School Update Tuesday 14th July 2020

If your child is attending summer club please click here for important information.

Contact information form to be filled out before attending summer school.

Dear Parents & Carers,

It’s hard to believe there is only one week left until the summer break.  What a term it has been! Thanks to you all for all the wonderful emails during this time: seeing your children’s work in all its splendour has enabled us to still feel connected, hopefully you’ve enjoyed looking at our class blogs as much as we have.  Our weekly phone calls too have proved invaluable and we hope very much that your children enjoyed talking to their teachers and teaching assistants.

Thank you for putting your trust in us to send your children back to school if they were in the year groups specified by the government and thank you also for sending your children to us from our other year groups to enjoy the PE activities that we organised.

The email stroudvalley@stroudvalley.gloucs.sch.uk was set up for lockdown purposes and to share your children’s work and so as of next week, this email will be closed down and we will not be calling children.  School will closed from Friday 17th July and will reopen to all children on Wednesday 2nd September.

Please can you communicate with us moving forward using the usual office emails:

office@stroudvalley.gloucs.sch.uk

admin@stroudvalley.gloucs.sch.uk

We are currently in the process of risk assessing the school and its grounds in preparation for opening in September.  We will continue to update you with information as we get it through our website.  We hope to see some of you over the summer whilst our summer club is taking place.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for all of your kindness and support during this difficult time – I couldn’t have done it without the support of the whole community and staff.

Very Best Wishes,

Miss Sleep

CLICK HERE FOR SUMMER CLUB INFORMATION

Letter from the Governing Body

Dear Parents, Carers and Children,

With so many recent changes and September arriving shortly, the Governing Body thought it would be helpful to give everyone an overview of what has been and what might be happening.

As far as September is concerned you know as much as we do - we don’t get any advance warning on Government information and the newspaper headlines are often the first we hear of things too! We will keep you updated on any developments as and when they happen.  We will notify you by a text when updates are published on the school website.

The school would dearly love to have everyone back, full-time but as always we will prioritise the safety and wellbeing of all our staff and children. Fingers crossed that things are back to ’normal’ by the start of the new school year.

Firstly, we’d like to thank Ms Sleep and everyone at school, the teaching staff, teaching assistants, cleaners, catering staff and office staff for all their hard work and personal sacrifice since March.

The school has been open, even during Easter and half term, to look after our vulnerable children, and the children of key workers so our staff have not been able to rest or protect themselves as many of us have.

Many parents may not be aware that Ms Sleep had concerns about the Free School Meal voucher scheme and to ensure all our children were well fed she has personally organised 5 meals a week for 42 children by purchasing from local supermarkets, packing them into bags and arranging for socially distanced pick-ups. She is still doing this as the voucher scheme has had some well publicised problems.

From the outset the school was determined to maintain verbal contact with all the children, which few other primaries have been able to achieve. The telephone calls and visits have been very well received even though organising and making over 200 calls per week takes many hours and much effort alongside preparing home learning resources and teaching in school.

Ms Sleep and her team considered using video calling to provide some online lessons but we are very aware that not every family has the hardware, high-speed broadband and technical knowledge required. In addition, the well-known security issues for children, especially our vulnerable children, and staff meant delivering online lessons safely for all our children was not possible - the school wanted no child to be left behind. With that in mind it was decided that using the website was the best method to deliver home-learning whilst keeping our children safe.

The school has followed Government guidelines at all times and these are clear in stating that we should not rota children if possible so we have run a full school timetable from 8-50am -3-15pm everyday for all eligible children. This explains why we have not yet been able to have other years in school as there is simply no room after we have around 100 socially distanced Reception, Year 1 and Year 6 children in school.

 To rota children with either half-days or only a couple of days per week increases exposure for our staff, and in turn our children and the decision was taken that this was a risk both Ms Sleep and the Governing Body weren’t comfortable taking unless we were given an instruction to do so. You will all have seen the letter on 26th June outlining the school’s cunning plan to get absolutely everyone back together in the next few weeks, for a few hours at least. We understand how much the children are missing their classmates and teachers - the staff are really missing the children too!

School reports for all children will be with you by the end of next week. These will, as usual, be sent home with the children that are in school during the week. Others will be e-mailed or posted to you.

September 2020

In the envelope will be the transition information for next year including name of teacher and our plans for meeting them and the classroom through a video format.

We are very grateful to you and the children for all the hard work with the home learning and we always value feedback so please make a suggestion, add a comment or express any opinions on the admin@stroudvalley.gloucs.sch.uk address.

Looking forward to seeing you soon!

Best Wishes

The Governing Body

For support, advice and recommendations about 'surviving' at home during lockdown please follow the link below to a really helpful local publication 'Families'   https://issuu.com/familiesonline/docs/gloucester  we hope you find it helpful.

With families using more apps to communicate during lock down we would like to draw your attention to the following information about the apps Zoom and House Party. Your child may be using these (either with, or without you) so we would encourage you to read these informative posters and discuss them with your child.  Zoom  House Party

Due to the on-going nature of the current situation we know many families are struggling to cope with the additional pressures of social distancing and spending long periods of time in their homes with children and young people. The Family Information Service advice line  provide some practical parenting support to parents click here to find out how to contact them and what suport they can offer you.

What we’ll continue doing whilst your child is at home

Please visit your child’s class page.  On the class page there is a HOMEWORK tab.  Every Monday by 9am there will be new activities posted for your child to complete on a daily / weekly basis.  Please continue to send us your photographs and messages as we love hearing from you.  stroudvalley@stroudvalley.gloucs.sch.uk

Please click HERE for a list of websites that contain learning materials for your child to explore whilst learning from home. These are general resources for all children in school. 

Below is a new online resource to support parents, carers and teachers. This resource brings together a range of free and easy to access online activities and learning for children of all ages, and is clearly grouped into subjects and topics, such as English and Maths. 

https://www.integra.co.uk/home-learning/

We have set up an email address which will be checked frequently by Miss Sleep and Miss Heague and we will aim to reply as soon as possible. 

stroudvalley@stroudvalley.gloucs.sch.uk

COVID-19 and social distancing: a polite reminder.

With the school closed to all but vulnerable children and those of key workers, it is extremely important to stress the need for social distancing to help reduce the transmission of coronavirus (COVID-19).  

Avoid contact with someone who is displaying symptoms of coronavirus (COVID-19). These symptoms include high temperature and/or new and continuous cough

Avoid non-essential use of public transport, varying your travel times to avoid rush hour, when possible

Work from home, where possible. 

Avoid large gatherings, and gatherings in smaller public spaces such as pubs, cinemas, restaurants, theatres, bars, clubs

Avoid gatherings with friends and family. Keep in touch using remote technology such as phone, internet, and social media

Use telephone or online services to contact your GP or other essential services

Everyone should be trying to follow these measures as much as is pragmatic.

We strongly advise you to follow the above measures as much as you can and to significantly limit your face-to-face interaction with friends and family if possible.