Covid Catch up funding

[Hexagon2]

Boris talked a lot about this but have you heard of extra catch up sessions being put on for your children? Is there really any funding?

My DD is Y6 and I've got a sinking feeling that the headteacher is choosing not to spend any money on Y6 as with no SATS taking place anymore he doesn't need to worry about league tables. I really hope this isn't true.

My DD has just scored 17 out of 34 in a Maths class assessment which is not a pass. I really don't want her going off to secondary school feeling left behind in Maths.

Our school have now pulled all the "fun" subjects after seeing the mess the kids' Maths and English is in. Plus sent umpteen bits of homework out and basically blocked the parents for not covering the lockdown work properly in the first place.

I'm looking into alternative schools.

Any additional money and time seems to be aimed at the kids of the parents who shout the loudest and have had everything thrown at them from nursery onwards but still seem to just cause constant disruption to everyone else.

My Year 2 DD has been in covid catch up classes, but the funding runs out at May half term so no idea what happens to those children who haven't caught up by then.

I contacted my child's school this morning via their messaging service to ask where the covid premium funding information was. No response to my message but the info has magically appeared on the website this afternoon. Looks like my child won't be receiving any form of catch up.

@BlueChampagne

Another governor here (and parent of a Y6) - yes, writing is the one that seems to have suffered most. Parents least equipped to support at home? Less parental awareness of what's required? Also the writing expectations have changed recently, placing less emphasis on ticking off all the technicalities, and more on individual flair. Which is good, except perhaps the timing!

Just to clarify for writing, the criteria haven't changed: all technical aspects still have to be used and evidenced across multiple pieces for each child. Individual flair is expected within those criteria, particular for the first assessment point of Greater Depth, and always has been.

There has been a slight easing so that if a particular child has one specific issue, it won't prevent them attaining the Expected Standard or Greater Depth. For example, if there is a child who has been having targetted spelling support for years but still isn't spelling at the Y6 expected level, he can be age related if everything else on the criteria list is proven and the issue is specific to him (and not class/group wide).

For example, if there is a child who has been having targetted spelling support for years but still isn't spelling at the Y6 expected level, he can be age related if everything else on the criteria list is proven and the issue is specific to him (and not class/group wide).

Moderator here - that’s not quite right. A child cannot be deemed to have all of the spelling objective discounted. There could be a specific weakness in an aspect of spelling - the example given in training is an EAL child who has a specific weakness spelling suffixes.

In any case, TAs are suspended for this year - schools will usually be asked to give informal assessments by individual secondary schools like last year, but that’s all.

My DS is in Year 2 in an outstanding state primary. School are running sessions in English before school for about half the class and after school for maths. They were given mock sats before the holidays and anyone not where they would have expected them to be is being “caught up”. They set full learning in both lockdown 1 (on website and marked) and live in lockdown 2. There are interventions in normal times too for those struggling. School very good at getting extra funding/help for those who need it, even in normal times. Basically, very well run schools know what they are doing.

Not really, since all the Y2 assessment is teacher assessment and has to be mostly evidenced in books - the odd question might be used as a tiny piece of evidence for a few objectives. The tests represent a very narrow snapshot of Y2 assessment and as such are not reported anywhere. An over reliance on them as described shows a fundamental misunderstanding of Y2 assessment.

"An over reliance on them as described shows a fundamental misunderstanding of Y2 assessment."

This.

Riquesh
A particular weakness, which would prevent an overall accurate and fair assessment of the child, can lead to one, or in some extreme cases two, "pupil can..." statement(s) not needing to be met.

Of course, you'd have to have the evidence to support that judgement. In practice, this would show which aspects of that standard the child could and couldn't do but that particular statement would still not have to be met in order for the child to attain WTS, EXS or GDS.

Moderator too.

That’s clearer - your first post made it sound like the whole of spelling could be a specific weakness, so felt the need to clarify. Thanks for reposting.

Ah - apologies for not being clearer. No, if you could ignore anything in its entirety, there'd be a huge jump in attainment nationally and the assessment of writing is already shaky enough as it is.

Our primary school asked for all lockdown learning books to be handed in and they were looked at/assessed but not sure how the school would know when children got help from adults or not. Our school are also running mental health intervention aka small group worry sessions/1 to 1 with TAs and extra exercise classes for certain children (not sure how they picked those kids). We all filled in a questionnaire stating where we as parents felt kids had suffered the most eg academics/mental well being/physical fitness

My school has employed an academic mentor to run catch up classes. The kids seem to mess about in them, and apparently she's only had two weeks training.

So our school is giving everyone extra maths and English.

My child didn't need that. I would have signed her up for extra sport though. Her clubs all stopped obviously and I had covid and her fitness has sufferered. Or if they had extra play. She missed free play with friends. Sport or play and Id have been there!

Are schools supposed to declare how much they receive or are we allowed to ask for this? I hadn't heard anything about this from them directly but have had a brief look on their website which only mentions receiving it in a few lines about 'increasing staffing for a broad suite of interventions across school', none of which have been relayed to us

Our school catch-up sessions are well under way and have been running since school re-opened.

School will assess what the priority is and how to spend the funding. Doesn't mean it will be spent on every child.

The school will feedback on
1)how it is intended that the grant will be spent
2)how the effect of this expenditure on the educational attainment of those pupils at the school will be assessed