Catch up program post COVID 19

Following the lockdown on March 28th due to COVID 19 the children of Little Eaton Primary School had to adapt as learners and rely on homeschooling, remote teacher support, and a reduced amount of face to face teaching from their class teacher. This meant that many children have gaps in their knowledge from the previous year group when they returned in September. 

At Little Eaton, we have constructed a ‘catch-up’ plan to ensure children catch up on any lost learning time and potential gaps in knowledge. This plan will focus on quality first teaching, targeted support, and wider strategies.

What is the ‘catch-up’ premium funding?

The government has announced £1 billion of funding to support children and young people to catch up. This includes a one-off universal £650 million catch-up premium for 2020 to 2021 academic year to ensure that schools have the support they need to help all pupils make up for lost teaching time. Schools should use this funding for specific activities to support their pupils to catch up for lost teaching over the previous months and have the flexibility to spend their funding in the best way for their children and circumstances.

Little Eaton has been allocated £17,000 additional ‘catch-up’ funding to support interventions designed to close gaps in attainment for this academic year.

How will spending decisions about interventions be made?

Since July, leaders in school have been following best practice guidance documents and approaches published by the DfE (Department for Education) and the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) to ensure the additional funding is directed in the most effective way (see Appendix 1). Approaches taken by the school will be driven by our detailed knowledge of children’s current attainment and will draw upon approaches that are evidence-based that are proven to have a positive impact on closing gaps.

Little Eaton takes a ‘tiered approach’ to closing gaps and raising attainment (see Appendix 2). In addition to high-quality teaching and learning interventions within the school day, Little Eaton has employed additional teaching staff to take targeted children or cover the class so that the class teacher can focus upon those in need. Evidence (EEF) shows that ‘Tutors that have qualified teacher status are likely to have the most impact’.

During November 2020, Governors in school scrutinised the ‘catch-up’ premium strategy to ensure all strategies chosen will have a positive impact on children’s attainment. The catch-up programme will link closely to the school improvement plans and Pupil Premium Strategy. Leaders must be able to account for how money is being used to achieve the goal of ‘catch-up’ Lesson plans will evaluate learning and identify gaps; assessment will be used regularly to assess progress against targets.