Y11 teacher off ill, what should we expect from school regarding lessons?

[LynetteScavo]

One of DDs teachers is unfortunately in hospital. DD was informed about this by the head of department during another lesson. Apparently it's hoped the teacher will be well enough to return after Easter.

What would you expect from the school regarding this? I don't expect a supply teacher to start doing live lessons, but I would have expected work to be sent through on this teachers behalf. Or is that expecting too much?

As a parent would you ask the Head of Year to clarify? (The head of department has blanked me for the last four weeks, so I'm not going to bother emailing them again). Obviously I'm worried DD might not be taught anything in this subject until her teacher is able to return to work.

If the teacher has just gone into hospital I wouldn’t expect anything for a week/ten days to give them time to decide how best to deal with the circumstance.

But I’d say work sent through and regular opportunities to chat to another teacher in the same subject at some point, as the bare minimum.

I’m a head of department with a member of staff currently off. I have set the work for them on their Team each lesson. Sometimes it’s just a link to an Oak Academy lesson. But they always have something. I would never leave students without work.

As it is year 11 have they have finished the syllabus for that subject at all. Many of year 11s have for a variety of subjects and they are moving into a revision phase. The Head of Department will surely make sure that they are catered for and if the course is not finished and being dealt with remotely no doubt another teacher of the same subject will be able to join that group in with theirs for the purpose of live lessons.

As they will need to do Teacher Assessed Grades they must be in the process of putting something into place to address this too. Perhaps it is too early at present for a definite plan to be in place but I am sure they must be on it.

How awful. If it's a good school, I'm sure they will be rapidly coming up with a plan. Y11 is top priority. Hope teacher gets better soon.

We've had this in y10 with 2 of 3 sciences out and it was mainly a link to Oak Academy and they are a couple of months behind in those now. There was a supply teacher but not in science when in school.

I think school will be looking into it but if you can find anything yourself it may help.

I have a colleague off sick at the moment. Their classes are all being taught by other members of the dept.

The next lesson is not until after half term, so I'll wait to see what happens. The fact that Oak Academy is available now is great! If nothing is forthcoming from school I'll ask what still needs to be covered (the school isn't dreadful but I have no faith o the head of department).
I've no idea how much is left of the course - they don't start GCSEs until Y10, so possibly quite a bit.
I very much hope the teacher gets better soon, not just for the teachers sake but also, selfishly, I don't want DD worrying about her.

No one starts GCSE's until Year 10...
Your DD should know exactly what she has covered, what is left and how well she understands so far. Ask to see her personalised learning checklist and then you can look at the specification. If there is a lot outstanding, then I would contact sooner rather than later, if a relatively negligible amount (about a unit or so) then leave for about 5 working days to allow the dust to settle and the dept to reconfigure.

There are some schools which start GCSEs is Year 9, @balloonsintrees.
I would expect Oak lessons to be set, they are really good. Or double up classes, especially when doing online live lessons. Year 11s should be top priority, so I would politely ask for clarification.
Supply teachers will be hard to come by at the moment and might not be the best solution.

GCSEs are two year courses and shouldn't be started until year 10.
My hod is terrible at communicating but SLT are on top of our cover situation. I'm sure the same is the case in your school.

@balloonsintrees

No one starts GCSE's until Year 10... Your DD should know exactly what she has covered, what is left and how well she understands so far. Ask to see her personalised learning checklist and then you can look at the specification. If there is a lot outstanding, then I would contact sooner rather than later, if a relatively negligible amount (about a unit or so) then leave for about 5 working days to allow the dust to settle and the dept to reconfigure.

Most schools start GCSEs in Year 9.

Ask to see her personalised learning checklist

Erm, DD has no such thing. I've just asked Y13 DS if he could remember and he said "What? There's probably a check list somewhere. Maybe in the front on your English book or something? Who knows! So I asked DD who is still awake and she said "Oh no, only upper set has those." I asked how she knows what she still needs to learn and she said "I don't"

I am very tempted to email the head of department to ask what still needs to be covered, just to prove a point, as I'm pretty sure she has no idea.

And lots of schools do start GCSEs before year 10.

Find the exam board website and the sample assessments for the subject and ask your daughter which she's done.

What is the backstory to the head of year blanking you?

Most schools start GCSEs in Year 9.

They really don't.

What subject? Is it something your child wants to do after y11?

My biggest concern would be evidence for possible teacher grading at the end of the year.

@MNerGoneRogueAgain

What is the backstory to the head of year blanking you?

All students had new email addresses at the beging of January. They had to login with their name and change their password. DD followed the instructions, but couldn't log in to Teams. The IT help desk confirmed DD had done everything correctly, but also confirmed my suspicion that DD had set up the account in her full first name rather than the name she is known as at school. (Penelope rather than Penny for example). So all teachers had been provided with the email PennyScavo for her. As advised, DD emailed all teachers explaining they had to add her email as PenelopeScavo. All but two teachers did as soon as they read her email. I also emailed the teachers to clarify. (It was very interesting how individual teachers reacted. One apologised every lesson for the following week for not reading her emails on her day off which meant DD missed a live lesson. One didn't read the email properly and insisted she did have the correct email address already and basically told me she had everything under control, and then had to back track when she realised DD wasn't in the lessons) but radio silence from head of department . DDs form tutor and head of year had both emailed her about it, but it wasn't until DDs form tutor spoke to her in school, after I said DD was being failed by the school, that she manually added DDs email address and DD was able to access any live lessons or work set by the head of department. So that was three weeks of DD missing out on lessons and work in that subject. It was a bit like everyone else in the class had been invited to a party and DD hadn't, so she felt quite hurt. As you can imagine I sent a few emails about this, and two thank you emails to the head of department when it was resolved, but radio silence. -- She also calls DD Poppy during the online lessons, which I suppose is better than "the girl at the back " which she calls her in school--

Sorry that was long, but you did ask.

@LynetteScavo

Ask to see her personalised learning checklist

Erm, DD has no such thing. I've just asked Y13 DS if he could remember and he said "What? There's probably a check list somewhere. Maybe in the front on your English book or something? Who knows! So I asked DD who is still awake and she said "Oh no, only upper set has those." I asked how she knows what she still needs to learn and she said "I don't"

I am very tempted to email the head of department to ask what still needs to be covered, just to prove a point, as I'm pretty sure she has no idea.

And lots of schools do start GCSEs before year 10.

Ofsted challenge schools that start them before Y10, as they argue its not providing a broad and balanced curriculum.

I would email the HOD and ask for a copy of the syllabus. Then sit down with your DC, figure out what they’ve already covered, have a gander at Oak Academy and pick some units that seem appropriate.
Or wait until after half term when school should have organised something.
Here’s the link to the Y11 English units on Oak Academy.
classroom.thenational.academy/subjects-by-year/year-11/subjects/english

We have been covering other teachers who are off, combining classes for the key worker kids in school etc. At a minimum an online assignment is set, if we can match to the same place as another class they may be asked to join the live lesson with a different teacher. Some schools are doing very little it seems.

No, it's not a subject DD wants to do next year, but she was "currently working at a grade 4" in the autumn and at parents evening the teacher didn't rule out a 5, although that was possibly the teacher just being motivational. DD probably did really, really badly in the mock, so I'm very keen on there being evidence and the teacher making a full and speedy recovery.

We do really like this teacher and of course wish her well for her own sake too!

@alwuebaha We've been doing the same. We are a core subject though so have the staff available. If this is a minority subject taught by one person in the whole school this would be very different. I teach an option that is only me. If I was off, cover would be a struggle.

@balloonsintrees

No one starts GCSE's until Year 10... Your DD should know exactly what she has covered, what is left and how well she understands so far. Ask to see her personalised learning checklist and then you can look at the specification. If there is a lot outstanding, then I would contact sooner rather than later, if a relatively negligible amount (about a unit or so) then leave for about 5 working days to allow the dust to settle and the dept to reconfigure.

Personal learning checklist? Never heard of it and I've been teaching for 27 years, including GCSE & A level.

We start our GCSE courses in year 9. I don't know why MN has this obsession about OFSTED not liking it; we were graded as Outstanding yet again last year. We've been doing this for around 15 years.

OP, find out which exam board your DD is using then look at the specification online. Then you/she can see what is missing. I do like revision guides, especially the CGP ones. They are written in a light-hearted style but cover everything. I have never been able to distil their information down further. Then use Oak Academy & BBC Bitesize to fill the gaps.

It is really tough when a colleague goes off sick, especially in a small department. Mine has 2 of us, my boss who is full-time and me 0.5. We are both members of all departmental Teams and will both answer questions kids pose, especially if one is teaching live and the other is on PPA or lunch. Trying to set work whilst also teaching live remote lessons and possibly supervising vulnerable & key worker kids is really hard so, whilst I share your frustration, please do cut them some slack this coming week. After half term, I would expect a clear plan as they will have had time to set things in place.

I don't know why MN has this obsession about OFSTED not liking it

Despite this, educationinspection.blog.gov.uk/2020/01/09/making-curriculum-decisions-in-the-best-interests-of-children/

This still happened www.google.com/amp/s/schoolsweek.co.uk/schools-running-3-year-gcses-twice-as-likely-to-be-inadequate-new-report-finds/amp/

As a minimum I'd have expected lessons via Oak academy and links to other resources.

@MotherExtraordinaire Oak doesn't cover everything. (this is not a bashing Oak post, they are fab, but some subjects aren't covered on there, one of mine included).

Personal learning checklist? Never heard of it and I've been teaching for 27 years, including GCSE & A level.
Never heard of it here either.

We start our GCSE courses in year 9. I don't know why MN has this obsession about OFSTED not liking it; we were graded as Outstanding yet again last year. We've been doing this for around 15 years
If it doesn't lead to a narrowing of the curriculum then there is nothing stopping schools making whatever decisions are right for their students. Unfortunately 3 year KS4s can easily become a very narrow curriculum. Certainly the places I know that have done it for English seem to have the approach 'teach the content in y9/10 to get it done and then spend y11 revising, and by revising we mean exam prep and reaching material that we didn't really teach properly first time round'.

OP If you can get a copy of the specifications, that would be a start and I would expect a Year 11 student would have their revision guides by now. Get DC to identify any areas that are totally unknown and areas they could brush up on. Focus on brushing up on slightly weaker areas between now and the end of half term and then see what the school have prepared for the other areas after half term.