As you will realise, Long Bennington CE Academy continues to be closed for the majority of our pupils, due to the national emergency.
However, the school continues to provide Emergency Childcare provision for those identified vulnerable children as well as children of key workers, so they can support the national effort.
If any parents do require the school to provide childcare for their children then we are here to help and you can contact us using the enquiries@longbennigntonacademy.co.uk email address to inform us of the days your child/ren will be in school.
Food Boxes
Food Boxes for those children who qualify for Free School Meals will be delivered to school on Tuesday 21st April 2020 and will be delivered to families on Tuesday.
Home Learning
In line with guidance from the Local Authority and the Department for Education we will continue to provide learning which can be completed at home. Unfortunately this will not take the form of 'live video lessons' as the safeguarding concerns around these are to great at the current time.
The teachers are working on a daily plan which will see 3 activities/lessons set for each day covering maths, English and one other subject. These will make use of a variety of resources and will be available to view on the class web pages as well as either Google Classroom/PurpleMash or Marvellous Me, depending on the communication method that has been established for the relevant class previously. In addition to this we will continue to set other activities and challenges which will also be shared via the different forms of communication.
To help with any queries or allow the children to interact with their teachers the staff will be available on PurpleMash e-mail, MarvellousMe or Google Classroom to answer questions/support learning at set times in the day which will be communicated by them. These set times are to ensure we can help you all with the learning being set, the staff will continue to interact at other times as well. We are working hard to adapt to the unprecedented situation that we find ourselves in and all of the staff are always here to try and support/answer questions as much as is possible.
We will continue to ensure that all resources are clearly signposted in our 'Home Learning' section of the school website.
Through all of this it is important to remember that you do what is best for you and your families at home and please feel free to 'Pick and Mix' the resources which work best for yourselves.
If any families are struggling to engage with the learning set then please feel free to contact us and we will do all we can to try and help/support.
Remember, as you begin the ‘new term’ and continue to support your child/ren with their home-learning I would like to encourage you to try and ensure that the children or yourselves engage with their class teacher at least once a week.
This could be simply to:
Collective Worship
As a follow up to the videos he produced around the Easter story, Mr Buckeridge has kindly offered to produce videos for the children to watch and enjoy as part of a time for quiet reflection. The link to his latest video which explores the story of the Good Samaritan is here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2LDoL7hD00&feature=youtu.be
Reading Books
There are many ways to access on-line reading materials at home these include:
Access 330+ free KS1 ebooks from our primary reading programme
Go to Collins Connect and click on the Teacher portal and enter:
Username: parents@harpercollins.co.uk
Password: Parents20!
and click Login.
http://E Books - 7,102 FREE books available
https://stories.audible.com/discovery
Physical Activity and Healthy Lifestyle Challenges
As you know we work closely in school with the local charity Inspire+, the staff at Inspire + have been very busy creating challenges for the children alongside virtual competitions. These are all available to view on their website:
https://www.inspireplus.org.uk/
I will continue to provide a daily update which will be available on the latest news section of the school website. I know that these are uncertain times for us all but we will continue to support our school community as best we can.
Stay Safe
David Nicholson