Remote Provision Statement

Our remote learning provision is responsive to the Government guidance and our local situation.  The information contained within this document predominantly focuses on our provision for remote learning if students need to work from home. On the final page of this document, you will find information regarding our provision for when an individual student is isolating but the majority of students still remain in school.

Remote Education Provision: Information for Parents:

This information is intended to provide clarity and transparency to students and parents/carers about what to expect from remote education if local restrictions require students to remain at home.

The Remote Curriculum – What is Taught to Students at Home:

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

In the event that the school has to close due to Covid, our remote learning provision will commence the following day.

The remote learning provision will mirror the normal school timetable with the exception of CR lessons and core PE lessons. Students will be required to join one tutor time per week.  All resources are uploaded to the student intranet and students will join their online lessons via Microsoft Teams.

Remote Teaching and Study Time Each Day

How long should my child be completing work each day?

We expect the teaching and the independent work that students complete will take pupils broadly the following number of hours each day:

  • Year 7, 8 & 9 –  4-5 HOURS PER DAY

 

  • Year 10,11,12 & 13 – 5 HOURS PER DAY DEPENDING ON IF THEY HAVE A TIMETABLED CORE PE OR CR LESSON THAT DAY

Accessing Remote Education

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

For the uploading of teacher resources, we use the school’s dedicated student intranet site for students to “hand-in” work. Microsoft Teams is used to deliver the live elements of our lessons. We also use a range of specific subject based programmes such as Doddle, MyMaths, Collins Connect, GCSEPOD and Kerboodle to ensure a high quality provision is provided.

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 students may not have suitable online access at home. We take the following approaches to support those students with their remote education:

  • We have completed a comprehensive survey in school with both students and parents/carers with regards to digital access and we have supplied a wide range of digital hardware to ensure that our students can access their education remotely. This includes laptops, Wi-Fi and Dongles. If you would like to discuss this, please contact either Helen Dafforne(Assistant Headteacher) or Paul Lovatt (Assistant Headteacher) on 01629 825577 or via email hdafforne@anthonygell.co.uk or plovatt@anthonygell.co.uk
  • If you would like to request paper copies of resources, please discuss this with your child’s Pastoral Manager in the first instance. The pastoral manager’s contact details are below:

Arkwright House – cflower@anthonygell.co.uk (Clare Flower)

Fearne House – ccarr@anthonygell.co.uk (Chris Carr)

Gell House – ldavis-patterson@anthonygell.co.uk (Lynn Davis-Patterson)

Nightingale House – nmoseley@anthonygell.co.uk (Nik Moseley)

Wright House – fsarginson@anthonygell.co.uk (Finn Sarginson)

  • If a student does not have online access then a parent/carer can deliver work back to the main school reception in a marked envelope and we will distribute it to the appropriate staff for marking and feedback.

How will my child be taught remotely?

We use a combination of the following approaches to teach students remotely:

  • Live teaching – Our students can access a fully live curriculum via Microsoft Teams when it is appropriate for the class teacher to do so. All students in Key Stage 5 (Y12 and 13) will join their lessons remotely.
  • Due to the live nature of our teaching we do not provide pre-recorded lessons unless we are using an external source such as Oak Academy, or if a teacher has the need to record something that cannot be replicated easily via a live lesson (such as a practical component of a lesson).
  • Printed paper packs produced by teachers are used in rare cases to support remote learning, when digital access for a student prohibits them being able to access their learning.
  • We use a range of commercially available websites supporting the teaching of specific subjects or areas, including video clips and sequences. There are links to the most popular of these on the front page of our school intranet.  Where appropriate, teaching staff will use these resources to teach and set learning tasks for students to complete.  Many of these resources provide digital and immediate feedback to students.
  • We limit the amount of long-term project work and/or internet research activities given to students. However in certain subjects at certain points in the curriculum, these are appropriate to students being able to learn effectively.

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?

  • We expect all of our students to make their best efforts to engage with the remote learning they are set everyday. However, we understand that there can be barriers to this and so all our work can be accessed and completed without the need to attend the live element of the teaching.  We expect our students to contact us if they are having problems accessing their remote learning, taking a pro-active stance. We will also contact students to check in with them if we find they are not engaging with their lessons to see if we can offer any support.
  • We work in partnership with parents/cares. We encourage and maintain an open dialogue. We communicate regularly with parents/carers to update them on our remote learning provision and to send any advice/guidance that parents/carers may find useful in supporting their children. We read and consider all feedback that stakeholders give and we adapt our practice accordingly.  The best way to support your child is by talking to them about their learning and help them to organise themselves for the day ahead so they can concentrate on their lessons fully.

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

  • All students who are self-isolating will receive a welfare call from our Pastoral Team to check on their mental well-being and to trouble shoot any problems with remote learning.
  • If there are concerns about your child’s engagement with remote learning in a small number of subjects, then the class teacher or Faculty director will be in touch. If the concern is more widespread than this, then one of the Pastoral Team will be in touch to discuss the barriers and to plan a way forward.

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 student work is as follows:

We are using a wide range of assessment and feedback techniques including Microsoft Forms, GCSEPOD, Kahoot, Quiziz, as well as more extended tasks that are submitted to the teacher in the marking folder structure or via Teams.  These tasks are varied and relevant to the context of the subject and the Year group.  Feedback will also be provided in a variety of ways including whole class feedback, individual self-marking feedback that the teacher will also review as well as written feedback on individual tasks for more detailed feedback. Students will receive feedback weekly.

Additional Support for Students 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 students, including but not limited to those 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 students in the following ways:

  • Teaching Assistants have a designated contact list for students who they routinely support. This allows improved contact with families allowing us to be responsive to any difficulties encountered by students with additional needs.
  • Some students may have difficulties accessing the normal curriculum and will also benefit from highly differentiated work. For those students, we provide packages of work related to any interventions they are currently receiving and if necessary, they will be delivered to the homes of students.
  • We have a designated section on our ‘pupil intranet’ where students can access the electronic support packages that we use in school such as IDL and Units of Sound.

Remote Education for Self-Isolating Students

Where individual students need to isolate when the majority of their peer group remains in school, the remote education provided for the individual isolating is likely to differ from the approaches described above. This is due to the challenges the teachers face of teaching students 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?

Years 7-9:  Maths, English, Languages and Science set all their lessons weekly via the student intranet where the teaching and learning resources can be accessed immediately by all our students. For all other subjects, there is enough work set on the student intranet to cover three periods of two-week absence from school. These lessons provide high quality learning for students linked specifically to our school curriculum, but they may not be a direct reflection of what students are currently being taught in school. We have taken this decision to reflect our local situation, but if our case numbers escalate then we would move to a weekly setting of lessons for all subjects.

Years 10-13: All lessons are uploaded to the student intranet for students to be able to access immediately. Students will be invited to join their lessons live via Teams.

Provision During a Full School Closure

During a full school closure as in Jan-Feb 2021, students in Years 10-13 will be taught on Microsoft Teams as per the students’ timetables (with the exception of core PE, CR and tutor time) All learning resources will be provided on the student intranet to enable students to successfully access the learning if they cannot access the live lesson.

For students in Years 7-9, a timetable is in place to cover the full breadth of the curriculum over a period of 4 hours per day. Again, these lessons are taught live via Microsoft Teams with resources uploaded to the intranet. As per Derbyshire County Council guidance, we do not record live lessons for safeguarding reasons so students cannot access the teacher led live content once it has been delivered, but can still access resources from the lesson on the student intranet. Students are also invited to a weekly tutor time session to keep in touch with their tutor and peers.  Registers, which show accurate attendance details for live lessons, are downloaded from Teams with teachers and Pastoral staff contacting parents/carers of students who fail to attend the timetabled lessons.

Our Pastoral / SEND staff contact each student every 2 weeks, with our cohort of vulnerable and SEND students being contacted weekly, or more frequently if necessary. Virtual assemblies are held via Microsoft Teams and will cover topics as broad as: student finance, mental health and wellbeing, the changing examinations process etc. Careers appointments for Y11 students continue to be held remotely.

Students with additional needs, including those who have a parent/carer who is a key worker and those with SEND needs, are encouraged to attend school and work alongside their peers within the school setting. This is to maintain the school routine, provide respite for parents and carers, but also to allow the student to receive specialist support alongside the remote teaching. The provision within school is tailored to the needs of the individual and can involve the use of rest and activity breaks. Groups are formed and maintained to support social interaction and social communication skills, as well as limit contact/possible transmission between students of different ages. More nurturing activities can be provided to support the emotional wellbeing of the student.

A wide range of assessment and feedback techniques will be incorporated including: Microsoft Forms, GCSEPOD, Kahoot, Quiziz as well as more extended tasks that are submitted to the teacher in the marking folder structure or via Microsoft Teams. These tasks are varied and relevant to the context of the subject and the Year group.