Dear Parents/Carers,
Thank you so much for responding to our parental survey. We are again overwhelmed by your responses and the positive feedback we have received. The additional comments are extremely appreciated and we are so grateful to have such supportive parents/carers.
Many parents are still concerned about home learning when a child has to isolate. Parents/Carers are doing an amazing job. Please don’t worry, we continue to be here for you if you need any support. Class Teachers will continue to ring or email to keep in contact. Please see below information regarding remote learning:
Home learning support – information for parents & carers
When will my child need to learn from home?
- If your child has to self-isolate because of coronavirus – either individually or as part of their class
- If there’s a local lockdown and the school is advised to partially close or your child has to shield
What is my child expected to do?
We’re determined to make every effort to keep our pupils on-track and make sure no one falls behind if they need to learn from home because of coronavirus.
We want to make sure your child can learn as much as possible at home. The following guidelines will explain what we’d like your child to do while learning remotely, and how we plan to support you and them.
When providing remote learning, teachers must be available between 9am-3pm on their working days
If they’re unable to work for any reason during this time, for example due to sickness or caring for a dependent, they should report this using the normal absence procedure.
When providing remote learning, teachers are responsible for:
Setting work –
- Teachers will provide learning for their current class. The amount of work they need to provide is daily Maths and English lessons plus 3/4 lessons for foundation subjects each week. Daily phonics lessons will be planned for KS1 and SPAG lessons for KS2.
- Teachers will use resources provide by the Oak National Academy, White Rose Maths and BBC Bitesize, as well as other resources identified by school curriculum leaders.
- The work will be set weekly.
- Teachers will upload weekly learning packs on the school website. The packs can then be accessed at home, printed by staff who are on site, ready for parents to collect or staff can deliver to homes.
- Teachers will outline the work daily via their class activity page.
- Providing feedback on work –
Pupils can email work to their class teachers. All work submitted will be acknowledged by the class teacher. Feedback will be given for English and Maths on an individual basis. Feedback will be age appropriate.
- Keeping in touch with pupils who aren’t in school and their parents –
- In the case of a national or local lockdown, Teachers will call pupils/parents at least every 3 weeks. Any concerns should be recorded and Head teacher alerted. In the event of a self/class bubble isolation, communication will be via email. If there has been no communication from either a parent or child via by day 3 of lockdown/self-isolation period starting, teacher or SLT member will call parents/pupils on day 4.
- Vulnerable pupils will be called weekly – CP/EHCP/identified pupils, this will be done by SENCO/DSL.
- Emails received from parents and pupils are to be checked between 9am and 3pm, Mon- Fri. Teachers should respond to pupil/parent emails within 48hours.
What support will our school provide?
- Regular contact with teachers through telephone calls/email
- Regular feedback via telephone calls and email so your child knows how they’re doing
- Resources
What can I do to help my child?
Create a positive environment for your child to learn at home, for example:
- Distinguish between weekdays and weekends, to separate school life and home life
- Designate a working space if possible
- At the end of the day, have a clear cut-off to signal school time is over
- Create and stick to a routine
- Put a timetable up on the wall
- Make time for exercise and breaks throughout the day to keep your child active
- Reinforce the importance of children staying safe online.
- Be aware of what your child is being asked to do, including: sites they will be asked to use and school staff your child will interact with
- Emphasise the importance of a safe online environment set age-appropriate parental controls on digital devices and use internet filters to block malicious websites. These are usually free, but often need to be turned on.
Website Resources
BBC Bitesize www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize -A range of revision materials and online daily lessons
Oak Academy https://www.thenational.academy- A range of virtual lessons have been produced on various topics.
Our school website is a constant bank of resources regarding well being, online learning, e safety, safeguarding issues, financial support/advice, food banks, local support.
Please also visit our new section of the website regarding returning to school. You will find information, our risk assessment, policies, action plan and robust procedures we have in place to do everything we can to keep the school community safe.
We also had a concern about marking homework. Teachers will mark children’s homework in a variety of ways. Generally the work will be acknowledged by the class teacher. Sometimes the work will be ‘quality marked’. This is when a piece of work is marked in detail and comments about future progress are added to the work. On other occasions the work may be marked orally with the child or the class. The class teachers have also had extra marking due to the three catch up tuition sessions they are providing at the moment so marking may not be as detailed as normally provided but will make every effort to try and apologise for any inconvenience. Please see below our homework policy:
Remember, if you have any concerns about helping your child learn or you need any other support from the school, please let us know by contacting school office via email: nettlesworth@durhamlearning.net or headteacher email d.lee103@durhamlearning.net
Please see results of the survey below and some of the wonderful comments about our school.
Many Thanks
Donna Lee
Head Teacher
