The Grange Education Group Head Teachers and Mrs Crawford (Depute Head Teacher) have met to discuss how best to approach P7 Transition this session in light of the Covid 19 pandemic.  Since this meeting, the Scottish Government announcement this week looks very positive about being able to move away from solely virtual transition which is very heartening to hear.

However, in the meantime until we are advised what is safe to do within primaries and within Grange our virtual transition process is continuing.  Following on from one of our Education Group Transition Team meetings, Mrs Crawford has prepared an information leaflet which has been placed on all the primary schools Apps introducing our Grange Transition Team and to encourage parents and carers to download the Grange School App where we will place future P7 Transition information.  Mrs McBride began meeting each of the P7 classes in their class Teams to answer questions that pupils had.  Mrs Crawford has now also met all the P7 classes and has had a virtual chat with them about how the school is organised in terms of the Senior Leadership Team and their Guidance teacher and how that links to their pastoral support.  She has also discussed how classes are made up and a timeline for that process.  She will have another round of meetings next week to talk about pastoral support in more detail and answer any other questions which arise. Feedback from the classes and class teachers has been very positive with pupils asking a range of diverse but pertinent questions.  Mrs Crawford has also offered to attend primary Parent Council meetings.

Our New S1 Team has now been set up and we will be posting a variety of information commencing today (26th Feb) with a welcome video, written information following on from Mrs Crawford’s chats with the pupils this week. Mrs McBride will be also be posting earlier than usual our Form to identify Grange siblings of the P7s and to allow pupils to identify four friends they would like us to know about prior to classes being created. Miss Cooper, our Library Assistant is in the process of creating a new updated Virtual Tour of the school, but meantime one class asked that we also post this version from last year this week as well.

Mr Adams, one of our PE staff has been speaking with a range of departments/faculties to organise staff having sessions with the full P7 year group on our new Team to allow the pupils to get to know a wider range of staff.  This will commence with Mr Smith in Maths followed by other faculties thereafter over the course of the next few months.

Additional Support Needs (ASN)  
Miss Reid, our Principal Teacher of ASN, has been meeting virtually with parents/carers of ASN primary pupils in all our five Associated Primary Groups to ensure we have all relevant information regarding pupils learning packages and plans.  Part of the meeting is to review what additional provision will be required to be in place to support the pupil in their move to secondary.  This process is currently on-track to be completed earlier than we would normally have planned to do which will be reassuring to the parents/carers whose children have ASN as we are aware how worrying the thought of this major transition can be.  Once complete and we have further guidance regarding what we can put in place we will then organise enhanced transition provision which would benefit some of these ASN pupils.

Enhanced Transition 
For the pupils identified as benefiting from enhanced transition a range of supports are available.  Our PT Transition, Miss McBride coordinates several activities in small groups to support pupils.  Miss Reid is organising mobility training for young people who require this and digital provision for pupils with a range of needs.  She also begun the collation of our ASN Log and for the information to be provided to Grange staff on how best to meet each pupil’s needs. She has additionally begun the process of coordinating the preparation of Medical Health plans for pupils who require these. Our Home School Link Worker, Lesley Wilson links with specific children and families and she is now coordinating a transition package with the primaries to support their move to Grange.  One of our Principal Teachers, Mr Dixon has been working alongside our Educational Psychologist, Bex Wilson, to strengthen our provision for young people who will benefit from additional Nurture Supports, Soft Starts, involvement in our Pupil Support Base and other adjustments to their school day.  He has sent a request for information out to our primaries to allow them to commence planning around the information provided by our primary colleagues.

The next Education Group Head Teacher Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday 2nd March followed by the next Education Transition Group Meeting on Thursday 4th March where further planning for transition will be discussed.

Kind Regards
Elaine Crawford
Depute Head Teacher