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. 

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?

All lessons will move immediately to live lessons on Google classroom for every lesson.  PE and PSHE are the only lessons which may not be ‘live’ but suggested

work will be set on Google classroom to be accessed in the students’ own time.

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 teach the same curriculum remotely as we do in school wherever possible and appropriate. However, we have needed to make some adaptations in some subjects. For example, In practical subjects we will demonstrate practicals on screen and try to suggest similar activities that may be completed 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:

Key Stage 3 and 45 hours per day of remote teaching plus tutorial time, matching the time of the usual school day but with each lesson lasting 50 minutes to allow
 comfort breaks and movement between screen time. We will not be setting homework for Years 7 to 9.  Years 10 – 13 should expect to be allocated further work to do in their own time, depending on their course.

Accessing remote education

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

Google classroom is the main vehicle for all lessons and within each lesson students may be directed to other Learning platforms such as Hegarty Maths, Doddle for Science  and BBC Bitesize for many subjects.  Students may also be directed to other websites to watch resources, such as YouTube.  Work done by students will mainly be stored in Google folders but some may be emailed to teachers direct, or photos of hand written work or artefacts may be sent to teachers by email.

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 will issue or lend laptops or tablets to pupils and further information can be gained from Mrs Clancy mclancy@ndonline.org for Notre Dame and from Dr Savage asavage@stbonifaces.com for St Boniface
We may be able to  issue or lend devices that enable an internet connection (for example, routers or dongles) by contacting the same address above
Pupils with no internet access can have printed materials sent to them and they should contact the leaders named above if we have not been able to help with digital access.
  Pupils with no online access who have no email access can use Royal Mail to send work but  we prefer to receive emails with photos of written work.

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)
textbooks and reading books pupils have at home
  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?

Our expectations for pupils’ engagement with remote education are that they attend every session as they would while at school, with the exception of PE and PSHE which may be done in the pupil’s own time frame.
We have a list of 12 rules for online learning that all students must follow.
We ask that parents do not engage with teachers or students during online lessons but email the teacher if there are any issues.
We ask that parents who are working with their child at home do not do the work for them.  It is important for us to be able to genuinely assess each child’s progress in learning (rather than their  parents’!)
  We welcome parent feedback on what we are doing well and what we can do better.  Please email us at covidtest@ndonline.org or covidtest@stbonifaces.com

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

Every day we will take registers for every lesson to check attendance.  Our attendance and pastoral teams will contact  any parent whose child has not attended lessons that day if they have not already contacted attendnace teams at school.  Please ring attendance in the morning if your child is ill and you know in advance that they will not be attending lessons that day.
Any lack of engagement from your child in every lesson will receive a Classcharts B1 mark.  You will be notified of every B1 through your Classcharts app.  
Pastoral leaders or tutors  will contact parents of any child who receives 5 or more B1s in any week to discuss the concerns and resolutions..

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:

A wide  variety of methods will be used to assess and feed back on pupils’ work, including comments in shared Google folders, marking of quizzes and tests on line, written email feedback and verbal feedback during online lessons
Formal Progress Reviews will continue at the end of each term.  Other feedback will be received in every lesson and written work submitted will usually be marked and fedback each week.

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 provide Breakout rooms so that LSAs can offer support in live lessons.  Students who require support are welcomed and encouraged to attend Educare provision in school but our SEND teams will provide key worker phone support to any parents who need help to support their child at home.
In some cases we have agreed to adjust the curriculum of some students to cover core subjects first, where the challenges of remote learning become generally overwhelming.  This can only happen through discussion with our SENDCOs, Mrs Baring at Notre Dame and Mr Ousey at St Boniface.