Learning at home throughout the pandemic report — June 2022

The top three positives for parents with the remote learning arrangements in February 2021 were:

• Being more aware of what their child was learning
• Having new options to engage with their child’s teacher (i.e. virtual parents’ evenings)
• Being provided with learning resources that helped them engage with their child’s learning

Other themes to emerge were:

The digital divide

• Although access to a digital device with an internet connection increased, there was still a large proportion of children who did not have an appropriate home learning environment or access to the technology and resources needed. Even with the technology and resources needed, there continues to be a social divide between the knowledge and experience middle-income parents have to support their children’s home learning, compared to lower-income parents.
  
• Community support groups and technology courses to help parents make better use of technology, workshops based on the UK curriculum and other workshops including lessons or courses which teach parents about different subjects would be highly beneficial for parents.

Parental engagement

• Parental engagement increased throughout the pandemic and is higher than ever before. However, lower-income parents were less likely to be involved in their child’s education compared to higher-income parents.
  
• One-third of parents expected greater involvement than before and only one in ten parents expected less than before. Almost half of parents from BAME (Black and Minority Ethnic) backgrounds, parents who are eligible for FSM (Free School Meals) and higher-income parents want greater involvement in their child’s education. Parents from BAME backgrounds, those with children eligible for FSM and those parenting a child with SEND were also however more likely to expect less involvement with their child’s education.
  
• The top barrier for parents in getting involved in their child’s education and school was lack of time, although it dropped in importance since 2019. Knowing how to get involved but being unsure about how to go about it, and offering support but having no one respond were the two barriers which increased since 2019. BAME, FSM-eligible and lower-income parents were all more likely to say that they ​’have offered to get involved in their child’s school but no one has responded to me’. FSM-eligible, SEND parents and white parents were more likely to find the idea of getting involved intimidating.
  

Increasing confidence

• Parents became less worried about their child missing out on face-to-face learning as time went on and parents’ confidence in supporting home learning increased. BAME and FSM eligible parents’ confidence, however, decreased after three months.

• To support learning at home, parents would find more feedback from teachers on their child’s work, more instruction/​teaching from teachers, live online classes and recorded video clips helpful. More video clips explaining subject matter was a high priority for BAME parents and lower-income parents. This may be a result of the correlation that exists between BAME parents and lower incomes and having less knowledge about the curriculum and subject matters.