Help Pack for all Parents

Dear Parents and Carers

Hampshire County Council, our Local Education Authority, has produced a parenting support pack for use by schools as a resource for parents. 

The power point has been put together by the county PSA’s (parent support advisors) who are part of the Primary Behaviour Service.  The pack is intended to be easily accessibly to parents, covering a range of topics and questions you may have from sleep to positive parenting routines and beyond.  All things familiar to families but which may have been impacted or exacerbated further by the lockdown situation and which in turn may have affected the wellbeing of the parent and child.  We have put the resource onto our 'parent information page'

Parent Information Page-click here

Lots of parents are letting us know how difficult they are finding it this time. We understand and we hear you, but until the school is out of lockdown , which has been driven by the high number of deaths and the hospitals being full, we are unable to open to you, even for a morning or afternoon as many have asked. To be clear, we are not a school that has opened to everyone full time. Critical Care workers were asked to confirm hours needed and children are not attending school when care isn't needed. Many are adjusting their hours to help reduce the number attending school. This doesn't mean there is 'more room'. It means that the risk of transmission of the virus to staff and children is reducing further with less children on site every day. We currently see up to 90 children through the week, which is 41% of our school. A  staggering rise in the number accessing us from the last lockdown where we were at 20 children.

To help identify staff who are asymptomatic, and further halt the spread of the virus, all staff , working in schools in England, have been invited to test twice a week, using 'lateral flow testing' kits at home. It is not compulsory, and if a staff member does test positive, then the bubble will be closed. This will hopefully help to bring the spread of the disease down further. It isn't a 'safety net' as people carrying a low viral load may not get picked up by a LF test, but we are seeing it as a positive way forward and hopefully a way to opening schools to all sooner. Our first kits are arriving next week, which is when we will start the testing.

Kind regards

Mrs Riches