How often did you hear from your teachers during the lockdown period?

As you cannot fail to have noticed, the UK was on lockdown for several months starting in March 2020. Many parents worried that their children were missing out on their education. So, for our latest survey we decided to find out how much contact children were having with their teachers over this time.

We asked the question, “How often did you hear from your teachers during the lockdown period?” There was a clear winner: 41% of respondents said they spoke to their teacher more than twice a week. However, in second place, 30% of children said they spoke to their teacher very seldom during the lockdown. In third place, on 14% of the vote, were children who spoke to their teacher just once per week. 9% had contact twice a week and 6% just once per month.

How school closures affected children

With schools across the country being closed to stop the virus from spreading, children and teachers have had a challenging time. Parents have had to take on the role of teachers, becoming home educators – a job which is not easy. Especially with other commitments.

The Institute of Fiscal Studies did some research on the effect of the lockdown on children’s education. Here are some of their key findings:

• Children spent an average of five hours a day on home learning
• Children from better-off families spent 30% more time on home learning than those from poorer families
• Half of parents said that they struggled to educate their children at home
• There is an inequality between schools in their provision of home learning. Schools whose pupils come from higher earning families provided more material than those whose children came from poorer backgrounds
• The school closures will lead to an increase in educational equality. Poorer children will be most affected by the closures.

With school closures having such a dramatic effect on our children’s education, let us hope that there will be no more. Or, if they are necessary, that greater provision will be made for the benefit of all pupils – not just for the better off.