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As we come into another national lockdown, we want to ensure that your child continues accessing full time education. We will do all that we can to limit the impact of the pandemic on your child’s education and can reassure you that our curriculum offer will allow pupils to continue to make progress in all of their usual subjects. Wherever possible, we will teach the same curriculum remotely as we do in school. However, we have made slight adaptations to some subjects. For example, we have changed our PE programme of study so that all activities can be done in the home and focus on getting pupils active.
During this period, our full time education offer is as follows:
In order to make education as accessible as possible, we will supply as many laptops as we can to those families who currently have no means of accessing our online provision – however, these pupils are also welcome to come into school.
Pupils coming into school will be expected to be in school at 8.30am and will leave at 2.00pm as per usual school hours. Once in school they will follow the same timings as those who are working online from home.
*Heads of Centre will be in touch with individual families if there are any changes.
Each centre will have individual timetables and will send out these timetables to pupils and parents. Pupils in KS4 will continue having lessons in English, maths, science, options subjects, PSHE, RE and PE. KS3 will continue lessons in maths, English, science, art, humanities, PSHE, RE and PE. KS3 and 4 lessons will also be supplemented by additional online work that must be completed. Pupils will be expected to complete one hour of English, maths, science and options work per week. In addition to this, they will also be expected to complete an hour per week of a PSHE and life skills project. |
All pupils will have the opportunity to access live teaching every day. However, as part of our live lessons, it will sometimes be more appropriate to give pupils the time to complete a task away from the screen and log back into the lessons at various times to gain support or feedback. Each lesson will be carefully planned to meet the needs of the individuals and so the structure of the lesson will be changeable.
Pupils with partial access to a laptop will be welcome to join their timetabled live lessons at any time. They are also able to access work that has been set by the class teacher via Microsoft Teams or SAM Learning – this can be done at any time. In addition to this, pupils will be sent physical work packs that reflect the work they would be doing in class or online. These work packs should be completed and then returned to their centre in the stamped address envelope provided. We will always send out ample work for pupils to complete but there will be an element of ensuring that your child does not become overwhelmed by work and you must support them in finding the balance between completing online and work pack based work. If you have any concerns or require support, please contact the Head of Centre in the first instance.
Please be aware that your child is entitled to full time education in school. If you would like to access a place, even if you have previously declined one, please contact your Head of Centre. We have collected the names of those pupils who do not have access to a laptop and will aim to prioritise these learners to receive a school or DfE laptop. If your circumstances change, please ensure that you raise this with your child’s Head of Centre.
For pupils without a laptop, work packs will be sent home. These work packs will contain two weeks’ worth of work. We suggest that you make a daily plan with your child so that they know what is expected of them and so that you can, where possible, support them. It is expected that after one week parents should send work back to the relevant centre in the stamped addressed envelope provided. This work will be returned to pupils with feedback in the following week. If you or your child require any guidance, please call the centre and we can offer support with any element of the work provided.
If your child struggles to engage, we know that reading is one of the best ways to educate children and so we suggest that you set time aside for children to read independently or with an adult. It could be a magazine or a book – it does not matter. If you require a reading book for your child, please liaise with the member of staff who calls you regularly and we will get one sent out to you quickly.
We acknowledge that the transition to virtual learning will be challenging for families. Parents will need to think differently about how to support their children; how to create structures and routines that allow their children to be successful; and how to monitor and support their children’s learning. During this period of online learning, we will work hard to support parents and ensure that we continue to engage meaningfully with your child in order to help them thrive academically. If you require any support, please email your child’s teacher or call the centre and we will offer advice and guidance to you.
Establishing routines and expectations:
We recognise that transition to virtual learning does not compare to physical classrooms. It’s important that our pupils continue their social-emotional and cognitive growth in these times of social distancing and isolation. It will be important to have a routine in these times. Younger pupils may need assistance with setting up and using online tools. The most effective models of virtual school have a carefully considered healthy and balanced amount of offline and online learning time. Our offer will include and be balanced with significant blocks of online learning and opportunities to work offline and unplugged.
For pupils with laptops, we expect engagement online at the start of the school day. Anyone who does not arrive at the first lesson will be called and offered support with logging into Teams. As per normal, we will take a register during each period of the day and mark those who are present. If your child is unwell, you must call the centre and let them know why they are unable to access the learning – usual absence procedures apply. During the lessons teachers will speak to pupils and set work – responses to work set will indicate levels of engagement. We expect work and tasks to be returned to the teacher so that feedback can be given and more personalised learning set. Should we not receive any work, parents will be called and asked to encourage their child to submit the relevant work.
For pupils who have partial access to a laptop, we expect some work to be completed online via Teams or SAM Learning. Any work that is sent in will be acknowledged by our internal register – we will be keeping a record of any engagement with learning for each child. Work completed on paper should be sent back to school in the stamped addressed envelope provided. We will return all work promptly and with supportive feedback. This applies also to those working at home without a laptop and, as above, engagement with work will be recordedpositively. If we have any concerns with engagement we will call parents and carers at home and support you to come up with strategies to help pupils access learning. We will also communicate with the pupils and offer them guidance and a reminder of our expectations.
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 valid and effective methods that we will use weekly. For extended pieces of writing, online or on paper, we will ensure that all pupils receive written feedback. Daily, we will offer oral responses to questions responded to in class. Shorter pieces of work will also be marked and will, where required, be returned to pupils with some feedback.
Pupils will have the opportunity to receive additional personalised feedback with form tutors and class teachers during 1:1 periods and we will continue to identify a pupil’s attainment grade in all subjects at regular intervals throughout the year. We will continue to send written reports to parents, advising on achievements and areas for development for each pupil at calendared times of the year.
If you have any concerns, or require any support with work, please email the relevant Head of Centre or the Head of Curriculum as listed below:
Primary work:
Head of primary curriculum, Karen Sweeney - KarenSweeney@cobschool.com
Secondary work:
Head of maths, David Lyall - davidlyall@cobschool.com
Head of English, Gee Mann - GurjitMann@cobschool.com
Head of science, Anna Adjei-Kwarteng - annaadjei-kwarteng@cobschool.com
Head of PSHE, Sunita Kellay – sunitakellay@cobschool.com
Head of humanities, Helen Carter – helencarter@cobschool.com
Head of PE, John Anderson - johnanderson@cobschool.com
Head of art, Sarah Harrison – sarahharrison@cobschool.com
Head of computing, Tony Hewetson - tonyhewetson@cobschool.com