14 Sep Letter to Parents
Dear Parents
It is wonderful to have the children back at school and to see you all on the gate every morning. Around 90% of children are back in school and more coming every day. Thank you for following the arrangements for social distancing when you drop off and pick up.
The children are being taught the normal lessons they are used to from earlier in the year. After six months away from school, some of them are finding this very tiring! Please make sure that they get to bed early and get a good night’s sleep.
It is obvious that most children have benefited from the home learning programme which we organised and you carried out. Well done to all parents who became teachers for six months. You have done a great job. There will however be some catching up to do. For most children this will happen through the usual lessons with additional support from members of the senior leadership team. Some children may have fallen further behind and will be supported in school by an additional tutor who is being funded by the government. This programme will begin after half term.
We are looking at possible ways of opening the Breakfast Club and after school clubs. This is not possible while the children are organised into four bubbles as advised by the government. The children are organised into four bubbles to provide a degree of social distancing. If children from different bubbles go to an after school club then there is no point to the bubble. I am hopeful that larger bubbles will be allowed in the future. Some local authorities in rural areas are advising having bubbles of up to three hundred pupils. This is not currently the case in Islington. A group of local headteachers is meeting regularly to discuss a way forward. It would take two extra staff in each bubble to be able to run a club within the bubble. If parents were to write to Jeremy Corbyn, our local MP, I am sure he would raise the issue in Parliament.
We can always improve on our procedures so if you have any helpful suggestions, please let a member of staff know.
Greg Crawford
Headteacher