{"id":546,"date":"2020-05-11T15:48:17","date_gmt":"2020-05-11T15:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/?p=546"},"modified":"2020-05-11T15:57:32","modified_gmt":"2020-05-11T15:57:32","slug":"newsletter-monday-11th-may-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/2020\/05\/11\/newsletter-monday-11th-may-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Newsletter – Monday 11th May 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dear Families and Friends of Crossmichael Primary School,<\/p>\n

Keeping in Touch<\/strong><\/p>\n

Good afternoon.\u00a0 I hope that you are safe and well.\u00a0 Once again, thank you for keeping in touch with us via email, telephone or class Facebook pages.<\/p>\n

One of my responsibilities is to provide safeguarding for all pupils.\u00a0 This can be challenging when staff are not seeing children every day.\u00a0 Therefore, I have created a short and simple Microsoft Form questionnaire for pupils to complete.\u00a0 It will tell me how your child is feeling, how they are getting on with learning activities at home, if they have done any exercise,\u00a0 if they need a member of staff to contact them, and enables them to add any other comments about life during lockdown.<\/p>\n

A weekly<\/em><\/strong> link to this questionnaire will be emailed to all parents.\u00a0 I would appreciate it if parent\/ guardians of pupils in P1-3 could complete it for each child by 3pm on Friday.\u00a0 Pupils in P4-7 will be able to access the link to the questionnaire via their GLOW emails and should be able to complete it themselves.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Access to Internet and Devices<\/strong><\/p>\n

I enjoyed delivering Chromebooks to those families who said that they were having issues connecting to the Internet or had a limited number of devices at home.\u00a0 I hope this has been helpful.\u00a0 We are very grateful to the Drax Group for purchasing the seven laptops for our schools.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Parent Council An<\/strong>nual General Meeting – Tonight (Monday 11th May at 7pm on ZOOM)<\/strong><\/p>\n

We are having our AGM via the ZOOM app at 7pm on Monday 11th May.<\/p>\n

The Agenda will be:<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Apologies<\/div>\n
Attendees<\/div>\n
Approval of minutes of previous\u00a0AGM<\/span><\/div>\n
Chairperson\u2019s report<\/div>\n
Head Teacher\u2019s report<\/div>\n
Treasurer\u2019s report<\/div>\n
Election of Office Bearers 2020\/2021<\/div>\n
Approval and resolution of amended constitution<\/div>\n
AOB<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

Dumfries and Galloway Council – COVID-19 Website<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dumfries and Galloway Council have created an updated COVID-19 information page that can be accessed here:<\/p>\n

https:\/\/supportdg.dumgal.gov.uk\/<\/p>\n

There is a tab specifically for Schools and Childcare.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

NHS Support for All<\/strong><\/p>\n

The NHS have a website dedicated to mental health and wellbeing and coronavirus.\u00a0 There are also a number of resources available to support you in talking to your child about Coronavirus.\u00a0 I have also attached resources to support you with mental health and domestic abuse.\u00a0 Please find these resources below.\u00a0 I will upload them to the Partnership Schools website.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.nhsdg.co.uk\/mental-health-and-wellbeing-and-coronavirus\/<\/p>\n

COVID-19 Resource Pack Unders – It’s ok to worry about coronavirus<\/a> \"\" How to Talk to Children about COVID<\/a> \"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Transition Arrangements<\/strong><\/p>\n

You will be aware that we have been given permission to have a Portacabin erected in order to accommodate all new catchment pupils.\u00a0 \u00a0This is good news as we will be able to welcome our new Primary 1 catchment pupils into Crossmichael Primary School.<\/p>\n

Normally, in May,\u00a0 parents\/ guardians of non-catchment pupils would receive a letter informing them if their child has been granted a space in their non-catchment school.\u00a0 Parents\/ Guardians of catchment pupils do not<\/strong> receive a letter and are automatically granted a space if the school can accommodate them.<\/p>\n

We usually begin the P1 transition arrangements once these letters have been received by families.\u00a0 This year, things are different because of the pandemic and it is looking increasingly likely that schools may not return before the summer holidays.<\/p>\n

Transition arrangements will have to be done differently this year.\u00a0 It is my intention to make up P1 packs to send out to pupils in June.\u00a0 I will also be speaking to staff to think of ways of introducing pupils to staff, the layout of the school building and each other.\u00a0 I have not yet allocated buddies to our new P1 intake but this is something that we will consider in the next few weeks.<\/p>\n

Having a Portacabin will enable us to have another classroom and teacher.\u00a0 Soon, I will be meeting with John Thin to discuss staffing arrangements for the Partnership schools.\u00a0 Once I have clarity on this, it will be easier to commence with transition arrangements for pupils.<\/p>\n

Other things to consider are the capacity of the Portacabin and what the return to school will look like for our pupils as we continue to maintain social distancing.\u00a0 The return to school is not likely to involve all pupils returning at the same time.\u00a0 We need to consider the health and safety of our school community.\u00a0 We are not yet in the position to be able to provide detail on what that may look like.<\/p>\n

Our P7-S1 transition arrangements have also changed.\u00a0 It is my intention to liaise with Castle Douglas High School and Kirkcudbright Academy to have our P7 pupils return to school for their Leavers Assembly.\u00a0 We plan to continue with the prize giving at this time too.\u00a0 We also hope to have a ‘Leavers Meal’ at some point.\u00a0 This will be dependent on advice from Scottish Government.<\/p>\n

I would hope that P7 pupils from other schools will have an opportunity to ‘meet’ each other via GLOW groups if they are not yet able to meet in person.\u00a0 I am sure that our secondary colleagues will be in touch about arrangements in the next few weeks.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Thanks to Our Staff<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is worth noting that several of our teaching and non-teaching staff are doing two jobs at the moment.\u00a0 They are planning learning for our children whilst also volunteering to work shifts at the Emergency Childcare Hubs in Dalbeattie and Kirkcudbright.\u00a0 (These Hubs are open at weekends and over school holidays.)\u00a0 Many of them also have their own families to consider and are juggling work and trying to teach their own children.<\/p>\n

Mrs Clifton has also travelled to Dumfries to collect ‘Literacy Ladders’ resources, has made up learning packs and has distributed these to the pupils whom she has been supporting with the ‘Closing the Literacy Gap’ materials.\u00a0 Thank you.<\/p>\n

Our staff have gone above and beyond what is expected of them and I would like to thank them for everything that they are doing to support us.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As always, please get in touch via email (gw08scottmary01@ea.dumgal.sch.uk) or telephone (07741 686730) if you wish to discuss anything further or if you need someone to talk to.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Best wishes,<\/p>\n

Mary E Lidstone-Scott<\/p>\n

Headteacher<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dear Families and Friends of Crossmichael Primary School, Keeping in Touch Good afternoon.\u00a0 I hope that you are safe and well.\u00a0 Once again, thank you for keeping in touch with us via email, telephone or class Facebook pages. One of my responsibilities is to provide safeguarding for all pupils.\u00a0 This can be challenging when staff […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9142,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9142"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=546"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":552,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546\/revisions\/552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/dg\/crossmichael\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}