not near a door where someone may walk past. Registrations at 8.40 and if they log onto lessons more than 5 minutes late they get a behaviour code . Oh and if that wasn't strict enough my friends daughter got told off for having her hair down and got told to tie it up all while sitting in her own home.

I sort of agree 2x zoom per child which is fine but only 20min and not finished till 2:20 when its getting dark soon.
To go out we would have to be back before 1pm.
Ideally 40min at once for eldest anyway so it's done then a long break. But they want a break after the 20min lesson! We then have to fit in
2x oak dc2
1 oak and 1 WRM dc1
Lots of math sheets
Some art

Dc2 is losing out because of all the maths.

I just dont like things daily. It's really bitty and involves 5x the time spent printing.

DDs school have started a trial of zoom lessons this week and she hasn’t taken part in any. The school did say in their email that they understand that it may not be do able for some people are they are ok with that. They ask for the child to be sat in a quiet room, no distractions or other people and there needs to be a parent to be sat next to, but out of camera shot, for the duration of the lesson. There will be parents who are on work calls/meetings that won’t be able to meet these expectations and timings. For us, DS who is 9 months can’t be guaranteed to be silent for half hour, I also cannot leave him unsupervised in another room or expect him to understand he needs to cooperate 😂 so unless the lessons happens to be a nap time it just won’t be realistic for DD to take part.

I'm teaching from home (not U.K.) & have 3 teenagers. It's all over Zoom. We're all on our bloody knees!

& that's best case scenario with an affluent student body, multiple devices as standard, & teachers who all get generous accommodation packages so can easily wfh - for example my villa has 4 bedrooms in the main house, a study for me, a separate self contained 'granny flat' apartment for sixth form ds, & a bungalow in the garden for anyone who needs peace & quiet. Teachers with young dc have affordable live in childcare.

Plus of course I'm a) wfh so around to help my dc & b) a qualified teacher.

& my dc are all academically able & old enough to get on independently 90% of the time.

If we are struggling, it's clearly next to impossible for huge numbers of people.