Parkhill Primary School Newsletter
Issue 11, Friday 15 May 2020
Dear Parents/Carers
It has been a busy week indeed, and with the announcement to return to school being made on Tuesday morning we have been planning all week.
The announcement outlined that all Foundation - 2 students would return to school on 26th May, following a curriculum day on 25th May. The Year 3-6 students are set to return on 9th June. However, at Parkhill we have made the decision to invite our Y3 students to return with their classmates on 26th May.
25th May - Curriculum Day
26th May Foundation - Y3 students return to school
9th June Y4-6 students return to school
The decision to stagger the return is not based around the children. Children have been deemed low risk in terms of transmission of the CoVID19 virus. The staggered return is to reduce the adult to adult contact in our community and to support social distancing in the staffroom.
There are a few basic rules we have established to make the return to school as smooth as possible. I ask for your support with these rules to ensure we are working together to protect the health and wellbeing of everyone in our community. I ask for your support in honouring and being respectful of these guidelines.
I have outlined these rules below:
Children must enter the school and leave the school through designated gates
F/1 use the front gate of the school, walk around the admin building to their classrooms.
2/3 will enter via the oval and use the path at the side of the soccer park to access the decked area and their classrooms.
The children in our Y4/5 classes will enter across the top of Ashwood High School oval and in the back gate beside the orchard. They should use the steps behind the art room to access their classrooms.
Y5/6 classes will enter the school via the Roger Beech Hall gate and use the undercover walkway access to get to their classrooms.
Parents are not allowed on site. There will be teachers and ES staff at the gates to meet and greet the children and help support the transition to their classrooms.
At pick up time parents are advised to arrange a meeting place outside of the school boundaries to meet up with their children. Again staff will walk their classes to the exit points outlined above.
Volunteers and parent helpers will not be needed for the remaining weeks of term 2. We will review this for term 3 - this applies to instrumental music teachers as well.
Due to our size staggered starts will not be necessary. School will start at 9am and finish at 3:30 as usual. Children can start to arrive from 8:50.
Children cannot be onsite before 8:50 and must meet a member of staff at the allocated gate.
Next week we will be contacting individual families to help support any student who may be struggling with anxiety around returning to school, please do let your class teacher know if you would like more specific strategies for your child.
During the two weeks from 26th May - 9th June children in Y4-6 will continue to access remote learning, while students in our Foundation - Y3 will be taught hands-on in class as usual. I am aware that there will be some parents of Y3 students who do not want to return to school until 9th June. Within those 2 week you will still be able to access remote learning for your child however the teacher will not be available to offer the feedback in the same way as they have been. Once the 9th June is gone there will be no support for home learning offered by the school as all students should be back onsite.
There will be no camps in 2020. We are unable at this stage to rearrange camps for later in the year and are unsure what the restrictions and guidelines will be like as the coming months progress. Jo Ravida, our Business Manager, will contact you to arrange a refund if you have already paid.
If you have any questions or feedback please do let me know - we don’t know what we don't know and you are living the platforms on a daily basis form the other side of the screen. Your knowledge, thoughts and information is super valuable to us at this time. brady.elaine.e@edumail.vic.gov.au
Please do email me directly.
Have a super fun weekend
Best wishes,
Elaine Brady
Principal
F/1 Maths learning
The F/1 students have had a wonderful time learning about their maths at home which has proven to be a very rich source for learning. They have shared some wonderful learning to their F/1 teachers with Seesaw. As you can see they have been finding shapes, measuring, counting, graphing and making a shop at home to learn about money just to mention a few tasks. The F/1 team would like to extend our thanks to all the parents and careers who assisted our little mathematicians to further their learning.
The students across the school have been sharing some wonderful work with us.
Chaplain’s Corner
Most of us were finally settled into some semblance of new routines when the announcement came this week from the Premier about a return to school.
We have already adjusted to many changes over the last 2 months or so and now we are being called upon to adjust once more. While some people will feel hopeful and excited about beginning to return to ‘normal’ it is also normal to feel stressed or anxious when adjusting to so many changes over a short period. We still have uncertainty about what the future looks like in terms of CoVID19 and this can cause us to worry too.
We cannot change the situation, but we can choose how we respond to it. (Sometimes that is easier said than done - but it is possible!)
Here are some ways recommended by KidsHelpline, to help you and your children feel better about these changes.
Be kind to yourself. You are entitled to your feelings. It’s okay to feel different emotions about things going back to normal. You are human and it’s okay not to always feel your best. Engaging in some self-care and coping strategies can help!
Focus on meeting your needs. This means reflecting on what you need in order to feel better. You can ask yourself questions such as: “What do I need right now?”, “How does this activity make me feel?”, “Is this what I want or I am only doing this for someone else?”
Take things at your own pace. Everyone adapts to change at a different speed. Just because you might be adapting more slowly/quickly than those around you, doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong.
Know your boundaries. Be clear with others and establish what you believe is or isn’t acceptable behaviour.
Practice assertive communication. This means communicating your boundaries and values in a way that is both polite and firm.
As always if it feels like too much to manage on your own do reach out to us, your GP or other mental help professionals to get some support in dealing with change/anxiety.
Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800
Headspace 1800 650 890
Lifeline 13 11 14
Suzanne Carmody
Chaplain
Parkhill PS
OSHC at Home
During this COVID-19 period, we have engaged a number of our amazing staff to help create activity sheets and video content of awesome and engaging activities for children to do at home – we call this OSHC at Home, so when you can’t come to OSHC, we’ll come to you. We understand the challenges for parents who are working from home as well as assisting with remote learning, so we feel this is a great way to assist mums and dads with some activities to keep the kids entertained during busy periods. This is a weekly program and we will continue to send these to all our families and School Partners to share with the wider school community during this COVID-19 pandemic period.
Below is a flyer outlining what ‘OSHC at Home’ is and a path for parents to sign up for it, so that we can email the weekly planner to them directly each Friday.
Also attached is the OSHC at Home Weekly Planner, outlining each of the activities available, along with a description of the kind of activity and it’s field (e.g. STEM, Mindfulness, whether it is hands on/off for Parents and appropriate age group).
Simply click on the activity to participate – and please note these activities can be repeated time and time again.
Parkhill Primary School
Email: parkhill.ps@edumail.vic.gov.au
Website: www.parkhillps.vic.edu.au
Location: 4A Parkhill Drive, Ashwood VIC 3147, Australia
Phone: 03 9807 2239