Good afternoon all,
It was lovely to see you all on Monday (although this now feels like it was a lifetime ago) and I am so thankful we got this brief period together.
Again, I would like to begin by expressing how upet I, and all of our staff are, that school was forced to close. We strived to remain open throughout all of this and had taken the utmost care in regards to hygiene and safety. It is such a shame that we were left with no other option but to partially close to many children.
I hope you are all coping well at home and I hope this lockdown doesn’t go on anywhere near as long as it needs to. I have really enjoyed looking at all the hard work you have been doing at home and thank you to those of you who have sent me your work.
Home Learning
Home learning is uploaded weekly onto the Google Drive Link. This can also be permenantly accessed from our website by clicking on ‘Year 2’ and then ‘Home Learning’. All home learning work is uploaded and updated here.
The majority of my communication will be through Class Dojo - as I know all of you have an account and access to this.
Work Expectations
As per Government guidelines, we are setting an average of 3 hours of home learning per day. This takes the form of a Phonics/Spelling task, an English task, a Maths task and another subject task in the afternoon. I also recommend 20-30 minutes daily reading either with books from home or by accessing the Oxford Owl book page (link on home learning plan).
I need to see your child’s work when they have completed it and this can be uploaded via the ‘Portfolio’ page on the Class Dojo app/website. Please use the ‘portfolio’, rather than the message function as the Portfolio work can be chronicled and accessed for assessment purposes, easily and effectively.
Please do try to send me daily photos of work so I can see how your child is doing and if they need any guidance or extra help. I appreciate this can be very difficult with all the other work and home commitments you all have and so I ask that you can at least send me examples of your child’s work every week. At the moment, we are all essentially working 2 jobs (as I know many of you are too!), having to be in school for the large numbers of critical worker and vulnerable children and also setting and responding to work from those at home so it would be very helpful if you could send me work just so I can know that everything is okay and that you have accessed it. I can also give your child Dojo Points for their hard work! If you need any guidance, please don’t hesitate to message me on Class Dojo.
Please bear with schools during this time. The lockdown was sprung upon us at the absolute last minute and we are currently playing catch up in regards to home learning. We are all working incredibly hard to provide work for the children. We strive to provide the best learning we can for all our class (children in school and at home are doing exactly the same things) but we are adapting and evolving work all the time and will continue to do so throughout this (hopefully short) lockdown. At present, we are sticking to our current format and where possible I will upload teaching videos of myself for your child to access. I feel this is more appropriate than live lessons for home learning as children and families access content at different times of the day/week. Therefore, recorded videos and worksheets that can be done at any time allow you all more flexibility in how you access the work.
Home Learning Timetable
Attached here is a suggested timetable for home learning. This is just suggested and I know will not suit everyone. Please do what you feel is best for your child and situation and lengthen/shorten/adapt as necessary. We want home learning to be as manageable as possible.
Responding to Work
I will always look at and respond to all the work I receive. I politely request that work is submitted Monday - Thursday before 5pm as I will be unable to check after this point and on Friday before 1.30pm. Likewise, I will be unable to respond to messages after these times on these days.
I apologise if it takes me a while to respond to messages. We have many more critical worker children in class than initially expected and so I am having to respond to Class Dojo submissions in class break times and in the late evenings. This can be quite challenging to stay on top off so please don’t think I have forgotten you.
Extra Activities
All children have a login to Education City (see Class Dojo stories) so they can access educational games and worksheets.
Twinkl has work and guidance for parents for free at present.
Oddizzi are doing more Geography home learning weekly packs. These were very popular last year and I will add them weekly on the website.
BBC Bitesize also has lots of great home learning activities.
Oak National Academy is incredibly useful for periods where you just want to set your child off and have them learn independently as has plenty of excellent units of work
‘PE With Joe’ is also making its return. Please search for this on youtube to access it.
Cosmic Kids Yoga is fantastic for some relaxing, mindful PE lessons. I highly recommend this.
Maths games is an excellent website with plenty of Maths games online.
Phonics Play is an excellent site with plenty of interactive phonics games (if you struggle to deliver phonics sessions, you could use this, or in addition to other phonics). They have a free period during lockdown… Username: jan21 Password: home
Do arts and crafts, cooking, gardening, cycling etc. These are all valid educational and important activities. Mental and physical wellbeing is just as important, if not more so, than educational learning.
I am also in the process of preparing two small printed workbooks with additional English, Maths and fun activities. Once I have gotten round to printing all of these, I will let you all know so they can be collected from school.
Difficult Times
More difficult days face us ahead but we have gotten through them once and we will endure again. I miss all the children deeply and I am so grateful to all of you at home working so hard to keep your child learning. You are amazing!
I also want to express my sincere appreciation and gratitude to all those front line workers who are putting themselves at risk daily in hospitals, supermarkets, care homes and other emergency services to help all of us. Let’s make things safer for them by staying at home.
Lots of love to you all,
Mr Whetnall
