Questions and answers for parents and carers
Your Questions
What is the Active for Life Year 5 syllabus?
The Active for Life Year 5 syllabus consists of 16 lessons and 10 homeworks focussing on eating a healthy balanced diet, and staying active. It is being taught in half of the participating schools during Year 5.
My child is taking part in the study, why have I not seen any Active for Life Year 5 homeworks?
There are 60 schools taking part in the study. Half of them are continuing to teach the curriculum’s normal lessons and homeworks; where as half of them are teaching the Active for Life Year 5 lessons and homeworks. Your child may be in one of the 30 schools that are continuing to teach the normal curriculum. If so, your child’s information is just as important to us as a child’s information from a school that is teaching the new lessons.
Whether your child is in a school teaching the new lessons, or a school continuing to teach their normal lessons, they will still comply with the national curriculum.
I have received a Parent Log, what do I do with it?
You have received a Parent Log to help you record the information required to complete a questionnaire that is being sent out to all parents/carers in the spring/summer of 2012. Read our section entitled Parent Involvement for more information.
I am happy for my child to take part, but I am worried about their private information. Is their information safe?
We take data protection very seriously. The information we collect on your child will be stored in the University of Bristol. All questionnaires and computerised data regarding your child will be stored against an ID and not against their name. This will mean that when the data is analysed, it is anonymous, so the researchers will not know which child the information belongs to.
Your child’s data will not be passed onto their school, or any other organisation (e.g. NHS, Council), it will only be available to the researchers directly involved in analysing the data. No one will be able to find out about your child’s measurements.
I am happy for my child to take part, but they are worried about having their measurements taken in front of their classmates. Can you provide privacy?
Yes, we only ever take measurements in a private room and we do not allow other children or adults (other than the field workers collecting the data) to be present.
My child is bringing home lots of healthy living homework and asking for my help, is it cheating if I help them?
The Active for Life Year 5 homeworks have been designed to encourage parent/carer involvement, therefore we would actively encourage you to join in with your child and help them with the homework.
My child is new to the school, can they still join in?
Yes, we welcome all new pupils! Either ask your child’s teacher to contact us, or contact us directly so we can send you the information pack that you will need to read. If once you have read it you are happy, your child will be included in the next set of measurements (either end of Year 5 or end of Year 6).
My child has left their activity belt at a friend’s house, what should I do?
Please try as best you can to get the belt back. The belts are very valuable to us as researchers, so we would ask you to contact your child’s friend and arrange for it to be collected. In all cases where a belt is mislaid, we ask you to try hard to return it.