A Letter from Mr Hewett-Dale
Keeping you up to date.
Dear Parents and Carers
I hope you are all doing well. This is a strange and bizarre time we are living through. As we entered 2020, I do not think any of us had an idea of what would happen. If someone had told me that school would be closed, that SATs were cancelled and some staff would have to spend 12 weeks at home due to Social Distancing, I would not have believed them. We want you to know that the school, although closed, is still here for you.
I thought I would update you on a few things.
Firstly, Free School Meals. The government have announced the introduction of a national voucher scheme. Unfortunately, we are still waiting for the details of how this will work. Portsmouth City Council and Caterlink (the council’s caterers) provide the service and we are waiting to hear from them.
For the following two weeks, we will continue with the daily Grab and Go lunches available for pick up from the school at 12.00 until 12.30. Even when they are released, the vouchers would not be available to be used in the Easter Holidays (6th April – 17th April). From Monday 20th, we will either provide a box of ingredients for a week or vouchers. This depends on what the City Council and Caterlink decide.
Secondly, from April 20th, each year group will post tasks for the week on our website (under the ‘Home Learning’ tab). This will be ready from 9am on a Monday morning for the week. The tasks will be aimed at children practicing the things they have already learned this year at school. We are grateful for all of the efforts of parents and carers at this time especially in encouraging the children to read every day.
During each week, teachers will also be making contact with each family in their class. This will be a chance for the school to make sure you are all ok, answer any questions you may have and possibly talk to the child from their class. We are also going to make more use of our YouTube channel so keep an eye on that too.
The best source of information through this time is our website. We will continue to post updates to our website on Facebook and Twitter. Please make sure you are checking our website regularly.
Mr Hewett-Dale