Remote education provision: Information for Parents

This information is intended to provide clarity and transparency to pupils and parents or carers about what to expect from remote education where national or local restrictions require entire cohorts (or bubbles) to remain at home.

For details of what to expect where individual pupils are self-isolating, please see the final section of this page.

The remote curriculum: what is taught to pupils at home

Moving from school education to remote education is a big change for a child, they may have lots of questions and may need to talk through what has happened and why. You may want to look through our Covid-19 Information.

What should my child expect from immediate remote education in the first day of pupils being sent home?

In the first day we will support children to transition to remote education by providing the following activities:

·  Set up a learning space.

·  Take part in a PE session.

·  Complete a topic related activity.

·  Read a book.

·  Complete an Education City game of your choice.

Following the first few days of remote education, will my child be taught broadly the same curriculum as they would if they were in school?

We provide the same curriculum remotely as we do in school wherever possible and appropriate. However, we may need to make some adaptations in some subjects. For example, our Forest School, Art and music sessions – we may adapt the activities/suggest alternative activities to reflect the limitations in terms of resources. Some Maths activities may differ due to the limited availability of resources at home.

Remote teaching and study time each day

How long can I expect work set by the school to take my child each day?

We expect that remote education (including remote teaching and independent work) will take pupils broadly the following number of hours each day:

Accessing remote education

How will my child access any online remote education you are providing?

• Tapestry (for uploaded resources, video links or clips and links to live teaching)
• Collins eBook library
• Purple Mash
• Education City
• White Rose teaching videos
• BBC Bitesize videos
• Oak Academy

If my child does not have digital or online access at home, how will you support them to access remote education?

We recognise that some pupils may not have suitable online access at home. We take the following approaches to support those pupils to access remote education:

• We have the potential of loaning a laptop. Certain criteria apply.  Please contact us for more information.
• We have the potential to support enabling an internet connection. (eg. routers, or dongles).  Certain criteria apply.  Please contact us for more information.
• If no online access is available to you, we will offer to post all home learning plans and resources.
• To submit work with no online access, we suggest posting work on a fortnightly basis. A teacher will then call the parent and child to give verbal feedback.

How will my child be taught remotely?

We use a combination of the following approaches to teach pupils remotely:

• Weekly planning overview with links, suggested websites and ideas
• live teaching for some groups (where children would normally receive additional support in school, be part of intervention groups or are on the SEND register)
• live sessions (e.g. story sessions, show and tell sessions, speaking and listening sessions)
• recorded teaching (White Rose for Maths, P.E sessions – yoga and exercise, Forest School, Phonics teaching – teaching staff, Values Worship – Head of School, Diocesan weekly worship)
• printed resource packs (resources that may help support learning at home – e.g. whiteboards, pens, hundred squares and number lines)
• Collins eBooks for daily reading, Charanga for music sessions, Purple Mash for computing and Education City for all subjects including homework tasks)

Engagement and feedback

What are your expectations for my child’s engagement and the support that we as parents and carers should provide at home?

Children should have a quiet space to work, with the equipment that they need for each session. We ask that your child has a good breakfast and gets dressed by 9am so that they are ready for the day. Children should attempt as many of the learning tasks as possible and is reasonable for your family’s individual circumstances. Please make it manageable and achievable for your child and family. Preferably, children should be accessing learning daily. This will however involve a mixture of focused core subject learning time and outdoor, physical and talk based learning. We advise that if it is more convenient for you to mix the lessons up and change things around with timings, then you do so. Children at infant level need regular breaks from learning and should be as active as possible in the day. Routine is crucial to young children as well as setting out clear expectations and a clear timetable. Your child will find it much easier to manage their day and their emotions if there is some kind of structure in place. The afternoons will probably be much more flexible than the mornings.

How will you check whether my child is engaging with their work and how will I be informed if there are concerns?

We ask that you upload any learning or pictures of learning to our online communication platform, tapestry. You may choose to do this once or twice a week or daily if that is more convenient. You may want to give us some brief information on any talk based, practical or physical learning that your child has taken part in. We will respond with a brief comment, giving praise and feedback. Most of our feedback is verbal at infant level so it would not be appropriate for us to provide lengthy detailed feedback that children cannot read or engage with well. We may also respond with individual or whole class feedback via Marvellous Me.

If we are concerned about engagement in learning, we will offer a telephone consultation to see what additional support we can offer. Depending on the response to support, we may follow this up with weekly phone calls or a weekly email. If you are concerned about your child’s engagement, you can contact us via the office email or call us. We will respond to any concerns within a 24hr period.

How will you assess my child’s work and progress?

Feedback can take many forms and may not always mean extensive written comments for individual children. For example, whole-class feedback or quizzes marked automatically via digital platforms are also valid and effective methods, amongst many others. Our approach to feeding back on pupil work is as follows:

We will assess your child’s work and progress predominantly via our online communication platform, tapestry. You will be able to upload your child’s learning, offering any comments on learning that you think are relevant. We will respond with brief feedback that you can give directly to your child. In addition to this, we may offer you some advice and support on your child’s progress and suggest ideas to move your child’s learning forward. We will use two ticks for things your child has done well and T for target – for your child’s next step.

Feedback will be given within a 24hr period once work has been uploaded. Please do not upload more than once per day, although several pieces can be uploaded at one time. If work is uploaded after 5pm on Friday, it may not be responded to until Monday.

Additional support for pupils with particular needs

How will you work with me to help my child who needs additional support from adults at home to access remote education?

We recognise that some pupils, for example some pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), may not be able to access remote education without support from adults at home. We acknowledge the difficulties this may place on families, and we will work with parents and carers to support those pupils in the following ways:

For those children who are not able to access remote education without a high level of support, we will contact you to offer regular online live support from a teacher or teaching assistant. We will make regular phone calls or contact you via email to check on your child’s ongoing needs and may offer extra, adapted resources to support the learning further.

Remote education for self-isolating pupils

Where individual pupils need to self-isolate but the majority of their peer group remains in school, teachers will send home work that is equivalent or as close to the activities the class are doing in school as possible.

If my child is not in school because they are self-isolating, how will their remote education differ from the approaches described above?

If your child is self-isolating, we will continue to provide remote learning by sending out a daily plan for your child to access at home. Most of our online platforms will still be able to be accessed (e.g. Collins eBooks, Education City, Purple Mash and Charanga). In addition to this, your child will have access to pre-recorded videos. Links for this will be on the daily learning plan. The learning will follow our curriculum for that half term and will be topic led. The hours of learning provided will mimic our above remote learning offer. You will be able to send in your child’s learning via Tapestry and your teacher will respond with feedback and advice on progression within a 24hr period. MarvellousMe will also be used to respond to children’s learning at home. A pre-recorded story will be sent out once a week.

Subject Leads/SENCOs

Alongside their teaching responsibilities and usual duties, subject leads are responsible for considering whether any aspects of the subject curriculum need to change to accommodate remote learning and working with teachers teaching their subject remotely to make sure all work set is appropriate and consistent.

Parents

It is important that children engage with home learning so that they do not fall behind with their learning.  We want pupils accessing home learning to engage with it to the best of their ability and complete work to the standard expected of them.

We ask that parents:

• support children with accessing home learning;
• make the school aware if their child is sick or otherwise can’t complete work;
• seek help from the school if they need it;
• be respectful when making any concerns known to staff.

We do acknowledge, however, that every family has their own unique circumstances and that there will be factors that affect home learning.  These may include parents working from home or limited access to technology amongst other factors.  If there are circumstances that mean a child cannot engage to some extent with home learning, we would ask that parents communicate with teachers to reach a solution to ensure children are able to learn at home.

Governors

Governors are responsible for monitoring the school’s approach to providing remote learning to ensure education remains as high quality as possible.

Safeguarding

Our usual Safeguarding procedures will apply.  Always refer any safeguarding concerns to a safeguarding lead.  The Covid-19 addendum to our Safeguarding Policy can be found on our website.

Monitoring Arrangements

This plan will be reviewed in depth on a half-termly basis.  Ongoing adjustments will be made to the plan following implementation and we will be responsive to any arising issues.