COVID Catch Up Funding

COVID Catch Up Funding

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Children and young people across the country have experienced unprecedented disruption to their education as a result of coronavirus (COVID-19). Those from the most vulnerable and disadvantaged backgrounds will be among those hardest hit. The aggregate impact of lost time in education will be substantial, and the scale of our response must match the scale of the challenge.
Schools’ allocations will be calculated on a per pupil basis, providing each mainstream school with a total of £80 for each pupil in years reception through to 11.
As the catch-up premium has been designed to mitigate the effects of the unique disruption caused by coronavirus (COVID-19), the grant will only be available for the 2020 to 2021 academic year. It will not be added to schools’ baselines in calculating future years’ funding allocations.

Use of Funds EEF Recommendations
 

Schools should use this funding for specific activities to support their pupils to catch up for lost teaching over the previous months, in line with the guidance on curriculum expectations for the next academic year.

Schools have the flexibility to spend their funding in the best way for their cohort and circumstances.

To support schools to make the best use of this funding, the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) has published a coronavirus (COVID-19) support guide for schools with evidence-based approaches to catch up for all students. Schools should use this document to help them direct their additional funding in the most effective way.

Please click here to see how we plan on using our catch up Covid funding

 

  

The EEF advises the following:

 

Teaching and whole school strategies

·         Supporting great teaching

·         Pupil assessment and feedback

 

Targeted approaches

·         One to one and small group tuition

·         Intervention programmes

·         Extended school time

Wider strategies

·         Supporting parent and carers

·         Access to technology

 
Identified impact of lockdown
 

Maths

 Specific content has been missed, leading to gaps in learning and stalled sequencing of journeys. Children still have an appetite for maths and lockdown has not affected their attitudes however they are quite simply, have large gaps in learning.

Recall of basic skills has suffered – children are not able to recall addition facts, times tables and have forgotten once taught calculation strategies. This is reflected in arithmetic assessments.
 

Writing

 Children haven’t necessarily missed ‘units’ of learning in the same way as Maths, however they have lost essential practising of writing skills. GAPs specific knowledge has suffered, leading to lack of fluency in writing. Those who have maintained writing throughout lockdown are less affected, however those who evidently didn’t write much have had to work additionally hard on writing stamina and improving their motivation due to the lack of fluency in their ability to write.
 

Reading

 Children accessed reading during lockdown more than any other subject. This is something that was more accessible for families and required less teacher input. However, children are less fluent in their reading and the gap between those children that read widely and those children who don’t is now increasingly wide. The bottom 20% of readers have been disproportionately affected.
 

Non-core

 There are now significant gaps in knowledge – whole units of work have not been taught meaning that children are less able to access pre-requisite knowledge when learning something new and they are less likely to make connections between concepts and themes throughout the curriculum. Children have also missed out on the curriculum experiences e.g. trips, visitors and powerful curriculum moments.