WLD Update for Parents & Carers Monday 30th March 2020

Good afternoon,

I hope that, under the circumstances, you had a reasonable weekend.  Some updates from today....

Easter provision:  We will only be open over Easter for children of key workers who cannot be at home - please would any parents/carers working in critical sectors and wanting to make use of our supervised provision over the 2-week Easter period make sure that we have seen a key worker letter or identification and you have notified us of your shifts. Please send them to l.hodgson@waltonledale.lancs.sch.uk or by Schoolcomms.  It is likely that we will be closed on the 2 bank holidays (Fri 10th April and Mon 13th April - we are just awaiting final guidance from Lancashire County Council on that).  At the end of this week teachers will set some activities for over the 2 week Easter period, but will not be setting work on a daily basis.  There will be occasional updates to everyone from me over the 2 week period as additional information becomes available.

Access to work online:  Only 19 students (out of 780) did not access their Office 365 accounts in the first 4 days of last week which is amazing!  I appreciate that this is not the same as doing the work, but at least we know that virtually all our students are in contact with their teachers.  We have been getting in touch with lots of families and those 19 students are clearly a priority over the coming days.

Online safety:  We have already published guidance for parents/carers and students on our website ( https://www.waltonledale.lancs.sch.uk/parents/e-safety-advice).  The government has also identified the following sources as useful for parents & carers to help support their children in staying safe online:

• Internet matters - for support for parents and carers to keep their children safe online

• London Grid for Learning - for support for parents and carers to keep their children safe online

• Net-aware - for support for parents and careers from the NSPCC

• Parent info - for support for parents and carers to keep their children safe online

• Thinkuknow - for advice from the National Crime Agency to stay safe online

• UK Safer Internet Centre - advice for parents and carers

Free School Meals:  We are aware that the Lancashire system for distributing meals through a central hub (in our case Clayton Green Library) has not worked well today.  As a school we have ordered supermarket vouchers to send to all the relevant parents & carers and we are expecting them imminently.  As soon as they arrive they will be sent out.  

Message from Mr Carr (Maths) about calculators:  If your child does not own a scientific calculator at home you can download a free trial of an emulator that runs on a PC or Mac from CASIO - https://education.casio.co.uk/emulators. Either the FX-991EX or the FX-83/85GTX would be fine for students in all year groups. They will have received an email to their school email account with more information on how to download and use it (the trial is free for 90 days). Most of their maths can be done using the calculator app on a phone, or any small calculator with x + - ÷ buttons, but the emulators are the same as the calculators they use in school/exams and are easier to use for complicated calculations or those needing square roots, Sin/Cos/Tan, powers etc.  

Best wishes

James Harris

Headteacher