Homework at St Mary's
Homework is an important part of learning as it helps to consolidate and extend pupils’ knowledge and deepen their understanding.
Homework will be set by teachers and recorded in pupil planners which they will receive next week. Information about specific subjects, for each year group, will be given out to pupils and sent to parents on Monday. Like most secondary schools, we use GoogleClassroom to communicate with and support pupils electronically as well as a few different online bespoke subject platforms such as Seneca and Sparx.
Google Classroom Access
All Year 7 pupils use Google Classroom in their Computer Science lessons, and will have a demonstration of Seneca and Sparx over the next two weeks to ensure they are confident using the platforms at home.
Pupils can access Google Classroom in a number of different ways:
1) from the St. Mary’s website www.stmaryswallasey.com
2) by searching for it or going to https://classroom.google.com/
3) by downloading the GoogleClassroom to a mobile device through the AppStore or equivalent.
Seneca
Many departments in the school will be making use of Seneca to set homework. Seneca is an adaptive learning platform, with a methodology entirely based on neuroscience, written by experts and academically proven to improve pupils’ outcomes.
Not only are they fun and effective, but they also adjust each assignment to each pupil, optimising their learning and providing teachers with detailed information about the class’ progress.
All homework that is set on Seneca will be accessed by pupils via Google Classroom.
Maths Homework
Maths homework will be set on Sparx Maths sets personalised homework for each pupil, creating a weekly set of questions tailored to their level of understanding and learning pace. The questions are designed to be achievable whilst offering the stretch that pupils need to make progress. The program learns what level of homework is appropriate for each pupil, therefore it may take a few weeks to match the needs of each individual learner.
Each week, topics are set by your child’s maths teacher and will make up the majority of the
homework questions. Questions from previous topics will also be included in the homework
so that pupils can keep practising the skills they have learned.
Parental Information
As a parent, you can get email summaries of your student’s work and progress in a class. Google Classroom, Seneca and Sparx. We will use the email address we have for you to set this up.
In email summaries, you can review:
Missing work—Work not submitted when the summary was sent.
Upcoming work—Work that’s due today and tomorrow (for daily emails) or that’s due in the upcoming week (for weekly emails).
Class activities—Announcements, assignments, and questions recently posted by teachers.
Help and Support
All students are part of a classroom called Google Classroom Help, which has lots of useful information and video tutorials that can be used if your child is struggling to access homework.
There are also video tutorials available on our school website via the Google Classroom Help Page https://stmaryswallasey.com/googleclassroom-help-page/
If you have any issues or concerns please feel free to contact the school on [email protected].
