Community Messages

Dear Parents and Carers,

In the hope of communicating with clarity and precision and living our value of being connected to community, I am sending this final email with the latest information I have available to me for all things related to next week.

We have put in place supports for those parents that meet strict Department guidelines so those children will be supported onsite by staff. Our specialist teachers will be those working onsite with children here at Kingswood. All other teachers will be working from home and accessible by email. Therefore, we will be running a skeleton staff onsite next week.

Kingswood has a one stop website where families and students can go to find teaching and learning materials, videos, WebEx links, Google Classroom sites, etc for each day’s learning. Please go to https://sites.google.com/kingswoodps.com.au/kingswood-learning-hub and bookmark it. Then just follow the links to your child's year level.

A number of year levels will be offering 1:1 reading assessments for children to assist with reporting to parents later this term. This was scheduled to occur next week anyway so there was a massive effort on Friday to ensure staff were provided the required resources for this to happen online and from home.

To ensure child safety standards are met there will be no 1:1 session with only one adult and one child. To comply with our policies, we have diverted tutors and education support staff from across the school to support teachers with assessments. Of course, when there are multiple children one teacher can work with them online without additional supports. Students when entering an online session will be held in our WebEx lobby until we are sure we have the right staffing and student ratios.

What we expect of families next week? Do what you can. Do not put additional pressures on yourself. If that means you do not engage on certain days because your home situation does not allow for it, so be it. Just make sure on Compass you put in an approved absence to keep the classroom teacher and school informed.

Learning from previous lockdowns

1. Where possible have your children use headphones when online

2. Enter an online learning space on mute and remain on mute unless otherwise instructed

3. If you have technical issues don’t stress. We all have technical issues at some time or another

4. If something is not working for you don’t push yourself or your children. If the weather is good head outside and have some family fun, if not, do a puzzle, play dress ups, etc, together

5. Reach out to the school or teachers if necessary. We are here to help as much as possible

It has been brought to my attention that for families with multiple children there are a number of online sessions at the same time and work commitments and lack of technology in the home makes it impossible for all children to attend these sessions. I will be conveying this to teachers in the hope that some teams might be able to move online whole class sessions to other times of the day as the week progresses. Please keep an eye out for any changes on the Kingswood Learning Hub.

Camp Australia will be running before and after school care services everyday next week if families would like to take advantage of that service. For those with children onsite, you will be required to scan the QR code on the front gate and come directly to the office to drop off or collect your child/ren.

To further support families I would highly encourage parents watch Cyber Safety: Raising Children in a Digital World. This was the presentation given to Dingley Village schools this week. There are some very good tips and suggestions for parents about parenting online behaviour, especially now that we are back in remote learning.

I hope this circuit breaker lockdown will not extend beyond next Thursday and we return on Friday as planned. Everyone stay safe and we will see you Friday 4th June.

Warm regards,

Aaron Cox

Principal

Kingswood Primary School