Remote Learning

St Mary's Catholic Primary School

Remote Learning

Suggestions for Remote Learning

Remote learning will pose some challenges. Here you’ll find some suggested ideas to give you and your child a structure and routine that may assist in making the learning easier and less stressful.

Have Clear Routines

Establishing new home routines are important especially in times of uncertainty as they create predictability, which in turn reduces anxiety and creates calm. Keep up a school morning routine as much as possible:

Set a bedtime routine
Set a time to get up
School morning breakfast routine
Get dressed, you may even decide to dress in or part of school uniform
Set learning and break times

Set up a Learning Space

Create an area in the house for your child/children to be able to focus on learning. There are no clear guidelines on what a learning area should look like but it needs to fit your child/children ’s individual way of learning and ensure she / he can focus and feel safe. Besides sitting at a table or desk you can allow for different places to learn e.g. lying on the ground to read or be read to. Whatever works for them and suits the task. Limit distractions: turning the TV off and switching off app notifications on the i-pad / computer, no toys nearby etc.

Provide a structure

It’s important to create a structure to ensure your child/ren do not just see this as an extended holiday but as normal school just from home. Have a set time frame for the learning time. Your child/ren’s school has a timetabled structure throughout the week, so rather than disrupting your child/ren’s routine, you might wish to follow your child/ren’s school routine.

Have clear behaviour expectations / study norms for the learning – and break times you have worked out with your child / children.

Keep checking in with your child/children as to how they are progressing, offering help as they feel they need it.

We all need to process new learning so allow your child/children time to relax between learning periods. In general a short 2-3 minutes brain- or movement break every 30 to 40 minutes is recommended.

Be around but let them do it

As a supervising adult you will be more a facilitator rather than a replacement teacher. St Mary’s will provide learning materials for your child to work through.

Therefore if your child/ren is finding a particular task difficult, be available to make suggestions and answer questions, but try to let them do things themselves as much as possible.

If you don’t know the answer, work with your child/ren to discover a solution. Let your child/ren, where possible, self-regulate – that is to take control of their own learning and not rely on you.

Self-rating after a task or session to critically reflect on their own learning performance can encourage your child/ren to be more responsible for their own learning and helps to develop their judgmental skills. Consider a reward / monitoring chart to keep up motivation and recording of progress.