Sheffield school in bid to offer best virtual education in city

With the coronavirus pandemic currently reshaping the education system, a Sheffield school is aiming to provide the best online learning possible and make sure students don’t miss out.
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Firth Park Academy, in Shiregreen, says it has pulled out all the stops necessary to ensure that learning continues despite the challenges brought about by Covid-19.

In an effort to become the best virtual school in the city, it has pledged to offer uninterrupted support to its pupils during lockdown with an online timetable consisting of four lessons a day, most of which are live 50-minute lessons in all subjects.

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Firth Park is offering an extensive range of online lessons alongside and has been keeping up with students through social mediaFirth Park is offering an extensive range of online lessons alongside and has been keeping up with students through social media
Firth Park is offering an extensive range of online lessons alongside and has been keeping up with students through social media
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Alongside this, it is providing additional enrichment activities and support, including live assemblies, English plays acted out online, small group mentoring and online counselling as well as carrying out fortnightly online surveys to check on their students and families.

Principal Dean Jones said: “I’m so proud of how everyone in our Firth Park family has pulled together to ensure that despite all the challenges we are facing, our families and students can continue to live remarkable lives.

“Over 220 of our 240 Year 10 individual students and parents and carers came into school for academic and wellbeing reviews recently, showing the trust in how safe our environment in school is.

“Staff and students have been incredibly brave in learning how to do all their lessons online, and we really have discovered what’s possible through using social media to connect us all at this time of unprecedented change.”

Firth Park has extended its support to Year 6 pupils who will transition to the school in September and has already welcomed back Year 10 pupilsFirth Park has extended its support to Year 6 pupils who will transition to the school in September and has already welcomed back Year 10 pupils
Firth Park has extended its support to Year 6 pupils who will transition to the school in September and has already welcomed back Year 10 pupils
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To ensure that every student can access online learning support, Firth Park loaned over 340 laptops to those without a computer at home.

And, in an effort to keep children engaged, the school has been operating four social media channels – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok – with content ranging from staff lipsyncing to TikTok dance competitions.

The support has also been extended to the Year 6 pupils joining Firth Park in September, giving them access to online question and answer sessions with Year 7 students and teachers, online get-togethers for parents, and catch-up learning over the summer through Google Classrooms.

Year 6s are also being invited into school, which is part of Academies Enterprise Trust, in limited groups to aid the transition.

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