Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate his Department has made of (a) local (b) regional and (c) national levels of participation in remote learning; and what recent assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of remote learning.

As both my right hon. Friends, the Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer have made clear, the Government will do whatever it takes to support people affected by COVID-19.

Our latest guidance on remote education during COVID-19 is set out below:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/remote-education-during-coronavirus-covid-19

The Department is continuing to assess the impact of the potential effect of school closure on children and young people’s education attainment, including on remote education. We are working closely with schools, sector organisations, international institutions and across Government to understand the risks to education attainment and wellbeing, and identify the children and young people that need help.

We are committed to ensuring that all children can continue to learn remotely in a number of ways during these very difficult circumstances, and are supporting sector-led initiatives such as the Oak National Academy. This new enterprise has been created by 40 teachers from schools across England. It will provide 180 video lessons for free each week, across a broad range of subjects, for every year group from Reception through to Year 10. By 24 May, over 2.3 million users had visited the Oak Academy site and over 8.6 million lessons had been accessed.

However, it is up to each school to determine how to deliver education to its pupils and we recognise that many schools have already shared resources – both online and printed resources – for children who are at home.