Lockdown has seen families and friends explore the benefits of connecting virtually with their loved ones.

So it is in schools, which have moved quickly to set up digital links with families to provide high quality teaching to their students at home.

This is a piece from Councillor Penny Frost, Liberal Democrat councillor for Ham, Petersham and Richmond Riverside ward and chair of the Education and Children's Services Committee on Richmond Council.

We are all hoping and planning to move forward to a 'post-lockdown' period where services and leisure activities settle down into a more recognisable pattern, but we are a long way away from returning to life as it was before Covid.

This will be particularly true for schools as they begin to welcome back all their pupils and students for the autumn term.

Blended learning

As schools work on their plans to overcome the difficulty of providing teaching in conditions where social distancing can't be fully managed, heads are aiming to offer 'blended learning' from September onwards, with some face-to-face classroom or smaller group teaching and continuing regular virtual teaching which can be accessed through the internet.

Students going on to college and university will also have heard a great deal about the blended learning they will experience next year as they start their FE and HE courses.

Teachers have risen to the challenge of delivering their virtual curriculum over the internet, setting assignments for students to complete and return for marking, and providing individualised feedback for their students.

Teachers have been following up the students whose participation is patchy, or have been struggling to manage their work away from the support they would be given in the classroom.

Happy parents in Petersham

In Ham and Petersham, we have heard some wonderful feedback from parents who have been very satisfied with the efforts teachers have gone to, and are relieved that their children have been as little disadvantaged as possible through the lengthy school closure.

However, virtual teaching and learning has highlighted a number of associated problems. Some families have little access to Wi-Fi, particularly while libraries have been closed.

Families where parents have also been working from home have experienced significant competition for laptops, and schools have done their best to lend school equipment to help out where they can.

The Department for Education has provided laptops for young people in Year 10, vulnerable children and Children in Care, but this has barely alleviated the need that some families have experienced.

The great worry following the prolonged school closures is that some young people from more disadvantaged families will have fallen further behind, and school heads and governing boards are very aware of the need to monitor the progress of all groups over the course of the next term.

Many thanks to Cllr Frost who wrote this piece for Richmond Nub News.

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