I hope that you are having a pleasant weekend. I know only too well how difficult this time is and I want to remind you that the Prince of Wales School will do whatever we can to support you.
Last week the children were delighted to see Elliott's fantastic bread making and to be set a challenge from Isaac dressed up as King Charles II. The children in the Exploration Kingdom recorded a voice message to Isaac explaining what they included in their own city designs.
This week we will start looking at sequencing and days of the week and for Wednesday's learning it would be useful for home learners to have some coloured card and glue that they can use if possible. Here is the link for this week's Prezi presentation. If your child would like to contribute something please let me know. I can add photographs and audio or I can share completed learning that your child is proud of.
On Friday Mr Spracklen shared this letter with you and I know for some of you this generated some questions that I will attempt to answer below.
Q1 Why are the changes happening now?
As you may be aware, the Prince of Wales school is committed to opening more widely, prioritising year 4 children who are in their last weeks at school before transitioning to middle school.
Whilst year 4s will not be coming back this week we have needed to expand the key worker groups. The number of key worker children that have returned to school now far exceeds the number that were attending during the lockdown period and to ensure that only 15 children are in each kingdom we now need to provide three groups.
The changes that have been set up now aim to minimise further changes if and when the school opens more widely.
Q2 Why does the year 1 staff have to change?
We will now have Key worker groups for the three remaining year groups not in school, years 2, 3 and 4. Some of these children will be attending school for the first time after lock down on Monday and several of them did not come into school during the lockdown period. To help them transition back to school it was deemed important that they were led by a member of staff they are familiar with which is why Mr MacBean will now lead a year 2 Key worker group.
Current Department of Education guidance fully supports the use of teaching assistants at these most exceptional of times. Mrs Cura was the obvious choice to come and work with year 1 as she is very familiar with the children, having worked with them since their reception year.
Mr Spracklen and I discussed how to best manage the two year 1 kingdoms and the decision was made based on Mrs Cura's extensive lower key stage 1 experience. Mrs Cura is an exceptional and highly experienced senior teaching assistant who prior to lockdown was leading a daily Read Write Inc phonics lesson with year 1 children.
I will continue to plan all lessons and activities and will work closely with Mrs Cura and both classes and will use video links to provide shared inputs and plenaries.
Please be reassured that every decision made is thought through carefully and that staff at the Prince of Wales school are working tirelessly to best support you and your families. I would like to remind parents and carers that we continue to adopt a 'YOUR CHILD, YOUR CHOICE' ethos and will continue to fully support children and families who chose to stay at home on a full or part time basis.
The prezi presentations mirror learning that will take place in school and we will continue to provide our main school virtual school programme and associated support activities including phone calls, food parcels, physical resource deliveries, loan of school equipment and virtual ELSA sessions (as required).
As ever, please always get in contact with me or Mr Spracklen should you have any questions or concerns.
Kind regards,
Ms Browne and the year 1 team
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