Critical Workers

Introduction

The Government list of who qualifies as a critical worker.

The guidance states: 'Children with at least one parent or carer who is a critical worker can go to school or college if required, but parents and carers should keep their children at home if they can.' 

We will make sure we have places for everyone who needs one but the objective, during the lockdown period, is to have as few people in the school building as possible for three reasons.

1. The purpose of the lockdown is to drive down transmission of the virus by limiting the number of different contacts each individual has so everyone should be staying at home when possible.

2. The fewer people in school the safer it is for those who have to be in school.

3. The focus of the teaching team needs to be with supporting families with home learning. 

How We Protect Everyone

The best way I can protect staff and those of you who have no alternative but to use us is to keep numbers in school as low as possible.

We are here for all of you who really need us but we have a lot more people who qualify as critical workers this time (see list below) so I am going to ask you to follow the Government advice and only use us if you have no other options and only on the days when you really need to in order to keep the numbers in class as low as possible.

If any adult in your household is working from home, then the children should really be at home. There will be a few exceptions to this. I know it may seem unfair to the rest of you but we willingly have children of teachers in school because we want teachers to be able to focus on supporting lots more children (and therefore their families) with remote learning to at least make it more possible for home working parents to get something done. However, we know some of our teacher families are keeping their children off because of concerns about the current situation.

If someone in the household is working from home but you are still requesting a place, please speak to us.

Illness

We also ask you to be incredibly careful if your child is feeling unwell and to keep them at home even when you would normally send them into school. We have now had numerous cases in the school community where the person testing positive had no or mild symptoms at the point where they tested positive. Some later developed one or more of the 3 main symptoms, but some suffered other symptoms such as stomach cramps and nausea. 

Organisation

In order to properly support home learning, one teacher and TA is working from home and one in school. We have therefore put the two classes together as one bubble. We don't want more than 16 (half a class) in any year group bubble if possible so that each child can have their own desk and we can maintain social distancing. At the moment that is possible because you are keeping your children at home if you can.

Booking Places

We have set up a signing up sheet. The link is sent via ping each Monday morning for families to sign up for the following week. The deadline for signing up is 10am on Wednesday after which the Ping message will disappear. We have committed to finding a place for everyone who really needs it so you will not be contacted unless there is a problem. If you applied you have the place.

Curriculum

The children in school will be following the same curriculum as those at home so, if your children are in school for some days and at home for others they will be able to continue from where they got to the previous day.

Breakfast Club

Please book in the usual way via. Parent Pay - but only use Breakfast Club if you need it as well! We're now trying to give every child their own table rather than every class.

Critical Worker Numbers by Year Group

This is the number of children in each year group who have been identified as critical workers. Added to these numbers are the 'vulnerable children' and a few staff children. At the moment not everyone is using their places and some families only need one or two days so we are able to keep the numbers in class below the 16 I need, even with places being offered to vulnerable families.

Reception: 31 key workers
Y1: 19
Y2: 19
Y3: 19
Y4: 18
Y5: 22
Y6 : 18