Our school isn't doing live lessons due to the number of families sharing devices and to give families flexibility to arrange the work around their own needs. It's all prerecorded, the majority from external sources. Plus the cost to families on data usage.

Live lessons aren't necessarily the best.

The school I work at (TA) are not doing any live lessons for the reasons above. Lots of families sharing devices or trying to fit homeschooling around their own work patterns means that it just isn't feasible. All the lessons are recorded videos of their own class teacher, or the other teacher from their year group, uploaded to the site for them to access when they can. We're also doing phone calls to speak to both parents and children at least once a fortnight (and can do more if needed) and are in daily contact via email. Seems to be getting a lot of positive feedback.

We get a half hour video call every morning. Teacher plays numbers bingo with the class. Then 2 reading group video calls a week. Group of 4 in the reading group. They have a pile of worksheets such as writing and learning common words / colouring in and numbers work which so far seems like games such as put 10 items on the table, cover with a cloth, adult to take some away and child has to say how many. So simple adding and subtracting. They have number lines and doubling to do too. That kind of thing. we have been asked to photograph and upload to teams.

I find live sessions a pain. Really limits being able to go out during the day with 3 children of different ages having to access them.

We have no live lessons or video lessons. We have PowerPoint presentations with audio and worksheets. We have the occasional video message from a yr1 teacher but never my child’s teacher.

Not year 1 but I have a reception child that has a 20/30 min call every morning, a pre recorded lesson, work set and a live call every afternoon for story time, oh and a live music class everyday.

My year 2 child has live calls throughout the day, and precorded lessons to watch. She also has a story time every day.

Its amazing and works so much better then the first lockdown, when we just received 1 sheet of work.

Presumably they're not sharing one device though, Unicorn?

That's where the problems come in. We had a lot of live stuff through the first lockdown - catch ups, zoom quizzes, lessons - but so many parents gave feedback that it was impossible for them to access them that we decided not to do them this time. If you've only got one laptop for the household and mum needs it 8-4 for work, even one child's ability to access live content is severely limited. Factor in siblings in different classes...

It's one of those things that works beautifully if everyone is fortunate to have the right set up, but it adversely affects children from lower income families considerably more than content that can be accessed at a time convenient to them.

No live lessons here for the reasons set out above. It works for us- I am working full time and my husband works out of the house. We have 3 children and are lucky to have enough devices, but I can't be supervising multiple live lessons and doing my job. We get videos from the teacher explaining the work and feedback on work submitted within the lesson time usually. The teacher might send a personal little video to check in every now and then and we get a phone call sometimes too. My 5 year old is happy with this and so am I. The school did ask for feedback and were prepared to do live lessons but the overwhelming feedback was that it was not the preferred option for most families.

We have a live zoom session each day. It's a pain, as I also have another kid who has various live sessions on top of my own calls. Be careful what you wish for...

That doesn't mean I think you should only be getting one worksheet by the way. That was piss poor provision by the school however you look at it!

My kids (Y2 and Y4) are getting recorded maths, literacy, and PE sessions every day, plus one extra (like French, science, art etc). Then they've got extra non-screen challenges to do through the week. Lots of provision, but nothing live.

I read a thread yesterday moaning about a year 1 child having zoom assemblies and story times because it was unreasonable and far too much.

What’s perfect for you is a nightmare for another family.

Schools won’t ever please everyone - at best they will please the majority at their particular school, which might be quite different from another school.

My year 1 do has-
Morning Google classroom chat. 20 minutes to go over what they're going to do that day. General chat.
Phonics recorded lesson, usually with some work attached.
Core Calculations, all given out at the start of the week
Maths recorded lesson and some work attached
Sometimes some DT, so a video with something to do/make
Sometimes a PSE activity and 1 Google classroom PSE chat a week.
Afternoon Google classroom chat to go over any work they've completed, ask any questions etc.
An Oak academy MTP lesson every afternoon.
Lots of other resources, phonics play, sound mats etc.

We do the morning chat every day but never the afternoon one as I have two dc in the same key stage and they clash, we can use two laptops in the morning but only one in the afternoon and doing it on my phone was frustrating. Also, because I need to supervise both dc we haven't always completed the work they go over.

We have no live interaction here either. We get lots of worksheets and work submitted gets a cursory comment made but no plans, suggestions for improvements etc. It's pretty shit tbh

I have 2 DDs reception age and year 2. They each have a daily zoom session with their teacher and class lasting anything from 10-30 minutes.

Mine has 2 live lessons of about half an hour each for English and Maths. Then they do a 15 minute story time before lunch. After lunch one group has guided reading, so that is once a week for each child. Then there is a short afternoon lesson, usually about 15 minutes but it depends how many children want to show their teddy/say what they had for lunch/tell the teacher it is raining etc. Plus every lesson then has a sheet or activity to complete afterwards. It is a lot and some days he struggles with it, but in general it is good. Most children are on every call, but it is an affluent area so probably not so many issues with devices. In the school I teach at we have many more families struggling for devices and Internet access. Having so much input does make it difficult to do anything else with the day, which is hard for the toddler because every time we start getting into anything we have to stop for the older one's lesson.

We have a timetable emailed at the beginning of the week. Links to videos on YouTube etc, worksheets attached or links to the relevant activity on purple mash.
Content seems fairly balanced and rounded. Email contact with class teacher. I wouldn’t expect anymore as they’re all in school on a set number of days as well as providing support / marking work etc. More than half the teachers at dc3’s primary also have their own children to home school.

My yr 1 DD gets 3 x 30 minute zoom calls per day. Phonics, maths and topic work. The phonics is done in 2 groups depending on reading level. They chat a bit at the beginning of each lesson so the children can say if they have some news etc. There are some tasks set to do between lessons but not compulsory. They put work children have sent in on a gallery on the school website.

It is really good but I can see it would be difficult for parents if they are trying to work from home because it really needs a parent on hand. There is about 40% of children in school and a high turn out on line for the other 60%.

I also have year 7 and year 9 dcs too. I couldn’t cope with set timetabled zoom lessons for yr1 dc3, as need to help both of them with some bits of work too. (They do both have lessons via teams throughout the day, but they can get on with them ok, until they need a bit of help with the standalone work).

We don't have live classes but her teacher sends out an email every Friday with the following weeks timetable. We have to do 6 topics a day (phonics, maths, active break session, English, picture assembly and a topic so science, music, geography, pe challenge etc). She will include links to videos on either YouTube or the websites we need to use. Most of the links will have videos we have to watch and complete the tasks, we also have to download worksheets. As well as homework which are the apps the school use so reading, numbers, times tables and spellings.
They reckon we should be doing between 4-6 hours a day not including the homework. Then we get a 7 minute video call each week to catch up.

It will also depend on how many children are in school - round here there are about 40% of children in by the time you add in vulnerable and key worker children. 1FE schools don’t have staff to teach a class in school and do live lessons for home school too.

year 1 - 3 zoom calls a day - work gets explained they watch a video then get sent to do worksheets or write a letter or something. we photograph the work and send it to the teacher

some days the zoom call will be PE with Joe instead or some days will be an assembly with the head reading a story... they will also have their regular coding lessons on zoom once every two weeks (i think, starts tomorrow)

so, all in all I am very happy with the school

i also pop to the school once a week where the teacher leaves me 4 biff chip etc books in an envelope and I return the old ones

and should mention is is a non-religious plain state school in London - 2 forms a year

the year 4 is also having similar - 3 zooms and coding and assemblies