Remote Education Legal Requirements
How classroom.cloud and NetSupport School can
help with your remote and in-school learning provision
Schools in England are now required to provide high-quality remote education for students, while also meeting their Ofsted responsibilities and in line with any remaining COVID-19 precautions.
With NetSupport’s solutions we have you covered, helping you solve all your in-school and remote learning challenges.
Remote learning
Remote education legal requirements for schools in England
During the pandemic, the Government made it a legal requirement for schools in England to provide high-quality remote education to students absent from school, either because of the need to self-isolate due to COVID-19 or where local restrictions obliged them to stay at home.
As the situation changes, there is now new COVID-19 operational guidance for schools (Feb 2022), while the technology-based statutory obligations for remote learning (Dec 2021) still apply.
classroom.cloud, our easy-to-use solution for in-school and remote online learning, can help schools meet the technology-based obligations that the Government outlines, in the following ways:
In developing remote education, schools are expected to…
How classroom.cloud can help
“Where needed, the remote education provided should be equivalent in length to the core teaching pupils would receive in school and should include recorded or live direct teaching time, as well as time for pupils to complete tasks and assignments independently. As a minimum, you should provide:
– Key Stage 1: 3 hours a day, on average across the cohort, with less for younger children
– Key Stage 2: 4 hours a day
– Key Stages 3 and 4: 5 hours a day”
As an easy-to-use solution, teachers can use classroom.cloud to deliver learning content and maintain contact with individual students, groups or the entire class.
“teach a planned and well-sequenced curriculum so that knowledge and skills are built incrementally... [with] a good level of clarity about what is intended to be taught and practised in each subject so that pupils can progress..."
The Student Toolbar can help teachers reinforce the points that are going to be covered in the lesson.
“select a digital platform for remote education provision that will be used consistently across the school in order to allow interaction, assessment and feedback, and make sure staff are trained and confident in its use"
Teachers and students can move between conventional in-person learning and remote schooling – ensuring a high quality and consistent learning experience in any scenario. Teachers can use surveys and/or a random select question mode to assess progress and provide real-time feedback – while the chat, messages and help request features support interaction and collaboration.
When teaching pupils remotely, we expect schools to:
How classroom.cloud can help
“set meaningful and ambitious work each day in an appropriate range of subjects”
Teachers can enter lesson objectives into the Student Toolbar, so students can keep track of what they need to do in each lesson.
“provide frequent, clear explanations of new content, delivered by a teacher or through high-quality curriculum resources”
Teachers can share their screen and audio to help explain lesson activities, and provide a link to a video exemplar via a message to students (for them to access at a later time) or, alternatively, launch it directly on their screens.
“[provide] opportunities for interactivity, including questioning, eliciting and reflective discussion”
classroom.cloud’s ‘Random Select’ questioning mode selects students at random to answer the teacher’s question and reflective discussion can flow from the answers given. This is also a great way to ensure students feel they are being selected fairly.
“[enable] pupils to receive timely and frequent feedback on how to progress, using digitally facilitated or whole-class feedback where appropriate”
A great way to give students feedback on how to progress is via the Chat tool. It also gives students a voice, as both the teacher and the student can initiate a chat. Any chat session can be copied and saved as a permanent record, if desired. Whole-class feedback may stem from the Random Select questioning mode detailed above.
“[use] assessment to ensure teaching is responsive to pupils’ needs and addresses any critical gaps in pupils’ knowledge”
classroom.cloud’s survey tool allows teachers to gauge understanding via new or saved topic-based surveys. They can then address misconceptions as they occur and to close any learning gaps.
“We recognise that some pupils with SEND may not be able to access remote education without adult support and so expect schools to work with families to deliver an ambitious curriculum appropriate for their level of need"
Designed for accessibility, classroom.cloud was described by the EAF as “…the guidance tools the teacher has are especially great for special education – control of the screen, quick launch and other tools make it possible to help students, who might struggle in focusing or who need help in accessing suitable resources.”
Going above and beyond
It is also crucial that schools still provide a safe learning environment. With classroom.cloud, teachers can use lists of ‘allowed’ and ‘restricted’ websites to ensure that students remain on task and protected from inappropriate content.
In addition, its eSafety toolkit ensures further safeguarding with its Keyword and Phrase monitoring, Keyword Cloud and contextual intelligence-based Risk Index tools that inform and alert staff to trending topics and any associated risks.
In-school learning
Ofsted EIF framework and social distancing
With the virus still circulating, schools are doing their best to keep students socially distanced during lessons in line with Government guidance, while also ensuring their education is as minimally disrupted as possible and remains of high quality, as per Ofsted’s EIF framework.
NetSupport School provides a feature-rich set of teaching, learning and classroom management tools for use within the school classroom to enhance learning and education outcomes.
It supports social distancing within the school, as teachers can deliver instruction and assessment across multiple rooms, monitor students’ screens and keep them on task from afar – while students can request help without having to leave their desks.
It also continues to support Ofsted EIF requirements in the following ways:
Ofsted EIF
Quality of education:
How NetSupport School can help
“Teachers present subject matter clearly, promoting appropriate discussion about the subject matter they are teaching.”
Teachers can show their screen so everyone can see what is being explained. They can also show a video or replay file to elaborate, plus use a virtual whiteboard to illustrate. They can also use audio mode to support teaching of languages, music and more.
“They check learners’ understanding systematically, identify misconceptions accurately and provide clear, direct feedback. In doing so, they respond and adapt their teaching as necessary, without unnecessarily elaborate or differentiated approaches”
“They check learners’ understanding systematically, identify misconceptions accurately and provide clear, direct feedback. In doing so, they respond and adapt their teaching as necessary, without unnecessarily elaborate or differentiated approaches” A thumbnail view of students’ screens reveals who is ok and who is struggling with a task. Teachers can undertake surveys to gauge understanding across the class or use the AfL-based Q&A mode with five different question types to engage students and see where learning gaps are. For direct feedback, teachers can use the chat tool with a student – or share a student’s screen with the rest of the class to demonstrate good work.
“Over the course of study, teaching is designed to help learners to remember in the long term the content they have been taught and to integrate new knowledge into larger concepts”
The Student journal is a comprehensive summary of a lesson compiled from the teacher’s and student’s notes and is perfect for revision or those who have been absent. To help students remember, teachers can leave a recording of the concept they have just demonstrated on students’ devices for their reference and send video exemplars to the class for them to reference later on.
“Teachers and leaders use assessment well, for example to help learners embed and use knowledge fluently or to check understanding and inform teaching. Leaders understand the limitations of assessment and do not use it in a way that creates unnecessary burdens for staff or learners”
Using the Test Designer, teachers can create and run customised tests (8 different question types) that are auto-marked – and can display individual results back to each student immediately. To help ease teachers’ workloads, NetSupport School stores any tests the teacher has created for future editing and reuse.
“Teachers create an environment that allows the learner to focus on learning.
Thumbnail view allows teachers to keep students on task – while ‘approved’ and ‘restricted’ website and application lists minimise opportunities for distraction.
“The resources and materials that teachers select – in a way that does not create unnecessary workload for staff – reflect the provider’s ambitious intentions for the course of study…”
Designed with teachers, for teachers, NetSupport School provides easy-to-use instruction and classroom management tools, with the majority available in a single click. Work can be sent to and collected from students quickly and easily, and tests can be auto-marked, saving time for teachers.
Behaviour and attitudes:
How NetSupport School can help
Relationships among learners and staff reflect a positive and respectful culture. Leaders, teachers and learners create an environment where bullying, peer-on-peer abuse or discrimination are not tolerated.”
NetSupport’s eSafety tools can help staff support a safe learning environment. Its ‘SafeSearch’ feature prevents inappropriate content being returned in search results, plus, its keyboard monitoring tool allows teachers to identify any inappropriate or bullying behaviour. In addition, teachers can capture how students feel via the Student Feedback mode.
Personal development:
How NetSupport School can help
“At each stage of education, the provider prepares learners for future success in their next steps”
NetSupport School helps teachers deliver technology-enhanced learning using a variety of different tools, which all help to equip students with the foundations of technology knowledge and experience they need for the future.
Leadership and management:
How NetSupport School can help