Coronavirus: NSW schools scramble to enter remote teaching mode

State teachers were caught off guard by an order to suspend classroom teaching amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Thousands of students across NSW will switch to remote learning on Wednesday after teachers were caught off guard by an order to suspend classroom teaching amid the coronavirus pandemic.

While the state’s 3136 schools — public and private — will remain open to pupils for the rest of term one, it is understood most of them will cease classroom teaching and effectively be shut down from Wednesday.

Students who do attend will be merged with different levels and supervised by teachers but will be required to complete the same online learning modules as students who stay home.

The move means NSW teachers will place their faith in educational technology that has never before been deployed on such a large scale, and with such a lack of oversight, in Australia.

Catholic schools in Sydney rushed to get ahead of the curve on Tuesday, with the region’s 152 schools shifting to remote learning, affecting at least 70,000 students, said Michael Hopkin, the head of system improvement at Sydney Catholic Schools.

“We had 24 hours’ notice so as you can imagine it has been a massive logistical exercise,” Mr Hopkin said. “These kids are in a whole new world and there’s no doubt it’s a big undertaking to move to remote learning — students are already anxious.”

The transition to remote learning for public school students is unlikely to be as smooth after scores of teachers said they were forced to “read between the lines” and rewatch a press conference by Premier Gladys Berejiklian on Monday.

“We had no contact from the Department of Education at all so we had to just go off what we saw on TV on Monday and make that call to move to remote learning,” said one primary schoolteacher based in Sydney.

It comes as state governments struggle to find a uniform position on how schools should operate in the pandemic.