Remote Learning

Where a class, group or small number of pupils need to self-isolate, or there are local restrictions requiring pupils to remain at home, the school will offer immediate remote education. We have carefully considered how to continue to improve the quality of our existing offer and have a strong contingency plan in place for remote education provision.

We are aware that younger pupils and some pupils with SEND may not be able to access remote education without adult support. In such cases the SENco and the class teacher will work with families to deliver a broad and ambitious curriculum.

We expect parents and carers, as per the Home School Agreement, to engage with the remote learning offer to the best of their ability. The school is realistic in our expectation of what pupils are likely to achieve at home, and the challenges families face in managing their children’s education whilst working at home and the difficulties in having to share space and technology. We will do everything in our power to support you. In return, we expect you to ensure your child registers online every day and completes the work set whenever possible. Please note if your child does not register and you have not reported their absence and you do not reply to the school’s text or phone call by 10.30 am, we will arrange a home visit and/or involve other agencies in line with our First Day Call Procedure.

Expectations, guidelines, resources and staff training on remote learning will be provided to meet the following government expectations:

Please note, from 22nd October 2020, it is a legal requirement to provide remote learning to anyone self-isolating (individual, bubble or whole school), including pupils who are shielding.

 ‘In developing these contingency plans, we expect schools to:

• use a curriculum sequence that allows access to high-quality online and offline resources and teaching videos and that is linked to the school’s curriculum expectations
• give access to high quality remote education resources
• select the online tools that will be consistently used across the school in order to allow interaction, assessment and feedback and make sure staff are trained in their use
• provide printed resources, such as textbooks and workbooks, for pupils who do not have suitable online access
• recognise that younger pupils and some pupils with SEND may not be able to access remote education without adult support and so schools should work with families to deliver a broad and ambitious curriculum

When teaching pupils remotely, we expect schools to:

• set assignments so that pupils have meaningful and ambitious work each day in a number of different subjects
• teach a planned and well-sequenced curriculum so that knowledge and skills are built incrementally, with a good level of clarity about what is intended to be taught and practised in each subject
• provide frequent, clear explanations of new content, delivered by a teacher in the school or through high-quality curriculum resources or videos
• gauge how well pupils are progressing through the curriculum, using questions and other suitable tasks and set a clear expectation on how regularly teachers will check work
• enable teachers to adjust the pace or difficulty of what is being taught in response to questions or assessments, including, where necessary, revising material or simplifying explanations to ensure pupils’ understanding
• plan a programme that is of equivalent length to the core teaching pupils would receive in school, ideally including daily contact with teachers’ (DfE, Sept 2020)

Remote learning will be provided using Google Classroom (GCR).

Additionally, reasonable adjustments will be made to your Remote Learning to allow access for all pupils (including SEND).

• All children must be accounted for: a daily register will be taken
• A daily welcome message including a timetable and to-do list will be provided every morning
• The programme will be of equivalent length to the teaching hours (4.5hours) and will include at least two live sessions per day.
• Children must be provided with one Maths, one English and one Curriculum session per day. All of these must have an assignment saved in classwork but may also be a live session for the children.
• Work will be sequential, progressive and match the curriculum and plans used in school.
• Teachers will upload an additional extra-curricular task for the week. PE lessons / videos will be provided by Mr Proudfoot.

Feedback will be given to these who successfully submit tasks on Google Classroom.

To ensure the wellbeing of children, staff will take the usual care when producing learning resources, taking into account any difficulties individual children may have if a topic is personally difficult for them or may trigger a response which would need support from a member of staff. It is important to note that children may be more vulnerable at this time due to the impact of Covid-19 on themselves and their families. Activities will sufficiently signpost to trustworthy sources of support available to pupils should they wish to get help or advice. Without this in place, children may explore unreliable sources for information, support and guidance.

• During online activity teachers should be in a neutral area, as should pupils (e.g. pupils should not be in their bedrooms) and all parties should be appropriately dressed
• Pupils should be reminded how to keep themselves safe online and who they can contact at school for help or support
• Staff will follow the normal reporting of absence including the First Day Call Procedure
• There should always be two adults on a call/lesson. For 1:1 sessions or sessions where another staff member is unavailable, ensure that a parent remains in the room or record the call/lesson (if using this option, staff will make it clear to parents why we are recording the lesson and how this will be stored and used)
• Do not send/reply to emails from children’s personal email addresses without seeking parental permission first
• Keep all pupils passwords and usernames private
• Inappropriate posts should be removed instantly and parents contacted
• Pupils should not post videos and pictures on the main stream