Latest News
Recent letters shared with parents and carers.
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Virtual Book Fair (16 - 27 Nov)
Tue 17 Nov 2020Virtual Book Fair Event 16 – 27 November 2020
This year is little different we know, but here at Galley Hill we want to continue to promote a love of reading with our children both in school and at home. There is strong evidence that links reading for pleasure with educational outcomes but we know that the benefits of reading for pleasure go beyond education. Reading for pleasure increases our understanding of our own identity, improves empathy and gives us insight into the world around us from the point of view of others.
What does ‘reading for pleasure’ mean?
It is simply that a child or indeed an adult, chooses to read something they enjoy. This may not be the latest chapter book by Liz Pichon (Shoe Wars) or Craig Smith (The Grinny Granny Donkey), it could be a newspaper, a comic book, a quiz book, a recipe or a factual book about a topic you are interested in. It could also be reading together and sharing the funny part of a story, a bedtime story snuggled on the sofa. The options and ideas are endless and so are the benefits!
Our Virtual Book Fair Event
Unfortunately, we cannot hold our usual book fair this year so we are going to go online! We will be sending home our usual scholastic leaflet by the end of next week. This year’s one has lots more to choose from! If you can’t wait until next week, you can look at the online leaflet: https://www6.scholastic.co.uk/3dissue/catalogues/Clubs/November2020/UKPrimary/. In classes this week, we will look online and talk about the different books on offer, encourage the children to recommend books they have already read to their friends and listen to extracts from new books from the Scholastic website. You can also listen to these at home by following this link: https://bookfairs.scholastic.co.uk/chapter-one. There are books for all ages, with an extract read by the author. It’s the perfect excuse to get a few early Christmas presents too!
Online orders will be open from the 16 - 27 November
Our new Scholastic Book Club is up and running!
Go to https://schools.scholastic.co.uk/galley/digital-book-club to browse the latest books and order online. For every £1 you spend on this month’s Book Club, our school will earn 20p in Scholastic Rewards. Please place your order online by 27 November 2020.
If you would prefer to order via the school, please fill out the paper order form in the brochure, send it back into school and make payment on School Coms by 26 November. All books will be sent to the school and then sent out with the children. We anticipate that this will be in early December.
Kind Regards
Mrs Spooner and Mrs Cole
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New Parent Update - Covid Measures
Wed 04 Nov 2020Dear Parents / Carers,
I am sure that you have all heard the announcement over the weekend from Boris Johnson about the latest restrictions that come into effect from tomorrow. These restrictions do not specifically affect schools but the full guidance can be found here: www.gov.uk/guidance/new-national-restrictions-from-5-november
So far, we have not received any direct guidance from the Department for Education regarding changes we need to make but I as I am sure you can imagine, we have been reviewing our risk assessments in school. It is our responsibility to keep everyone in our community as safe as possible, including children, parents and staff who are considered vulnerable.
We are therefore requesting that from tomorrow (Thursday 5th November), all adults who enter our school site are wearing a mask or face covering. This is in all areas, including on the playground and pathways. Obviously we are aware that some of you may be exempt and we completely understand that. Please also ensure that you are maintaining a two metre social distance with other people at all times.
You will see that staff out on the playground or at the doors are also wearing masks and we have also asked staff to wear masks in communal areas around the school. They will not be wearing them when teaching the children unless it is their personal choice to do so and we do not expect the children in our care to wear a mask at any time, again unless they choose to do so.
We ask that parents of Nursery children now please leave their child at the top of the slope down to the classroom and remind parents of Reception and Year 1 that they should not be going down the slopes from the playground at any time. Thank you to all parents who continue to follow these requests and ensure they stick to the one way systems we have in place.
We would also like to remind you once again that while waiting on the playground before or after school, children should be standing still with their parents. Please also ensure that you only arrive at school or drop off your child just before their class opens in the morning as we seem to have a lot of people on the playground, including unsupervised children from Years 5 and 6, for a long time before school starts.
We are really sad that we have had to temporarily stop our football and netball clubs that had started for children in Years 5 and 6. Unfortunately the national lockdown guidance (under section 7 about education) clearly states that extra-curricular clubs should not take place. We apologise for any inconvenience.
We know this is an anxious and uncertain time for everybody but we do assure you that we are doing all we possibly can in school to keep the children safe and we very much appreciate your support with this.
Yours sincerely
Mrs E. Birch
Headteacher
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Zones of Regulation
Tue 03 Nov 2020Dear Parents and Carers,
This year we are introducing to all children the Zones of Regulation. This is the next step to the children’s work on understanding emotions and wellbeing. Some children will have learnt about the Zones of Regulation during the last academic year when some teachers were researching this concept.
The Zones of Regulation are lessons and activities to help us to gain skills in the area of self-regulation. Self-regulation can go by many names, such as self-control and impulse control. The lessons and learning activities are designed to help children recognise when they are in the different zones as well as learn how to use strategies to change or stay in the zone they are in. In addition to addressing self-regulation, the children will gain an increased vocabulary of emotional terms, skills in reading other people’s facial expressions, perspective about how others see and react to their behaviour, insight into events that trigger their behaviour, calming and alerting strategies, and problem solving skills.
We will be using language with the children to support them to understand which zone they are in e.g.
“This is really frustrating me and making me go into the Yellow Zone. I need to use a tool to calm down. I will take some deep breaths.”
It is important to note that everyone experiences all of the zones—the Red and Yellow Zones are not the “bad” or “naughty” zones. All of the zones are expected at one time or another. The Zones of Regulation is intended to be neutral and not communicate judgment.
We hope you can support your child when use this language.
Yours Sincerely
Miss Elsey
Deputy Head Teacher & SENCo
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Year 5 Puberty Letter
Tue 03 Nov 20203rd November
Dear Parents/Carers
As part of the science national curriculum, Year 5 learn about puberty. We will be completing these lessons in the Autumn term.
Children from both year five classes will complete this session during their PSHE lesson on Friday 13th November within their own class bubbles. We are unable to invite parents to come in to view the DVD this year. This session will only cover puberty. We will watch the video and then take questions from the children. If we feel that a question is too advanced or inappropriate for their age group, we will decline to answer it.
Please be aware your child may wish to talk about their learning at home.
Yours sincerely
Miss Featherstone Mr Kain
Year 5 Teacher Year 5 Teacher
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Year 6 Puberty letter
Fri 02 Oct 20202nd October
Dear Parents/Carers
During Year Five the children were due to complete puberty lessons as part of their national curriculum science lessons. Due to unprecedented events last year, this will now take place in the Autumn Term.
Children from both year six classes will complete this session during their PSHE lesson on Friday 16th October within their own class bubbles. We are unable to invite parents to come in to view the DVD this year. This session will only cover puberty and their sex education lesson will remain in the Summer Term. We will watch the video and then take questions from the children. If we feel that a question is too advanced or inappropriate for their age group, we will decline to answer it.
Please be aware your child may wish to talk about their learning at home.
Yours sincerely
Miss Duggan Mrs Spooner
Year 6 Teacher Year 6 Teacher
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Yr6 Walk to Gadebridge Park
Wed 16 Sep 2020Dear Parents/Carers
We are planning to take the Year 6 children to Gadebridge Park on Monday 21st September. We will be conducting some fieldwork by the River Gade as part of our Geography focus on rivers and the water cycle. Each class will go on the same day but the bubbles will remain separate throughout the trip and will not mix. Equipment will be wiped regularly to prevent cross-contamination.
The children should come to school in old clothing that is OK to get wet and muddy, with trousers that can be rolled above the knee. They must bring a warm coat/jacket if the weather is looking cold and bring in their wellies in a bag. We do expect that the children’s feet will get wet, despite wearing wellies, so please send a small old towel for drying off and a spare pair of dry socks.
They will change into their uniform when they return to school. Please make sure they have a carrier bag for any wet clothes/wellies.
We are aiming to be back at school by 12:30 so they will not need a packed lunch – they can have their usual dinner options at school. If possible, please pack a healthy snack (fruit, vegetables, bread-sticks) that they can have during the morning.
Yours sincerely
Mrs Spooner Miss Duggan
Year 6
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Revised Timing information for Parents
Thu 10 Sep 2020Revised Timings from Monday 14th September
Class
Start Time
End Time
Dropping Off and Collection Arrangements
N Amber
8:30am
12:30pm
11:30pm
3:30pm (2:30pm)
Before and after school wait on KS1 playground spots. An adult will come and collect your child and return them to you.
R Turquoise
8:45am
3:05pm
Before and after school wait on KS1 playground spots. An adult will come and collect your child and return them to you.
R Garnet
8:55am
3:15pm
Before and after school wait on KS1 playground spots. An adult will come and collect your child and return them to you.
1 Jade
8:50am
3:10pm
On arrival, children go straight into class through classroom door.
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS1 playground and children will be sent to you.
1 Crystal
9am
3:20pm
On arrival, children go straight into class through classroom door.
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS1 playground and children will be sent to you.
2 Pearl
8:45am
3:05pm
On arrival, children go up the fenced path from KS2 playground into back classroom door (parents remain on playground).
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground at the bottom of path and children will be sent to you.
2 Diamond
8:55am
3:15pm
On arrival, children go up the fenced path from KS2 playground into back classroom door (parents remain on playground).
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground at the bottom of path and children will be sent to you.
3 Ruby
8:50am
3:10pm
Parents remain on KS2 playground, children go straight in through the front door and into the cloakroom.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be brought out to you.
3 Emerald
9am
3:20pm
Parents remain on KS2 playground, children go straight in through the front door and into the cloakroom.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be brought out to you.
4 Coral
8:45am
3:05pm
On arrival, children go straight in through the fire escape near the table tennis tables and upstairs.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you.
4 Opal
8:55am
3:15pm
On arrival, children go straight in through the fire escape near the table tennis tables and upstairs.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you.
5 Onyx
8:50am
3:10pm
On arrival, the children go straight into class.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you or can walk home alone.
5 Sapphire
9am
3:20pm
On arrival, the children go straight into class.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you or can walk home alone.
6 Topaz
8:45am
3:05pm
On arrival, children go in through the skills room and straight upstairs.
They will leave through the dining room door. If being collected, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground or child can walk home alone.
6 Amethyst
8:55am
3:15pm
On arrival, children go in through the skills room and straight upstairs.
They will leave through the dining room door. If being collected, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground or child can walk home alone.
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September Reopening Information for Parents
Fri 17 Jul 2020Phase 2 Re-Opening (September 2020): Information for Parents
- All children in Years 1 to 6 are expected to return to school on Friday 4th September 2020.
- Children in our Nursery and Reception classes will be having a phased start to the school year and every family will have received their own letter about when their child is due to start school.
Groupings
Class
Start Time
End Time
Dropping Off and Collection Arrangements
N Amber
8:30am
12:30pm
11:30pm
3:30pm (2:30pm)
Before and after school wait on KS1 playground spots marked 1. An adult will come and collect your child and return them to you.
R Turquoise
8:40am
3pm
Before and after school wait on KS1 playground spots marked 2. An adult will come and collect your child and return them to you.
R Garnet
9am
3:20pm
Before and after school wait on KS1 playground spots marked 1. An adult will come and collect your child and return them to you.
1 Jade
8:50am
3:10pm
On arrival, children go straight into class through classroom door.
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS1 playground and children will be sent to you.
1 Crystal
9:10am
3:30pm
On arrival, children go straight into class through classroom door.
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS1 playground and children will be sent to you.
2 Pearl
8:40am
3pm
On arrival, children go up the fenced path from KS2 playground into back classroom door (parents remain on playground).
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground at the bottom of path and children will be sent to you.
2 Diamond
9am
3:20pm
On arrival, children go up the fenced path from KS2 playground into back classroom door (parents remain on playground).
At end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground at the bottom of path and children will be sent to you.
3 Ruby
8:50am
3:10pm
Parents remain on KS2 playground, children go straight in through the front door and into the cloakroom.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be brought out to you.
3 Emerald
9:10am
3:30pm
Parents remain on KS2 playground, children go straight in through the front door and into the cloakroom.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be brought out to you.
4 Coral
8:40am
3pm
On arrival, children go straight in through the fire escape near the table tennis tables and upstairs.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you.
4 Opal
9am
3:20pm
On arrival, children go straight in through the fire escape near the table tennis tables and upstairs.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you.
5 Onyx
8:50am
3:10pm
On arrival, the children go straight into class.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you or can walk home alone.
5 Sapphire
9:10am
3:30pm
On arrival, the children go straight into class.
At the end of the day, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground and your children will be sent to you or can walk home alone.
6 Topaz
8:40am
3pm
On arrival, children go in through the skills room and straight upstairs.
They will leave through the dining room door. If being collected, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground or child can walk home alone.
6 Amethyst
9am
3:20pm
On arrival, children go in through the skills room and straight upstairs.
They will leave through the dining room door. If being collected, parents wait in a socially distanced way on KS2 playground or child can walk home alone.
- Children will be in their classes of up to 30 children. You have already been told which class your child is in for September and who the adults in their class are.
- The teacher or TA will be with the class at break time. There will be one consistent adult (two for Reception) supervising one class for the whole of lunch time. In many cases, this is the class TA.
- The children from within each class will not be able to interact with children from other classes within the school. This is to keep the possibility of cross-contamination to a minimum as the government have accepted it is impossible to expect primary school children to fully socially distance.
- Staff working across classes will be kept to a minimum.
- Class staff will be cleaning throughout the day and our cleaning team will be in school twice a day to ensure a regular and rigorous cleaning procedure.
- As per government guidance, classrooms are being reorganised so that all children will be forward facing.
Dropping Off and Collecting Arrangements
- Please see the table above the start and finish times for the school day for each pod of children and the arrangements for dropping off and collecting.
- Please endeavour to come as close to the start and finish times as possible to avoid coming into contact with other parents and children.
- If you have more than one child, you can send them both into their classrooms at the earliest start time. At the end of the day, you will need to collect one child and then wait for the other to finish. Children will not be let out early. Please socially distance while waiting on the school site.
- We encourage parents of children in Year 6 to work towards not entering the school site once your child is settled back into school routines.
- Please all remain vigilant of social distancing when around the school site and arrive only a couple of minutes before the start / end time for your child’s school day. These have been staggered to help keep you safe.
- Nursery, Reception and Year 1 parents and children should use the Pudding Lane entrance only. The small gate will only be for entering and the large gate will only be for exiting.
- The internal path between the two school playgrounds can be used but is one way from KS1 (Pudding Lane) to KS2 (Gadebridge Road) only. It is too narrow to safely have two way traffic on it.
- Children and Parents in Years 2 to 6 should enter using the Galley Hill gate only. They should exit using the Gadebridge Road gate only. We apologise for the additional walking time this may bring but it is essential to keep everyone safe.
- Children will be asked to wash their hands as soon as they enter the classroom. We are installing hand sanitiser stations at points where children do not enter straight into their rooms.
- At the end of the day, please be respectful of our whole school community and ensure that you wait in a socially distanced way. Children must remain with their parents.
- The Galley Hill gate will only be available to enter and exit through during the school day if you need to go to the office. Please be aware of others going up and down the path and wait for them at the end to allow for social distancing.
- Only one parent can attend the school premises to drop off or collect a child (plus siblings where no other childcare is available but they MUST wait with their parent).
- We ask that only one parents steps inside the school office area at a time. There will be markings for others who are waiting to queue.
- Parents (and other visitors) will not be invited inside the school building apart from in very exceptional circumstances. We apologise in advance that we may not seem as welcoming as usual but it is for your safety as well as ours.
- Initially, the play trails will not be in use at any time and will be cordoned off. Please do not allow your child to go on these before or after school.
- Breakfast Club will be running from Monday 7th September. This will take place in the big hall to ensure there is space for the children to social distance. Initially, we will not be serving food and so there will be a reduced cost of £2 per child, per day.
- We are working with Coaching Me to allow after school club to also open in the big hall each day.
- Initially, there will be no further after school or lunch time clubs taking place.
Uniform and Personal Belongings
- Children should all wear their usual school uniform.
- All children should have their PE kits in school every day (these can be brought in on a Monday and left for the week). They will be expected to wear them for P.E. lessons. As P.E. will be taking place outside, please ensure your child has appropriate footwear and jogging bottoms if the weather turns cold.
- We request you not to send children to school in shoes with laces unless they have the capacity to tie these for themselves.
- The children will be allowed to bring in their book bag or a small backpack each day. These should only contain essential personal belongings needed for school.
- All children will be provided with their own pack of resources (pens, pencils etc) to use during the school day. They must not bring any pencil cases or other equipment into school.
- EVERY CHILD will need to have a named water bottle as we will have no means to provide them with water otherwise.
- Children may also need their lunch box, a rain coat, a hat, sun cream and possibly hand cream due to the increased amount of handwashing that will be taking place.
- No other personal items should be brought into school whatsoever. We will not be having any show and tell sessions and unfortunately, we will not be able to distribute birthday sweets or similar.
- If your child took home their inhaler or epipen when school closed, please ensure that these are returned on the first day.
- We will be issuing reading books again in September. These will be put into ‘quarantine’ for 72 hours before being sent home with another child.
- The advice is that face masks should not be worn in school however we feel this is personal choice and we will allow staff and pupils to wear them if they wish. We will however inform you if your child does not seem to be able to wear a mask properly.
- Staff will of course wear PPE if dealing with a child who develops symptoms in school or for intimate care when appropriate.
- We strongly recommend that mobile phones are not brought into school. If you feel that it is essential for your child to bring their phone to school, they will need to take it to the office and put it in a box provided. They will take it back out of the box at the end of the day themselves. We take no responsibility for any phones left in school.
Lunch and Break Times
- Children can have their usual choice of school dinners or packed lunch.
- Lunch boxes will be stored in the classrooms.
- Herts Catering will be returning as close as possible to their usual menu with red, green and packed lunch choices each day.
- Universal and benefits related free school meals will be resumed. All of those who do not fall into these categories will be charged as usual.
- Lunch and break times will be staggered to reduce the likelihood of children coming into contact with others who are not in their class.
- Children from Years 1 to 6 will have their lunches in their classrooms each day.
- Children in Reception will have their lunches in the big hall each day.
- Lunch is likely to be late for some children compared to what they are used to. Parents can supply a healthy snack (fruit, vegetables or bread sticks) for their child to eat at break time.
- One consistent adult (two for Reception) will supervise each class at lunch time. For many classes, this will be their usual class teaching assistant.
- Each class will have a designated area to play in during break and lunch time so they do not come into contact with those from other classes. They will each have their own bucket of playground equipment to use.
Learning
- A full broad and balanced curriculum will return for children in all year groups.
- Our key purpose is to educate your children. Every child will be expected to attend school every day (unless genuinely unwell or self-isolating).
- Children will be reminded how to wash their hands thoroughly and will receive health and hygiene learning when they return in September.
- We have had a school focus on well-being for a number of years now. This will remain the case.
- One of our school priorities for the next school year is to further develop outdoor learning. Please ensure your child always has appropriate clothing for the weather with them (i.e. a sun hat, a waterproof coat etc).
- We cannot hold any whole school events at this stage. Assemblies will be taking place within classes. We are hoping to put together virtual sharing assemblies during the year if necessary. We will also be looking at being as creative as possible to allow other events to go ahead, including parent’s evenings, using virtual communication platforms if necessary.
- Local school trips that allow for social distancing and can be walked to can now go ahead. We will also be enhancing our curriculum by organising theme days and learning to learn days within classes.
- We are continuing to work on our strategy for remote learning in the event of classes all having to self-isolate or in case of a further full or local lockdown. We will provide further details around this when we return in September.
Suspected Cases / Illness
- CHILDREN, STAFF AND PARENTS MUST STAY AWAY FROM THE SCHOOL SITE AND SELF ISOLATE AT HOME IF THEY, OR ANYONE IN THEIR HOME, HAVE EVEN MILD SYMPTOMS OF CORONAVIRUS (high temperature, persistent cough or loss of taste / smell). We cannot stress how important this is to protect our whole school community.
- Children who develop any symptoms in school will be immediately isolated and kept in a ventilated room away from all others. You will be called to pick them up immediately and we thank you in advance for ensuring you arrive to collect them promptly.
- Any child or member of staff who gets symptoms must immediately isolate for 7 days. If a member of their family gets symptoms, the staff member or pupil must isolate for 14 days. Please inform us as quickly as possible if this is the case.
- We strongly encourage anyone with symptoms to get tested as soon as possible and to let us know the results in a timely fashion.
- If there is any confirmed positive test results, all children and adults who have been in the same class must self-isolate for 14 days and cannot come into school. Please inform school as quickly as possible of any positive result so we can ensure the class can be closed.
- It is our expectation of all parents and staff members to fully cooperate with the Test and Trace system and to keep the school informed. We MUST keep our whole school community safe.
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Parent Update
Thu 18 Jun 202018 June 2020
Dear Parents / Carers,
I am writing to you today in order to give you a further update regarding our plans between now and the end of this school year. As previously, we want to give everybody as much notice as possible regarding the plans we have in place. Also as before, we have carefully considered our next steps following meetings with other Dacorum Heads, the school governors and consultation with the staff.
As you already know, by next week we will have reopened to children in Nursery, Reception, Year 1 and Year 6 in addition to the key worker children that we have had in school throughout this time. Sadly, as we have already let you know, it is simply impossible for us to open to any other year groups with the current government guidance of only having 15 children in a pod.
We have therefore made the difficult decision for the school year to end for the year groups who are in school (N, R, 1 and 6) on Friday 10 July. This will allow us to invite the children from the other year groups (Years 2, 3, 4 and 5) into school in a controlled way during the week beginning 13 July.
Each year group will be allocated a day and the children will come in to meet their new teacher for a short period in groups of 15. We would hope that we can hold these meetings outside but the children will have the opportunity to walk through their new classrooms. We are hoping that the weather will allow us to have the whole year group in over lunch for a socially distanced picnic. We will send out further details as soon as we have them in place.
We also want the children to have the opportunity to say goodbye to their current teacher and you will have received another letter from Mrs Spooner regarding Zoom meetings that we are also organising.
The children in Nursery, Reception and Year 1 will have the opportunity to meet their new teacher during their final week in school (WB: 6 July). Those children who have not returned to school will also be invited to come in at some point during that week to meet their new teachers.
When the children come into school for their transition session, they will also be given their school report for this year. These have been written based on the children’s work and attendance up to the point the school closed on 20th March.
As you will know, we have been allowing for parents to change their minds and send their children back to school later than their year group’s original start date. In order for us to ensure there is provision in place, the final date for parents to inform us they wish for their children (in Nursery, Reception, Year 1 or Year 6) to return to school will be 24 June to start the week beginning 29 June. We will be offering places on a first come first served basis so may need to close admissions earlier than this date if the pods fill up.
We appreciate that some children or members of their family are currently shielding and if rules have not changed, will therefore be unable to come into school. We will organise for their reports to be collected from school or delivered home and we intend to make videos of the new classrooms to go on the school website before school returns in September. We feel this may help the transition for all children. We will also make sure they know who their new teacher and teaching assistant are before we close in July.
We will be continuing to provide provision for children of key workers, regardless of their year groups, until Friday 17 July. We should however state that we are currently almost at capacity for the number of children we can take in to these pods so we cannot guarantee anyone a place who does not already have one.
Along with the governors, we have made the decision to close the school site over the summer period. We apologise in advance for any inconvenience this may cause but we feel it is essential that staff have the time and space to ensure we are prepared for a reopening in September. We do not yet know how this will look but we do know that we will have to make significant changes to our curriculum so that it meets the needs of our children once they return back to school after this long period of absence and uncertainty.
We are very aware that the decisions we have made are not ideal for all parents but we are trying our absolute upmost to do the very best for our children while ensuring that the whole school community remains safe.
I would like to end by saying another enormous thank you to all of you and all of the staff at Galley Hill. This has been an incredibly difficult experience for everyone but the on-going support of parents and staff has been incredible and I continue to be extremely proud to lead such an amazing community.
Take care and stay safe,
Mrs Birch
Headteacher
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Zoom Meetings (Y2 - 5)
Thu 18 Jun 202018th June 2020
Dear Parents and Carers,
Firstly, we hope you are all keeping well in these strange times. Now that it has been announced that other year groups will be unable to return before the summer holidays, we felt that having some face to face time with those classes would be beneficial both to connect the staff with the children and for the children to see each other too. Having considered the options available, we have decided to hold some zoom meetings. We know that this has been a really challenging time so the Zoom sessions will be focused on a fun activity e.g. sharing a story/quiz. The zoom meeting will last 30 minutes.
We have considered carefully how to do these meetings so that they meet out safeguarding standards. We have chosen therefore to use Zoom. The safety settings of this app have been improved recently and we will also be putting other safety measures in place.
Safeguarding Measures:
* Two members of staff will run the meeting.
* There will be a virtual ‘waiting room’ where we can check a child’s identity before admitting them into the meeting.
* All cameras must be switched on so that we can see the pupils – these must remain on for the whole meeting.
* Children must have their real name as their screen name otherwise they will not be admitted.
As a parent, by allowing your child to access the meeting, you are giving your consent for them to take part. We also ask that you talk to your children about appropriate behaviour when online.
If you have not used Zoom before then you can download the Zoom app onto your phone and tablet or simply google it on your pc or laptop. Your device will need to have a camera and the microphone turned on.
What happens to access the meeting depends on whether you have a Zoom account or not, either situation will work. Initially, you will receive an invitation with the date and time of your allocated Zoom session. You will receive your email link to the meeting by Friday 19th June.
- If you have an account, this email will include a link to click on. At the time of your session, you just click the link and your teacher can accept you into the Zoom session.
- If you do not have an account, you will not get a link ahead of time. Instead, at the time of your session, your teacher will email a meeting ID and password. You will then need to access Zoom on your device, click ‘Join a meeting’ and enter the ID and password. Your teacher can then accept you into the session.
- If you want to set up a Zoom account ahead of time, either install the app on a phone/tablet or download the program to a pc/laptop and ‘Sign Up’. It is free to do so.
Each year group will be having their meetings on the same day but at different times. We have done this to reduce the possibility of sibling clashes in meeting times and days. There will be two meetings held before the end of the academic year – one in the WB22/06 and another in the WB06/07.
I know the teachers are looking forward to having this chance to connect with their class.
Kind Regards
Mrs Spooner
- Galley Hill Primary School and Nursery, Galley Hill, Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, HP1 3JY
- Tel: 01442 406000, 426752, 426753
- Email: admin@galleyhill.herts.sch.uk