Stress free Home Schooling with Home Classroom

This post is in collaboration with Home Classroom from TeacherActive

Of all the things that I expected when I celebrated the arrival of 2020, spending most of the year at home during a global pandemic with no childcare, no visits to my Dad or in laws and juggling homeschooling around working from home certainly wasn’t one of them!!! Fast forward to November and whilst the girls are both finally now back at school, everything still feels very unpredictable. We’ve seen a huge amount of disruption to our children’s education so far this year and whilst they are incredibly brave and resilient, it’s been a real concern. Since the start of the Autumn term alone we have already seen two periods of self isolation and a (thankfully negative) COVID test; and I’m fully expecting school to feel a little bit like an extended game of the Hokey Cokey for some time to come.

One of the biggest challenges I found during the first lockdown was attempting to juggle home schooling around working from home. Trying to focus on lessons with Erin whilst taking calls and managing my own heavy key worker workload was virtually impossible and as such, I wasn’t always able to fully support her or guide her learning. I felt a huge amount of pressure trying to complete the work we were set from the school, whilst all the while feeling hugely guilty that I couldn’t give her the help that she so clearly needed. Having already struggled a little with her literacy and Maths prior to lockdown, I found myself constantly worrying that she was falling further behind or would struggle with the transition from infants to juniors.

Our Home schooling challenges

As a Mum, I found taking on the role of ‘teacher’ during our periods of home schooling incredibly tough. I wasn’t familiar with the topics, I wasn’t sure what methods were correct and after a session trying to demonstrate fractions with gummy bears ended particularly badly (namely with me eating them all in a fit of rage!!), we very quickly came to the conclusion that education wasn’t for me!

We went on to attempt a number of pre recorded online lessons which whilst interesting, were made with one way communication only and for Erin this wasn’t always effective. She has a tendency to just sit and listen without fully taking anything in, and without the ability to talk back and clarify her understanding, there were times when she struggled to go on and complete the exercises that were set.

How can Home Classroom from TeacherActive help?

We were approached by TeacherActive one week into a two week period of isolation for Erin after a positive case in her bubble and the timing simply couldn’t have been better. I was going through an incredibly busy period at work and had been really struggling to keep up with the list of tasks being sent from the school.

We were asked if we would be interested in reviewing their online tutoring service Home-Classroom.com – a portal providing access to hundreds of high quality and vetted learning staff for one to one tutoring using interactive whiteboards and video tools and I pretty much bit their hand off.

Being able to pass over the reins to a trained professional who could work specifically to Erin’s needs and requirements sounded like a great plan. Over the last few weeks we have reviewed two hour long lessons with a Home Classroom personal tutor. Here’s what you need to know if you are considering tutoring for your child.

What is Home Classroom?

Home Classroom is a tutoring website bought to you from TeacherActive.com who have over 15 years experience in supplying schools with high quality teaching staff including supply teachers, support staff and teaching assistants.

Home Classroom provides parents and guardians with access to hundreds of classroom practitioners who have all been vetted to the REC’s accredited standards. From a safeguarding perspective, all Home Classroom tutors have at a minimum had a face to face interview, comprehensive identity and background checks, thorough references and qualification checks and an enhanced DBS check, meaning that you can proceed safe in the knowledge that they have your child’s best interests and safety at heart.

The Home Classroom tutors cover a variety of curriculums from Key stages 2 (Juniors) through to Key Stage 5 (16-18 year olds). You can search for a tutor based on your childs’ specific needs using the subject or topic they wish to study, as well as the tutors availability (with many tutors also offering the flexibility of evenings or weekend lessons). There is no minimum sign up or tie in, meaning that you can arrange tutoring as and when you need it, subject to your tutors availability. This flexibility around tutoring makes it a great option for parents who are working from home and want support during periods of lockdown or homeschooling.

Each tutor has a photo and a brief summary or bio, including details of their background and areas of expertise or specialism. If you are unsure which tutor will be most suitable for your needs, you can even contact the Helpdesk at Home Classroom who will assist in finding the best match based on your requirements.

Home Classroom offers one to one teaching support in online classrooms with interactive whiteboards and online teaching tools. There is no software installation required – just a web cam and a wifi connection and the lessons can be tailored entirely to your child’s pace and level of understanding; with the ability to message tutors directly to discuss and determine the best approach or areas where your child may need additional support.

Finally for peace of mind, parents will be pleased to know that there is no sharing of personal information other than your child’s first name, with no addresses or bank details being shared. Instead funds can be added to a online wallet and are then transferred automatically to the tutor once the lesson is complete. All the tutors hourly rates are clearly listed and lesson duration can be agreed directly with your tutor once assigned.

Our Experience of Home Classroom

Having been worried about the impact on Erin’s maths and English in particular, I decided to test out Home Classroom with some comprehension and numeracy tutoring, using the search tool to review the tutors who may be a good fit for her needs.

When searching for a tutor we came across Mrs Katie R, a primary teacher with 17 years’ experience, who tutors for KS2 in English and Maths. She was available at the weekends which worked well for our availability, her fees were reasonable and she looked really friendly and smiley! I dropped her a message to discuss my needs and we were able to book in a lesson for the following Saturday morning.

The messaging option was a real positive as it gave us the chance to have a ‘chat’ before committing to a lesson. Most tutors on Home Classroom offer a trial lesson free of charge, allowing parents to introduce the tutor to their child and gauge the response before parting with any funds.

Based on our discussions and the fact that Erin’s attention span isn’t the best, Katie came up with a lesson plan that covered a variety of topics in one session, rather than focusing entirely on one subject for the full hour.

The Home Classroom website itself was very easy to use. Once we’d established we wanted to proceed with Mrs Katie R, I created a profile for Erin, and assigned Katie as my tutor. You can set up different profiles for different children, meaning if you have more than one child you can easily differentiate their accounts. Children are also given their own logins, meaning older children can login and start off themselves whilst the guardian account can process the payments and arrangements in the background.

I was able to add funds to my wallet ready to pay Katie automatically after our lessons were complete. There is no official diary or appointment booking system on Home Classroom – instead you agree the date and time of your lesson directly in the chat, and then logon to the classroom at the designated time. As someone who at times would forget her own head if it wasn’t screwed on, I personally would have loved to have seen a reminder service included, as with life being as crazy as it is at the moment, there is a slight risk that some lessons can be missed.

Our First Lesson

When we logged on for Erin’s first lesson we could see a small box with our tutors video, as well as a shared interactive screen or white board where the lesson content was shared. Mrs Katie R quickly introduced herself to Erin and got started relatively quickly, creating a mathematical ice breaker game as an introduction which Erin really enjoyed.

The lesson was a mix of comprehension, Maths and literacy, including a fun recall exercise on emperor penguins, and using adjectives, adverbs and conjunctions to make a ‘boring’ sentence more interesting. They were able to work together to create a fun story, with the tutor providing lots of positive reinforcement and helping her when she made some spelling mistakes or forgot some of the literacy terms.

Erin could see the teachers screen in front of her at all times and was able to write her answers using the keyboard so the tutor could see. Its worth noting here that the online classroom does require a basic level of IT and typing skills to navigate around the interactive whiteboard and as I have a Mac, Erin did need a bit of help initially when highlighting text or inserting new lines into a document. That said, once she had been shown this once, I was actually really impressed at how well she worked her way around – 7 year olds technology skills never cease to amaze me.

The varied nature of the lesson meant that the time passed very quickly, and at no point did Erin lose focus or get distracted, with the exception of a very brief visit from her sister who was probably coming to see what all the fuss was about.

The lesson concluded with some more mathematical games using counting in 10s and the fun, interactive style of these elements meant that Erin probably didn’t even realise she was learning!

Lesson 2

By our second lesson, Erin was already really comfortable with her tutor. Despite remote learning being new to her, she was very quickly able to build up a rapport with the tutor, with her friendly and approachable manner really gaining (and more importantly keeping) Erin’s attention.

For our second lesson Katie did a lot of work on comprehension, encouraging Erin to read and understand a passage of text before answering questions and recalling what she had observed in the text. Erin has a habit of guessing or thinking she just knows the answer during comprehension and it is an area where she has struggled in the past, so it was great to hear the techniques that Katie used to try and encourage skim reading and fact finding from the paragraphs displayed on the screen.

Depending on your child’s speed of typing, some of the written elements did take quite a while, and with older children this may allow the pace to be slightly faster. That said, I am fairly confident it would have taken Erin just as long to write it by hand, so this is by no means a criticism! With a web cam involved there is of course the flexibility for written work to be shared as well if your child prefers to work in that way or is less confident on the keyboard.

The latter part of the lesson again was maths, using a number chart to practice her times tables and counting; something which when practiced regularly has really helped improve her confidence.

Overall our experience with Home Classroom was really positive. I found Mrs Katie R to be a great tutor for Erin. She was friendly and fun, patient and calm and used lots of interactive techniques to really bring the best out of Erin during each lesson.

Whilst I was present at all times for the purpose of this review, I felt Home Classroom would be a great option for parents who are struggling to homeschool whilst working from home, or who want to catch up on areas which might have been missed if they are studying towards important qualifications or milestones in their education.

The fact there is a two way dialogue between your child and the tutor means you haven’t constantly got to be investing your own time in the lesson, or attempt to understand the topic fully yourself.

Home Classroom offers convenience and flexibility, with the tutors being able to work at your child’s own pace. Not having to worry about keeping up with other pupils who may be more confident or comfortable with the content, meant that Erin was far more likely to interact and ask questions too, with the content tailored specifically to her needs.

Finally, the lessons come with the added bonus of helping your child’s confidence in using technology, a skill which has certainly seen its value in 2020!!

My tips for getting the best out of Home Classroom

If you’re going to arrange some tutoring for your child, here are some of my tips for getting the most out of Home Classroom.

• Be on hand – Whilst I didn’t have to be there at all times during the lesson. it was helpful to be close by incase of the odd technical difficulty or if Erin wasn’t sure how to do something. At one point my battery on my laptop started to die mid lesson, and the screen size on the shared element was a bit big, so it was useful that I was on hand to quickly assist.
• Be prompt but not early – The timers on the lessons start as soon as you login to the classroom and it appears that you are charged proportionately of their hourly rate if your lesson overruns the hour. For that reason if you as the guardian have questions you might be better to ask these via the messaging tool rather than within the lesson itself.
• Ensure basic IT knowledge – Your child does need to have some basic computer use knowledge to get the most of Home Classroom, such as navigating around the screen with the mouse, clicking, typing on the keyboard and highlighting. It is not impossible without, however it  may slow down the pace of the lessons a little.

Want to try it for yourself?

If you want to try Home Classroom for yourself you can browse through their range of available tutors here and arrange a trial lesson to put it to the test.

If you use my code INFRM01 you can get an extra £5 in your wallet when you top up £10. Simply insert the code in the ‘Where did you hear about us?’ section of the website when you register.

*This post is in collaboration with Home Classroom. Our lessons were provided free of charge and we were compensated for our time, however as always, all thoughts and opinions are my own and an honest reflection of the service we experienced*