Remote Learning offer during National Lockdown 2021

Park Road Academy Primary School have a robust, comprehensive and engaging remote learning off. Our offer compromises of live and independent tasks.  The amount of remote education provided will be on average:-

• Key Stage 1: 3 hours a day 

• Key Stage 2: 4 hours a day

Teachers at Park Road Academy plan a well-sequenced curriculum so that knowledge and skills are built incrementally against their Age Related Expectations. Teachers will offer a  good level of clarity about what is intended to be taught and practised in each subject so that pupils can progress through the school’s curriculum during live and independent sessions. We aim to set meaningful and ambitious work each day in an appropriate range of subjects. 

We aim to deliver 'live' lessons throughout lockdown on a daily basis. However, online video lessons maybe delivered by the Oak National Academy or BBC Daily Lessons, in lieu of school led video content if required. 

We understand that younger children in Key Stage 1 or EYFS often require high levels of parental involvement to support their engagement with remote education, which may make digital provision a particular challenge for this age group. We will continue to offer 'live' sessions for this age group, but we will not overly rely upon digital means of learning for this age-group.

Park Road Academy continue to use Tapestry across the school in order to allow interaction, assessment and feedback. All staff are trained and experienced users of this platform. This platform will be used to carry out daily checks to gauge whether pupils are engaging with their work. If we identify a family who are not accessing our remote learning offer, we will make communication by telephone/email in order to work with families to rapidly identify effective solutions where engagement is a concern. 

To support families to overcome barriers to digital access for children we have and will continue to distribute school-owned laptops. Each family in receipt of a school laptop will be asked to complete a user agreement via completing a contract on 'Operoo'. 

If necessary, at parents/carers request, we are happy to provide printed resources to supplement other forms of communication to keep pupils on track. 

For children with SEND, our teachers and learning support are best-placed to know how the children's needs can be most effectively met to ensure they continue to make progress even if they are not able to be in school due to self-isolating. All children with an EHCP have secured a place in school. We will work collaboratively with families, putting in place reasonable adjustments as necessary, so that pupils with SEND can successfully access remote education alongside their peers. During periods of self-isolation, EHCP support staff provide small group or one to one live sessions for children with special educational needs; this is in addition to or in replace of whole class live lessons, dependent on the individual needs of the children. 

Where individuals who are self-isolating are within the definition of vulnerable, Mrs Harrison or Mrs Morris will keep in contact with them. When a vulnerable child is asked to self-isolate, the school's Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL),  will notify their social worker (if they have one).  The DSL will agree with the social worker the best way to maintain contact and offer support to the vulnerable child. We have checked that our vulnerable children have access to remote education support, to allow them access to remote learning (as far as possible). We will also carry out regularly checks while they remain at home. If a family requires a device during a period of self-isolation or home-learning, please contact the school as soon as possible. 

Keeping children safe online is essential. We follow the statutory guidance Keeping Children Safe in Education, Safeguarding and Remote Education during Coronavirus (COVID-19), in addition to our own policies for online safety and acceptable use procedures. All information on what we do to protect our pupils online can be found in our Safeguarding and Child Protection, E-Safety, Live Lessons, Acceptable Use and Social Media policies. 

Miss Hart and Mrs Taylor have overarching responsibility for the quality and delivery of remote education, including that provision meets expectations for remote education. 

If parents/carers feel we are not providing remote education of a suitable quantity and quality, we encourage you to raise concerns in the first instance with your child's class teacher, and if concerns are not resolved please contact Miss Hart or Mrs Taylor.