Remote education provision: information for parents

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

The online offer will begin 24 hours after the event of a lockdown or bubble closure announcement. This is to give teachers time to plan and prepare for online school.

 If a bubble is closed down during the day, pupils will be sent home with Chromebooks. If the announcement is made out of school hours and you do not have a device which can access Google Classroom at home, then you can collect a Chromebook the following day. Please ring the school office on 0114 2396464  to arrange collection. You can also email the school office, enquiries@woodlands.sheffield.sch.uk or send a message to the 'attendance attendance' Dojo account.

Our remote learning is provided through live teaching sessions on Google Classroom. These sessions are at 9:30, 10:30, 11:30 and 1:30. To access the lessons, your child needs to log into their Google Classroom account. If you have lost your login details, please message your class teacher through Dojo.

Online classrooms will be open between the hours of 9am and 3pm.

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?

Please see curriculum policy, which outlines how we are teaching the curriculum during lockdown.

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 1	6 hours of directed learning and support from teachers and support staff.
Key Stage 2	6 hours of directed learning and support from teachers and support staff.

Accessing remote education

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

Woodlands Primary School Community Primary School will be using Google Classroom to provide live lessons. Alongside Google Classroom, we will use Class Dojo to communicate with our families.

Passwords and usernames are available should parents need these via their class teachers.

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:

• Chromebooks are available for any pupil who does not have suitable technology at home. You can request a Chromebook for each isolating child you have at home.
• We may also be able to provide support with internet connectivity. Please get in touch for further information.
• Staff are here to support your child to access online learning. Please get in touch with your class teacher if you are having any difficulties.

How will my child be taught remotely?

Children will be taught through a range of strategies. These include:

• Our main teaching strategy is live lessons through Google Classroom 
• We may also upload pre-made flipcharts on Dojo to share learning and concepts
• Self-quizzing and assessments through online platforms
• Phone calls to provide additional support where needed, related to the tasks set within the day.

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?

Please see Woodlands Primary School Pledge for further details.

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

Woodlands Primary School is committed to safeguarding, and so a flowchart system provides information on how we will communicate with families if they are not accessing learning though the provided platform.

Day 1 of missed learning

• A dojo message should be sent to the parent asking if any further support is needed from school in order to access learning.

Day 2 of missed learning

• A dojo message will be sent by the class teaching assistant at 10am, and if no reply by 12pm, this will be followed up with a phone call.
• This information will be added to the safeguarding system within school.

Day 3 of missed learning

• A further phone call will be made to the family, and details added to the school safeguarding system.
• Where there is no response, the school safeguarding team will be informed, who will take appropriate action.

Day 4 of missed learning

• Further intervention of safeguarding team to ensure welfare of pupil.
• All concerns related to the welfare of the child must be reported to Wendy Scott, Designated Safeguarding Lead.

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: Daily assessment will continue to monitor the progress of children;

• Weekly testing in the form of online quizzes
• Baseline assessments will happen within the first 2 weeks of children re-entering the classrooms after lockdown.

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 the youngest pupils, additional teaching assistant capacity is built in to make sure they are able to make further contact with pupils in the form of phoning and dojo messages.
• Vulnerable places in school have also been offered, and our most vulnerable are currently in school working within Rowan or Knowledge for Life classrooms.

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?

10 day workbooks can be collected or sent to the children and where needed, daily calls are made to help understanding of concepts.