What will life be like at School During Level 2?

Dear whānau,

As we move back into life at school things will understandably be a little different. We are getting ready to open on Monday 18 May - whoopee!

Parents, I can tell you that you have done an amazing job being your child's teacher for the last six weeks! You should be proud of what you have done for your children over this time. Your understanding, patience and ability to take on new challenges has been impressive whilst you kept up with work and household chores too! 

I am also proud of the staff for providing such creative and purposeful distance programmes for our tamariki. Like you they have put themselves out there online - screen to screen over Zoom and video recording to try their best to keep strong connections with their whānau classes while making the learning fun and easy to manage.

Our main focus upon returning will be ensuring that all tamariki settle back into school and are emotionally ready for learning. Wellbeing will be paramount as we reconnect with each other. In some ways it will be like starting the year again.

To keep everyone safe we will be asking all visitors (those parents and whānau entering the school gates) to sign in each day. This is for contract tracing purposes in the unlikely event of a case being linked to the school. The only access to school will be through the front gates past the Tari where I will greet you with the sign in tables.

In order to support a successful restart our key focuses will be:

- re-establishing routines and realistic expectations

- ensuring we plan wellbeing activities

- regular breaks

- safe distancing (1m indoors, no touching and out of the 'moist breathe zone' of others)

- regular hand washing and sanitising routines throughout the day.

As you can imagine physical distancing for children is a near impossible challenge. We will do our best!

At Level 2 we still need to remember to follow the guidelines given to us. As adults we are more versed at our distancing and now know it is not being impolite while talking 2m away, giving others a wide berth and not shaking hands. Please be understanding when we ask you not to loiter as long as you might usually - we are just trying to avoid too much contact with others.

I know many of you will be anxious to know what effect the lockdown has had on your child's learning progress. Matua Craig has an article explaining what the process will be now for assessment and reporting mid year. This unprecedented situation will mean a number of children may not show increases in reading. writing and mathematics levels. This is no reflection as to what you did or did not achieve at home over the extended lockdown, but the fact the trained professionals were not face to face with you tamariki each day. Let's focus on what we can control - children regularly attending school, teachers teaching and parents parenting! 

We are looking forward to hearing the cacophony of little voices, running feet, unpredictable screams of elation, and warm smiles filling the school once again. We welcome you all back to your kura.

See you all next week!

Matua Mike