Mailing for 5^th February 2021

To our essential worker parents who are continuing to work at these difficult times - a HUGE THANK YOU!! To all those parents who are helping to keep our school community safe by keeping their children at home and home schooling them – thank you and WELL DONE!!

In the continued national effort to limit the spread of the virus, as a school we are required to continue to contact tracing during the February half term. If your child has been attending school and tests positive having developed symptoms within 48 hours of being in school, please contact us on the school email address so that we can follow our school procedures to identify close contacts and advise self- isolation, as the individual may have been infectious whilst in school. Where pupils or staff still attending school test positive for coronavirus (COVID-19) during the holidays, having developed symptoms more than 48 hours since being in school, we are not required to take any action.  Please do still notify us though for our records. Parents and carers should follow contact tracing instructions provided by NHS Track and trace.

We are looking at ways to enhance the wellbeing of children and staff, so Year 1 and 2 will have Wellbeing Wednesday and will be set some mindfulness activities to complete both at home and in school. Year R will continue their wellbeing focus on Thursday’s through PE and music and Fab Funky Friday.

Year 1 and 2 children were previously used to receiving ‘carrots’ for their achievements in a Friday assembly before the ‘lockdown’.  To reward learning in school and home learning, certificates will be awarded. The recipients of the certificates will be notified on the Class Dojo. There is an alternative plan in place for Year R when they all return to school as they had not been receiving carrots before ‘lockdown’.

We are in the process of making arrangements for teachers to hold virtual parent meetings via MS Teams.  We will be in touch as soon as we have dates and will let you know how to make bookings.

Reminders for children in school:

• There have been some children arriving at school after 9am when the classroom doors have closed. Please be aware that if this happens more than three times, your child will not be admitted in late. Staff are starting their teaching sessions promptly at 9am and with ‘class bubbles’, we do not have spare adults to collect the children from the playground gate. Gates will be locked at 9am.
• Please provide additional layers that they are able to put on/take off as the classrooms can sometimes get chilly with the need for increased ventilation.
• Year R children will continue to take part in small group PE sessions on Thursdays, please send your child in sport-type clothes on Thursdays.
• If your child is unwell (non Covid 19), please consider if they should be in school. We have had several children in who have been dosed up on Calpol that we have had to send home. We are concerned that these illnesses may pass to staff resulting in the ‘class bubble’ having to close. Thank you for your understanding and consideration.

Letters Home:

Whole School:

• Tesco - donate a book
• Road Safety Parent Newsletter

Year R:

• There is no specific mailing this week

Year 1:

• Parent resource support booklet -   In school, we frequently use resources that you may not have, so this pack provides alternatives for you to source and some to print out and try with your child. We would love your feedback on how things worked for you and your child at home. Happy hunting.
• Alien space letter
• Alien activity ideas

Year 2:

• Parent resource support booklet -   In school, we frequently use resources that you may not have, so this pack provides alternatives for you to source and some to print out and try with your child. We would love your feedback on how things worked for you and your child at home. Happy hunting.

‘Teach your Monster to Read’ is an amazing FREE reading resource that was available during the last ‘lockdown’. Click this link to register your child to access it: https://www.teachyourmonstertoread.com/

Please continue to share what your child has done, whether it’s one of the tasks set or a photo of them making something, via the class emails, or for Year 1 and 2 via the Dojo platform. Staff will try to respond as quickly as they can but please remember that at the moment they are teaching the children in school as well as preparing the home learning tasks so are busier than ever.  To help try to support our staff working under this immense stress, we will acknowledge each piece of work submitted and give more detailed feedback on one specific task each week.

As so many children are not in school, we ask that your child joins a ‘Zoom’ meeting each week so that we can check in with them and they can also see their friends.  It is also important that they are completing some of the remote learning that staff have prepared. We will make contact with families if we do not see them or if they are not accessing the tasks.  Remember, anything you can do is great it is also important to maintain the balance in these tricky times of learning and having fun as a family.

We continue to put our children, their parents and our staff at the centre of any decision making to ensure that we keep everyone as safe as we can at this continued tricky time. If you have any feedback as to how this week has been, please let us know via parent.mail@hwis.hants.sch.uk

It’s the weekend so enjoy some quality time together as a family J

Take care and stay safe.

HWIS team