Dear Parents and Carers

Firstly, may I thank you for the responses foundation year 1 and 6 have provided on our anonymous online survey.

I know how challenging it is for you all and thank you for the amazing support you have given to your children and school.

The government has asked that schools plan for re-opening for specific year groups. The earliest that this will be is the 1st of June and is dependent upon the country reaching the five key tests set by the government. As you would expect, the safety of children and staff is our utmost priority. We are all very much looking forward to getting back to normal at some point in the future but – in the meantime – when we do start to re-open schooling, things will be very different to how they were in the past.

We are awaiting further guidance, the key points that we can share with you at this moment are:

• The government are planning for a gradual return to normality. We will be open to the specifically identified year groups first, reception (F2), year 1 and year 6.
• We have received guidance about implementing protective measures in schools and are currently using this in our re-opening plans.
•  Re-opening strategies will be different in different schools.
•  Re-opening will be in a phased manner. This might mean that children may be offered part-time schooling, with different start and end times for different groups.
• We are aware that some parents have indicated a reluctance to send their children to school during this crisis. This is a parental choice; parents will not be fined for non-attendance.
• Class sizes will be limited to a maximum of 15. We will be encouraging social distancing and groups will be isolated from one another where possible.
• We remain open to the children of key workers.
• All children who attend a school when we re-open must follow social distancing guidelines at home too.

As you are aware our school building is small, we have only 7 classrooms. To have 2 metres between each child per class we would only be able to have 8 children in each group. As you are aware children need to move around, visit the toilet etc and social distancing will not be maintained once this happens. Toilets are shared between classes, corridors are just under 2 meters wide, and all other rooms too small for any social distancing measures.

We have been asked to advise parents that due to the nature of children and the school environment social distancing cannot be guaranteed. The guidance from the DFE on this subject states ‘We know that, unlike older children and adults, early years and primary age children cannot be expected to remain 2m apart from each other and staff.’

I appreciate that you would like more detail regarding our planned return and as soon as we have further clarification, we will let you know.

Kind regards

Emma McGrenaghan