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

A pupil’s first day or two of being educated remotely might look different from our standard approach, while we take all necessary actions to prepare for a longer period of remote teaching.

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

Your class teacher will be in touch via Class Dojo to ensure that you have all of the information you require to log on to Google Classroom.  This is your opportunity to request additional resources such as whiteboards and a pen, exercise books or remote learning packs should you require them.  We know that remote education is not always straight forward, and those first few days are as much about you getting your head around how everything works, as your child getting work done.  Take your time to navigate around Google Classroom and message your class teacher via Dojo if anything is unclear.  Above all, don’t panic!  We understand and are here to help.

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?

Your child will receive the same curriculum remotely as the children remaining in school.  Google Classroom will have all of the resources that you require to ensure parity with pupils not being remotely educated.

Remote teaching and study time each day

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

When being taught remotely, the government expect us to set meaningful and ambitious work each day in several different subjects. We are expected to provide remote education that includes either recorded or live direct teaching and should be of equivalent length to the core teaching pupils would receive in school. As a minimum that is 3 hours for KS1 and 4 hours for KS2 (there are no minimum expectations for EYFS).  We must emphasise, this is what we are expected to set, not what you are expected to complete.  We recognise that people’s working patterns may make this unfeasible on any given day and, as such, your child’s class teachers will point you towards key pieces of work.

Accessing remote education

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

Our remote learning is hosted on Google Classroom and communication with parents will be via Class Dojo.  In terms of other apps and online tools, we also use Numbots/TT Rock Stars, Maths Shed, Spelling Shed, Bug Club and Accelerated Reader.  All of the user names and passwords for these can be found in your child’s reading diary.

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: the opportunity to borrow electronic devices from the school/Local Authority; access to printed home learning packs (which can be collected from and returned to the school office).

How will my child be taught remotely?

We use a combination of the following approaches to teach pupils remotely: live teaching (online lessons); recorded teaching (e.g. Oak National Academy lessons, video/audio recordings made by teachers); printed paper packs produced by teachers (e.g. workbooks, worksheets); workbooks and reading books pupils have at home; and commercially available websites supporting the teaching of specific subjects or areas, including video clips or sequences.

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?

We are well aware that factors such as your working patterns, the age of your child/ren, the number of children you have at home and the availability of devices will dictate the amount of work they get done in a day.  As such, your child’s class teacher will give you details of what we consider to be your child’s key priorities.  For example, in Key Stage 1, the top priority is a daily phonics session and the completion of Maths and English work by the end of the week.  It may be that working patterns necessitate Maths is done over three days not daily, and this is absolutely fine.  It may be that you choose to spend the day as a family and English work is done by an older sibling once the younger ones are in bed, again absolutely fine.  We recognise that what works for others may not work for you and vice versa.

As parents, we expect you to monitor your child’s usage of online learning materials and behaviour whilst online.  We completely understand the stresses and pressures that accompany balancing a child’s home learning with working from home (we’ve been there too) and are here to help and support.  Please do not feel that you are alone in this, the mental health and wellbeing of your child and their family is our number one priority.

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

As a school, we are monitoring engagement in a number of ways: through registers of who is accessing live sessions (we are expecting to see a child at least three times in any given week), submission of work onto Google Classroom, usage of Numbots/TT Rock Stars, Maths Shed, Bug Club, Accelerated Reader and Spelling Shed; and monitoring of remote learning pack completion.  If we feel that your child is not engaging, we will be in touch, either by phone or Class Dojo, to establish why this is and assist in whatever way we can.

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. As teachers, we know that under ‘normal circumstances’ the most effective feedback is given at the point of delivery, clearly this is very difficult to do remotely and we are working hard to establish how we can best achieve this. Our current approach to feeding back on pupil work is as follows: we will use Google Classroom to ensure that key pieces of work are marked each week - this may include some corrections for your child.  If a piece of work is to be marked, it will be set as an assignment and you can therefore expect feedback in one form or another in a timely manner.  If a piece of work done not require marking, for example a PE or Music lesson, it will be set as ‘material’.

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: we will run live booster groups and one-to-one or small group sessions where appropriate to do so.  This may be from your child’s class teacher, a teaching assistant or from another qualified adult in school.

Further to our SEND offer, we recognise that younger children will also need additional adult support.  Mrs Toynbee and the EYFS team have worked hard to provide a remote learning offer that is tailored to best suit the needs of the children in their care.

Remote education for self-isolating pupils

Where individual pupils need to self-isolate but the majority of their peer group remains in school, how remote education is provided will likely differ from the approach for whole groups. This is due to the challenges of teaching pupils both at home and in school.

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 endeavour to provide remote education as similar as possible to that described above.  Due to the demands of having to teach pupils in school, this may include remote learning packs rather than live lessons or regular contact from a qualified adult as opposed to your child’s class teacher, but the premise of using Google Classroom as the go to place for your child’s learning will remain.