Parents expecting work packs when we're still open

[Bridecilla]

My lessons are mainly interactive / powerpoint based so wouldn't have the same impact printed out.

I've started sorting online resources etc on the usual platforms and will obviously have more time to update these if and when we close.

Parents are expecting "work packs" which we simply don't have time to collate. Does anyone know what our responsibilities are to children whose parents choose to keep them off before shut down?

[echt]

I've emailed all parents and students to look at the day's lesson plan if they want to keep up to date. Those would be the lessons plans I've been posting all term.

[Luunaa]

Here's the wording of the email sent:

At the moment we are still running a fully functioning school and will continue to do so until the Government advises us otherwise. If you choose to keep your child at home, either because they are showing symptoms or someone else in your house is ill, I regret that we are not in a position to prepare work on an individual basis for them at the moment. Our efforts must be to prepare for full emergency school closure as well as continuing to run the school as usual.

[Luunaa]

I was just coming on to say we have no printer paper left anyway!

We sent out an email saying packs will be available when school closes, but anyone not in before that happens can't have work provided unfortunately.

[Kuponut]

Times table rockstars sent a mailing out at the weekend saying they'd do free access for a school's families if they need to close - might be worth chasing up to throw at parents if required. I probably have the email somewhere in my inbox if you need the link. Likewise Twinkl as someone mentioned earlier.

Or (and if you're my kids' teachers please don't do this) - send home the most obnoxious make a model parental timesuck homework going. If you're my kids' teachers - please tell them to do some reading and keep it sane!

[TorysSuckRevokeArticle50]

This is the level of info we have readily available to every parent on the school website. 1 document for each year group. I think that's sufficient for parents to be able to work out their own activities, this is just science and history but it covers all the other subjects too.

I've prepped over the weekend by getting some blank exercise books and craft supplies and if schools close we will keep records of what we do so she can take them in when schools reopen.

[TorysSuckRevokeArticle50]

As a parent who's kid is going to school until someone says they're not to, I wouldn't expect a work pack.

School publishes the curriculum so I know what she has to cover this year and I know what she's already done. Then I'll just do my best to google or improvise the rest.

Unless it's an exam year a few weeks of improvised learning won't hurt them.

Just tell bolshy parents insisting on resources to contact the DfE or figure it out themselves.

[CallmeAngelina]

I think there are specific conditions that denote whether or not we have to provide work for children not in school. Last week, we had five families who were not sending their children in, but only two of those met the criteria for having work sent home.
I think that message has got lost in translation.

[StillbreathingStillhere]

@PegasusReturns
I work from 7am and get home at 5. I then do another 2 to 3 hours in the evening. I would suggest you put a sock in it love.

[StillbreathingStillhere]

HCPs who work part time have been asked to go FT. Manufacturers are working round the clock, police and utility providers have had leave cancelled. It’s an emergency situation that require an emergency response

Oh FFS..... getting work packs to students is hardly a life or death situation. Comparing this to HCP's is beyond ridiculous. When do you propose staff do this on top of everything else they have to do? Nobody will die if they dont get work sent home from school. It's not an emergency. Thankfully some parents use their own initiative.

[StillbreathingStillhere]

We are being told to send work electronically to those who self isolate..... its becoming an effing nightmare to sort out.

[Bridecilla]

Very true about resources being thin on the ground. We currently have no printer paper anyway 🤨

[BelleSausage]

Just for those who are shouting ‘work packs now!’

I make a work pack every holiday for one of my groups for their homework. They are twenty pages long and take up to four hours each to resource, tweak and plan. That amount of work will last them one 40 min homework per week for six weeks.

To make a work pack that lasts for four hours a week for six or eight weeks is a considerable undertaking. If schools don’t already have them then it will take a while to make them

And buying resources off TES is costly. My department don’t have any money left this year. We are currently required to print as little as possible. Is the government going to pay for buying work packs or the hours they take to make or the extra printing budget required to print ten per 1500 kids in our school?

Parents are about to find out how underfunded the U.K. education system is. It’s been held together by good will and teachers spending their own money in resources for ages.

[WyfOfBathe]

I'm already putting in extra hours to get to grips with new software and create online lessons and "work packs" for when we close. I don't have any more spare hours!

I upload the homework to Google Classroom anyway, so if a student can see "perfect tense exercises" then they can Google the perfect tense. It may not sound good coming from a teacher, but your child's education really won't suffer longterm from a week or so with no teacher input. Coronavirus is an emergency, but a shortage of work packs isn't.

[frugalkitty]

My youngest DS is off with a cough (had a temperature but that's gone), I certainly don't expect school to send work for him. He can look on google classroom and do any homework that's due but I'm sure the staff have enough going on without having to send extra work home.

[CaptainBrickbeard]

I’m self isolating with my kids this week due to symptoms and coming up with useful activities for them myself - I wouldn’t dream of asking the school right now, how ridiculous. Even if we aren’t productive this week, it’s not going to ruin their education. Everything is going to be disrupted, a week without a work pack is of zero consequence.

[Minesabecks]

So, just checking - we are already mostly working long hours, but we need to up this considerably to make workpacks, and then when schools shut we need to be online during every normal lesson (while caring for own dc), and accept that we should have summer cut short as we have had extra holidays (except they were spent doing online classes and virtual detentions).

[PopcornZoo]

OP I am sorry I didn't realise you had been contacted by parents on a Sunday!

[justsaynothankyou]

I was very pleased today when the HT of my school reported that a parent who had chosen to withdraw their child and wanted special work was told no; special work will only go up when the school is shut down.

Every lesson is up on the school's system anyway so all they have to do is check in, but hey ho, that's too hard for some.

[Bridecilla]

@NeurotrashWarrior thank you.

There are so many resources online - there should be no need for paper packs.

[NeurotrashWarrior]

Someone I know has worked on this exhaustive list of online learning:


theeducationhub.github.io/

[NeurotrashWarrior]

Until staff are given time during the normal prep and teaching day, those packs are non existent.

I'd reply something like that.

We have an staff meeting which has been switched to preparing packs in our school this week. Sen so it's going to be challenging to come up with appropriate work. We use so much hands on equipment.

[Bridecilla]

Be resourceful and stop treating your child's teacher as a vending machine

That did make me giggle!

I was moaning about this to my Mam earlier and she said "pet, if you worked on a checkout in a shop that didn't do deliveries and a customer called the store to ask you to take him some shopping round would you? No well there's your answer love"

[AlexanderBerry]

I’m in ROI and my DC are definitely not “winging it”. They have full structured school days and have to log in every class as if they were at school. Detentions are being set for missing class as normal and teachers are available online throughout each class
Do they have to do the detention in their own home or something?

[HopeClearwater]

Be resourceful and stop treating your child's teacher as a vending machine

[oncemorewithfeeling99]

Fair enough to be grumpy with those ones!