Dear Families,

My regular newsletters normally open with a review of what has happened in the past weeks, however this newsletter finds us in the quirky circumstances of a lot more happening away from the school.

Firstly I must reach out and congratulate our wonderful school community for the way we are coping through this pandemic.  Our staff are doing a terrific job, but as a group we know that the people doing a significant job are our parents.  To all parents we say thank you and congratulations - we are so impressed with all you have already achieved during this significant time of change.

Last week we had significant contact from parents, all living through this experience in different ways though a common thread was a desire by parents to give their children the very best of opportunity during this time.  As educators it is always a positive when parents engage with us, and even though Remote Learning was definitely no one's preference or choice, we are faced with it for this term.  We can either look on it as an opportunity or allow it to have a negative impact on our children and families.

This week staff have been kept busy working both on and off site interacting with students, while also preparing the next set of Learning Packs that were made available for collection on Thursday.  This past week we have seen a tremendous growth of online interactions and engagement in learning, and while COVID-19 is in no sense welcome, we do welcome this unexpected opportunity to bring learning from the classroom to the dining room.  Many of the staff have children at home so they too are living through the changed circumstances of Remote Learning while also working - and we probably echo the pleas of school parents for things to go back to normal as teaching a classroom full of students is much easier than teaching your own kids at the kitchen bench!

So I offer you the corny catch cry we hear on Channel 7 commercials we I say "We're all in this together".

Take care, keep safe.

Kind regards,

Dave

PS.  Please note the absence of any reference to football in this newsletter ;)