Learning from Home
This page will be kept updated with links to resources to enable you to continue learning from home.
We know that this period of school closure brings all sorts of challenges to our students and their families. At Walthamstow Academy, we are committed to providing good quality remote learning in a way that supports in our students at this difficult time and recognises the additional challenges they face. Our way of working during school closure is described below under the five headings from the United Learning Framework for Excellence.
Best In Everyone
We continue to seek the Best in Everyone, knowing that the best our students can give will depend on their own circumstances. We seek to do this through:
- Clear communication. Our Principal’s letters to parents throughout the school closure period can be found here.
- A simple structure for home learning. We are using the Google Classroom platform to communicate with students. We are recommending that students try to complete home learning by following their school timetable, but we offer flexibility as we know that won’t always be possible. The system we are following with our students depends on their year group. Links to Google classroom, Tassomai Science and Hegarty Maths can be found below.
- Our Key Stage 3 students get one message per week on Google Classroom that contains all the information they need to complete that week’s work. Our teachers split the work into lessons (if a student would have had three maths lessons that week, then they are set three lessons of work). Within each lesson there is a ‘core’ set of tasks and further ‘optional’ work that students can complete if they feel able to. The core work should take 30 minutes and the optional a further 30. If students find they need help, they can leave a message on Google Classroom and their teacher will respond with help within 24 hours
- Our Year 10 and 12 students are also set lessons through Google Classroom. Where possible they complete these lessons at the same time as they appear on the school timetable because they then benefit from live help given by their teacher. Our teachers are logged on and ready to guide students’ learning at the times the lessons appear on the school timetable. If it is not possible to complete the work during the timetabled slot then students can still log in later and do this.
- Our Year 11 and 13 students have now finished their exam courses but we are using Google Classroom to set work that will help them transition to the next stage of their education: MOOCs (Massive Open On Line Courses), further reading, A-level transition packs and Maths & English retake materials have all been made available. This work is voluntary but, where students want it, they still benefit from our teachers’ help and support
Powerful Knowledge
Our students still benefit from the Walthamstow Academy curriculum and the expert guidance of their teachers. Each lesson is designed to help students make progress. We use ‘voice-over powerpoints’ to explain new ideas and then the best resources available for testing and consolidation. Teachers take in work through Google Classroom and provide feedback to help their students improve.
The remote school curriculum from April 20 to May 23 can be found here.
Our full curriculum is based on the United Learning curriculum, which can be found here for each year group.
Home learning resources
Please find below a list of useful website that students can access during this Learning from Home period. We have complied a list of general education sites and then more subject specific sites to be used alongside the work set by our teaching staff.
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Home Learning Websites
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You will also find below the Home Learning Schedule which outlines the work being set during the closure period.
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Home Learning Schedule
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Hegarty Maths |
Google Classroom |
School Comms |
Education with Character
We always strive to provide more than just qualifications for our students, but now more than at any other time our core values of ambition, determination and respect are important. Our Education with Character programme continues during lockdown and includes the following components:
- A weekly assembly from the Head of Year in which team spirit, current issues and year group online engagement are discussed.
- Our Personal, Social, Health and Religious Studies programme continues via Google Classroom. The weekly programme can be found here.
- Our extra curricular programme continues with suggestions for exciting projects and web-based activities. Details can be found here. We have included activities and opportunities created by the Academy and elsewhere. One of most popular offerings are our week Creative tasks that are designed by the Art and Design department (these are linked below).
- Our literacy programme encourages our students to read widely. Daily tasks and videos are posted to keep students engaged and interacting.
Leadership in Every Role
Ensuring that our students are safe, well and learning requires leadership in every role. Beyond our teaching staff who provide our remote lessons, we are relying on the leadership shown by:
- Our students, who are finding they must lead themselves through this time and be motivated to continue their work.
- The parents of our students, who are providing so much support for remote learning at this time.
- Our safeguarding team who make daily calls to those who need them.
- Our Learning Support Assistants (LSAs) who work remotely with those students who have Special Educational Needs (SEN).
- Our Heads of Year and tutor team, who are making phone calls to see what support we can offer for those finding remote learning difficult.