Time is moving very slowly as events are travelling at breakneck speed. When I wrote the first blog, I suggested that parents made use of the outdoors so that children could explore nature: of course, we are now expected to stay indoors as much as possible with limited exercise in a day.
We have had our first week in school since the closures. It has seemed so strange to have the spaces of school housing so few children and strange to shrink back from each interaction to maintain that safe distance…
I think it is true to say that no one can guess what is on the horizon. Who would have thought that the heir to the throne, Prince Charles, and the Prime Minister should both contract the virus in the same week?
It perhaps isn’t strange that this time away from school has led to all sorts of creativity and innovation. We now have a school Facebook page and a YouTube channel. If you go onto YouTube and look up Conisbrough Ivanhoe Primary Academy, you will see a range of videos uploaded by staff for the amusement of children – and one (the most brilliant) created by a child. Please look and see.
We hope to move to a voucher system for Free School Meals after Easter, so if anyone is entitled to FSM but isn’t claiming them (some people don’t bother because infants get free meals anyway, but these are not FSM) get in touch with the office. I guess that some people may now be on benefits that weren’t before, so contact us if you think you have an entitlement and we can help. Currently, we are providing grab bags during the school term.
I hope that everyone is managing – it has been lovely to see so many pictures on Twitter and Facebook of children making use of their time.