Feedback from parents (through the APEEE) on the online learning system put in place on 16 March 2020 following the school’s closure due to the COVID-19 crisis

This summary is based on a feedback asked to class representatives of all language sections of our school, and includes the nursery, primary and secondary departments. Parents were asked for their feedback in general (without a questionnaire) and to inform the APEEE on what is working well and what is working less well. All language sections contributed. The summary below reflects the overall feedback from parents across sections.     

Overall assessment

Overall parents congratulate the school on having put in place an effective workable online learning system very rapidly after school closure in order to ensure the continuity of teaching and learning. Parents do compliment the school management, teachers and the school’s IT team. Parents are further very happy with the engagement of teachers who have adapted quickly to the distance-learning environment.

Online schooling is a new experience for all: teachers, pupils/students, parents. This is not the normal environment, neither for teachers, nor for pupils/students or parents. Another important context factor is that the large majority of parents is teleworking themselves, so often the entire family is at home, which presents challenges for both school and work.

Summary of results

The summary below distinguishes between nursery/primary and secondary. For both areas, a distinction is made between “strengths” and “other points raised & suggestions for improvement”.

A common point for all sections is that online learning has its technical limits. Not all families have a sufficient number of laptops/tablets at home to ensure individual use by each child and some do not have a proper printer at home. Some parents also reported connection problems at their homes.  

Primary/nursery

Strengths:

• Appreciation for rapid transformation into digital school as well as agility of teachers to adapt to new and unprecedented situation and conditions;
• Appreciation for daily encouraging emails from teachers, which are well structured, clear, diverse and positive;
• Appreciation of communication by the Primary Director to parents;
• Useful to receive E-mails the day before so parents can have everything ready for the next day;
• Overall satisfaction regarding nursery on which no particular issues were reported.

Other points raised & suggestions for improvement:

• Too much screen time: there is tension between “online learning”, using screens, and recommendations not to overuse screens by children. There needs to be a balanced approach between online work using screens, and paper based work, art etc.;

• Too much printing: more use of Adobe is recommended to reduce printing; this would also allow children send the work to teachers. In addition, if printing is necessary, could the font be reduced, pictures deleted etc. to keep it to a minimum?;
• Homework: some parents find that children are under a lot of pressure and are receiving too much schoolwork when you combine all the subjects (L1, L2, Art, Ethics, Religion etc). Teachers seem not always aware of this accumulation;
• Videos chosen are not always adapted to the vocabulary level of the children
• New topics should first be well explained before assignments are given (not for all children easy to engage with new topics through online learning); class lessons pre-recorded by teachers could help keep children engaged;
• Presence of adults needed: in primary distance education requires often the presence of an adult as in practice it is more “home schooling” than online learning; but this is not easily combined with teleworking by parents and even more complicated when more children of a younger age are at home. Furthermore parents are not teachers and cannot replace them;
• Interaction with the teacher: although many teachers do very well, parents also feel that more personal interaction and more regular online contact with teachers would be helpful;
• Guidance on the usage of Teams from the school to ensure children are using it for the purpose it was intended would be useful, e.g. some ground rules/ healthy norms for the live chat features;
• Assignments: it is not clear to all parents whether work needs to be back to the teacher or not (parents report on conflicting messages); furthermore, parents wonder if teachers will check any of the work that the children are doing; 
• Curriculum: expectations regarding following the curriculum should not be too high in these times and the fact that children do also do other useful work at home (e.g. helping to cook) should be appreciated as well.

Secondary:

Strengths:

• The system in place works well and hardly any parent reported about technical problems. 
• Learning goes on and that is great under the circumstances

Other points raised & suggestions for improvement:

• Homework: the point most frequently mentioned by parents of all sections is the perceived increase in homework. What students normally do during the class at school is now to be done in addition to the time spent for the remote course. This leads to additional stress and fatigue of students. Teachers should assess the amount of work with a view to achieve normal homework standards;
• Communication on assignments: parents reported about written instructions to be sometimes unclear (examples: no date given for deadlines, not clear whether the work needs to be handed in to the teacher); deadlines may interfere with obligations in other classes, etc. In addition, some educational methods overemphasise the use of assignments;
• Communication channel used for homework: parents reported inconsistency between teachers on the communication channel for homework (sometimes Teams is used, sometimes SMS);
• Use of “Teams”: there are considerable differences between teachers in the use of Teams. Some teachers use the functionalities very well (e.g. by using the screen as “whiteboard”), or by giving assignments at the beginning of the class, followed by “course work” and a wrap up at the end of class. A more harmonised approach of using Teams and also a better understanding of Teams by some teachers would be welcomed (e.g. exchange of teacher experiences could perhaps contribute to achieving this);
• Video chats: although video chats are overall highly appreciated, many parents reported problems during video chats: one of the recurrent problems is students muting other students or muting even the teacher. In addition, problems of ejecting students were reported. Teachers should have a minimum required knowledge on using Teams. Furthermore students should be disciplined not to mute others (and not have technically the possibility to do so);
• Duration of lessons: it was reported that there is variety in the duration of lessons: they are sometimes shorter than normal (e.g. 25 mns) and sometimes longer (over 45 mns); lesson time should not go over 45 mns and breaks between lessons should be respected in order to avoid stressing students;
• Being online all the time: overall parents report a too long period spent on screens by the students. Teachers should find ways that pupils do not have to be online all the time during class periods. Ideal could be a combination of virtual class room teaching and offline work on assignments;
• Other points on Teams: some pupils seem to use Teams system for creation of groups outside the scope of teaching. This should be not be technically possible. Also handed in homework should not be mutually visible, but only by teachers;
• Communication between students and teachers: as the chat function in Teams is not the most ideal method for communication with teachers in many cased it is recommended that teachers offer other possibilities to pupils to interact with them individually;
• Presence and absence: teaching time is not always used efficiently: some teachers spend a lot of time on noting presence and absences; sometimes students were noted as absent when this was involuntary due to connection problems at home. Furthermore it is not always clearly communicated to students when teachers are absent;
• Physical education: inconsistency in approaches: some give a written assignment for PE, in another case students were noted “absent” when not online during PE (in one case the student went out for a walk). Parents suggest that students should be physically active during physical education classes, offline or with the help of e.g. videos. This could also help to cope with the additional stress the online learning system is representing.

Other issues raised by parents in their feedback (N/P/S):

BAC: Parents (especially from S7) are worried about the BAC this year. 

School trips: rather than cancellation, parents wonder about the possibility to postpone rather than cancel school trips

Easter holidays: has the school envisaged setting up any online activity during the Easter holidays that will be spent at home in quarantine which should however not be school

Testing: what will happen to testing if the school remains closed after the Easter holidays