Keep up to date with all the latest news happening in school at the moment.
Dear Parent and carers,
After receiving confirmation from the government earlier this week, we are so pleased to announce that all pupils will be welcomed back to school from Monday 8th March 2021. The whole staff community are both happy and eager to make the return as enjoyable, exciting and most importantly, as safe as possible for all pupils and their families. We are also pleased to confirm the reopening of our Greswold Greyhounds Childcare facility for before and after school clubs and wrap around.
However, it is vitally important to maintain our stance of safeguarding the school community while abiding with the strict guidance laid out by the government. This is why the vast majority of procedures adopted from September 2020 will need to continue from the 8th March. These expectations will be communicated again to parents early next week.
Even though an updated parent protocol will be communicated to families very soon, below are some other important headlines regarding reopening:
|
Year |
Location |
Drop-off |
Pick-up |
|
Y6 |
KS2 pedestrian entrance |
8:30am |
3:10pm |
|
Y5 |
Double doors to right of main school office |
8:30am |
3:10pm |
|
Y4 |
KS2 pedestrian entrance |
8:30am |
3:10pm |
|
Y3 |
Double doors to the left of the library |
8:30am |
3:10pm |
|
Y2 |
Greswold Greyhounds |
8:40am |
3:20pm |
|
Y1 |
Double doors to the left of the library |
8:40am |
3:20pm |
|
Reception |
Early Years’ entrance |
8:40am |
3:20pm |
|
Nursery |
Early years’ entrance |
8:30am |
3:30pm |
Parents will again be allowed to pick up their children from outside classrooms at the end of the day.
I’m sure that parents will understand the need to continue communication with school via email to the school office in order to reduce face to face contact with staff and other adults. All other protective measures will remain such as regular handwashing, sanitisation, increased cleaning routines, social distancing, as well as adults wearing masks in communal areas. Thank you in advance for your co-operation.
Take care and stay safe.
Mrs K. Scott
Headteacher
Dear Parents and Carers,
I would like to convey my personal gratitude at the patience, understanding and support shown and given by Greswold families during this latest school closure, particularly with regards to remote learning and home schooling. Your efforts under very challenging circumstances are very much appreciated by all staff associated with school.
Tuesday marked this year’s Safer Internet Day which perfectly coincides with our desire to inform parents of web page set up by Solihull Local Authority to provide families with information about online safety and other aspects of remote learning. To access this, please copy the link below.
https://www.solgrid.org.uk/education/remote-education-information-for-parents-and-carers/
Also, after some recent mental training undertaken by staff, a gaming platform called Avakin Life was flagged up for some serious safeguarding concerns. There is more information about the platform through the link below:
https://primarysite-prod-sorted.s3.amazonaws.com/greswold-primary-school/UploadedDocument/7b48d7c80df04fbaa52ffd307e2887be/ineque-anakin.pdf
As we arrive at the end of this half term, I feel it a sensible time to seek feedback from parents on their thoughts of the current remote learning provision. Therefore, if you would like to complete a short remote learning survey, please click on the link below. Your feedback is an incredibly important element of our school self-evaluation.
Thank you and have an enjoyable half term.
Mr Hornsey
Dear Parents and Carers,
As we approach the final week of this half term, I’d like to give families a friendly reminder that Friday 12th February is a non-pupil day (INSET), meaning live ‘catch-up’ sessions will be scheduled on alternative days instead. This vital training day will enable staff to start strategically planning for the return of all pupils in March, depending on clarification from the government on 22nd February.
In respect of remote learning, this past week has seen the introduction of live sessions for Reception pupils, along with the launch of Assignments in years’ 2-6. As always, staff are constantly reviewing their remote learning, and the provision as a whole, enabling senior leadership to plan ways to adapt, develop and improve elements of it further.
An aspect of remote learning that isn’t always ideal, but necessary, is the regular use of a device to complete tasks, upload work, view recordings and participate in live sessions. The need to look at a screen for prolonged periods of time is something that we have been deliberating for some time, due to the obvious implications on physical wellbeing. Therefore, for the final week of term, school staff have decided to generate tasks which will help reduce the amount of time children spend on their devices. Although several live sessions will continue, your children will encounter a slightly adapted approach to next week’s provision, with an emphasis being placed on more practical and creative aspects of learning.
Recently, school have received a number of emails from families enquiring about the possibility of school publishing a week’s learning in advance and, while we acknowledge the advantages to some households in doing so, there are several reasons as to why we’ve chosen the system we currently have.
In order to resource each individual lesson properly, staff require time to generate impactful content, resources and recordings and this can only be achieved on a day by day basis. Also, government guidance recommends a system which ‘enables teachers to adjust the pace or difficulty of what is being taught in response to assessments, including, where necessary, revising material…’ Supplying at least two days of work a week initially, which will then be added to according to evaluations, will continue to be school’s preferred system for the time being.
To conclude, a handful of other updates from the last week:
• If your child is having any sort of difficulty with the learning or task set for them, they should be accessing the daily ‘drop-in’ sessions for support. An indication to parents of a need for this would be your child requiring instructions clarified or simply a question they have.
• School would like to encourage pupils to complete their daily tasks as much as possible during school hours. There have been instances of work being uploaded into the evening and we would prefer to promote these times of the day for rest and sleep.
• Next week, staff in years’ 2-6 will be monitoring the chat function of live sessions closely to ensure it is used appropriately. Children are not allowed to use the chat function during live assemblies either.
• A reminder that the instructions on accessing Assignments in Microsoft Teams using an Ipad is located in the Video Resource Centre of the school website in Children.
As always, thank you for taking the time to read this update. Take care and stay safe.
Mr Hornsey
Deputy Headteacher