Teachers: Coronavirus

(asked on 9th September 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to support teachers in the distribution of home learning packs to pupils who are not returning to school during the covid-19 outbreak.


Answered by
Nick Gibb Portrait
Nick Gibb
This question was answered on 23rd September 2020

Shielding advice for all adults and children was paused on 1 August. We now expect all pupils, in all year groups, to return to school full time for the autumn term. On 2 July, the Department published guidance to support schools to do this. While our aim is to have all pupils back in the classroom, every school will need to plan for the possibility of local restrictions and how they will ensure continuity of education.

The Department is committed to the continuation of high-quality remote education during this difficult time and is supporting schools to ensure that it is aligned to their normal provision for their pupils. We expect schools to have a strong contingency plan for remote education in place by the end of September. We have asked schools to look to align the quality of their existing provision with the expectations set out in the published guidance on curriculum and remote education provision: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/actions-for-schools-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak/guidance-for-full-opening-schools#section-3-curriculum-behaviour-and-pastoral-support.

We have published a comprehensive range of advice and guidance to support schools. This includes examples of teaching practice during the COVID-19 outbreak, which provides an opportunity for schools to learn from each other’s approaches to remote education. It outlines strategies and techniques that have worked for teachers and school leaders and contains information about effective remote provision. This can be viewed here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/remote-education-practice-for-schools-during-coronavirus-covid-19.

The guidance also includes examples of how schools can support pupils without internet access by, for example, providing physical work packs, which can be accessed here:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/remote-education-practice-for-schools-during-coronavirus-covid-19

https://www.gov.uk/government/case-studies/providing-physical-work-packs-for-pupils-with-limited-or-no-internet-connection.

The Government has already invested over £100 million to help schools and young people continue their education at home and access social care services. This includes investment of over £14 million on technical support to give schools access to cloud based education platforms, nearly £6 million to support a new EdTech demonstrator school network, and over £85 million to provide laptops, tablets and 4G wireless routers to young people who would not otherwise have access. The Department is now supplementing this support by making an initial 150,000 additional devices available in the event that face to face schooling becomes disrupted as a result of local COVID-19 restrictions. These should be used to enable disadvantaged children in years 3 to 11 to continue to access remote education.

The Department has also supported sector-led initiatives, like Oak National Academy, which launched on 20 April. By 12 July, 4.7 million unique users had accessed the Oak National Academy website and 16.1 million lessons had been viewed. The Department has made £4.84 million available for Oak National Academy both for the summer term of the academic year 2019-20, and then for the 2020-21 academic year to provide video lessons for reception up to year 11. This will include specialist content for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities. Oak will remain a free optional resource for 2020-21.

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