Dear Parents / Carers,

There are several reasons we want year 10 to return to school this term. The main ones are as follows:

• The students will have been out of school for more than 12 weeks and a return to school, in any capacity, is almost certainly a positive move emotionally / socially
• The students will have an opportunity to feed back to a member of staff regarding the lockdown experience on an educational and personal basis. They will be given the opportunity to raise concerns and to ask for assistance where necessary. Staff will be there to offer positive strategies and will pass on any concerns to relevant colleagues
• Support will be offered to those students who have found on – line learning difficult to access
• Subject teachers will be able to outline, in person, what the next steps are over the next few weeks and to offer reassurances regarding September and the next academic year

How will the face to face meetings be managed safely during the week beginning 15 June 2020?

• The year group will be divided into 4 groups. One group will be asked to attend school each day (maximum of 40 students per day, which is about 25% of the year group)
• Invitations have been sent asking no more than 10 students at a time to attend the face to face interviews. The interviews will run each morning from Monday 15^th June until Thursday 18^th June.
• Meetings will take place outside, or in an open space eg Hall, sports hall, canteen with all windows and doors open
• Cleaners will be available to clean during the day
• Social distancing procedures will be in place at all times, and students will be reminded not to meet up on the way to / from school
• Students can wear non uniform (please change clothes once back home)

What will the students do in these sessions?

The students will discuss how they have been doing during the lockdown period. They will let us know what we can do to help them between now and next September, and we will tell them what they need to do in order to keep up with the work set over this period.

Which staff will be used during this time?

The Senior Team will be in each day, along with the Head of Year 10.

Other colleagues will also assist with the interviews, and the social distancing procedures.

What next?

On Friday 19 June, once we have completed all the face to face interviews with year 10 students, and collated all the survey responses from Parents / Carers, we will work out what our next steps will be.

We are strictly limited regarding what we can offer at this time, because of social distancing and the risk of a spike if we open the school too quickly.

However, we hope to offer the following:

From Monday 22 June we hope to offer a supervised service for on-line learning.

The work the teachers have provided thus far has been very impressive indeed. There are daily videos, quizzes, powerpoints with voiceovers for teaching points, and a wide variety of great activities for all students to complete. However, not as many students as we would like have engaged fully with these great resources.

In order to address this issue, we would like to offer 3 hours per day for students to work in a computer room in school if this means they will be more successfully engaged.

These sessions will not be compulsory. We will provide it if you want to take up the offer of the provision, and will allocate sessions on a weekly basis. The number of sessions available to each child will depend on the level of demand as I cannot have more than 40 students per day in school.

If you would like your child to attend the supervised sessions, please email devans@hornchurchhigh.com and / or mneill@hornchurchhigh.com to let them know you would like to book a space.

From Monday 29 June we hope to offer small group lessons in core subjects (English, maths and science)

We hope to invite all year 10 students in during this week for a 40 minute session with English, maths and science teachers. This will be to outline what they have been asked to do so far during lockdown, to let them know what to do next, and to deliver some revision points.

A timetable will be sent out in due course. All students should try to attend these sessions, however they are not compulsory.

We know that lockdown has not been easy for any family, and we have very much appreciated all the positive feedback we have received as a school over the past few months. We will continue to find ways to develop our learning platforms and communication methods as the weeks go on.

In the meantime, please believe me when I tell you that we really miss our school, your children and our ‘real lives’ – we are hoping to get back to some kind of normality in September, and will keep in touch with you to make sure you know what we are planning as soon as the advice is given to us from Health and Educational officials.

Take care, and stay safe.

Val Masson