Christ is the centre of our school community, where we live, love and learn together

Friday 15th May 2020

Prayer Focus for SUMMER Term

Walk with Me Prayer (KS2 Focus) Lord God, our light and our salvation, we praise you

for your gifts of life and faith. We thank you for the

desire that you have planted in our hearts, our

yearning to see your face

Help us to meet you in prayer, to walk in your ways,

and to speak to others of our joy and consolation in

your presence.

Give us faithfulness in this present life so that we may

come to know and praise your beauty, with all our

brothers and sisters in the life to come. We make this

prayer through Christ our Lord Amen

School Mass and Catholic Life

Public Mass is not available under the current circumstances but please join Father Sean

via live streaming of the daily and weekend Masses on

https://www.mcnmedia.tv/camera/our-lady-of-lourdes-birmingham

Our Lady of Lourdes, pray for us

Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Primary School

Parental Newsletter 33 (2019/2020)

Telephone: 0121 444 2684 Website: www.ourladyoflourdesprimary.com

E-mail: enquiries@ourlady.bham.sch.uk

Twitter: @ourladyoflourd1

EYFS Focus (Nursery/Reception)

Father in heaven, you love me, you are with me night and day. I want to love you always in all I do and say. I’ll try to please you, Father, bless me through the day. Amen.

Guardian Angel Prayer (KS1 Focus)

Guardian Angel, my guardian dear. To whom God’s love commits me here. Ever this day be at my side. To light, to guard, to rule and guide. Amen.

Corona Virus Update The Government announced its expectations last Sunday night that early years providers and schools get

ready for a staggered return on 1st June. This has been followed by a series of governmental documents

with their ideas for how this will work.

It is my intention to write to you all on Tuesday next week (it would have been Monday so I apologise)

with detailed information about how we will do this at OLOL (if the 5 tests are met by 28th May and the

Government stick with their original agenda). It is my hope that you are not overly worried at this stage

and I want to reassure you that any increased capacity will be driven by safety for your children and my

staff, and not by any other agenda the Government has for expanding childcare. I want to be up front

and tell you all that I do not agree with how the Government has managed this process.

As the Head Teacher, I have responsibility for Health & Safety for pupils, staff and visitors on site and so

the guidance issued by the Government has provided some helpful information points but it will not be

possible to implement the entirety of the Government’s wishes as they are stated.

You will remember in last week’s newsletter, I asked all parents to have reasonable expectations of what

we could do based on staffing, the structure of the building and health and safety. I have been working

with my senior leaders this week and will have detailed planning and implementation to share next

week. Some families will get a text asking them if they will be sending their child back to school if we

increase capacity in that class. Please reply Yes or No as soon as you get this text to help me finalise

planning. This must be your decision based on the available science and discussion in your family. Once I

have numbers I can determine safe staffing levels in final form.

However, despite the Governmental promise that all key worker children can be accommodated at

school immediately, that is simply not possible. My staffing rotas have been designed to maximise staff

availability while minimising their exposure to each other and groups of children. They also have to build

in the staff May half term holidays in staggered groups so that staff are able to rest.

For the next two weeks, we will maintain the Key Worker offer to those families that accessed it up to

today – these families have had no option but to use the childcare at school and we want this to be

maintained to allow stability for those children who have been with us. It also minimises group mixing.

From Monday 18th, any additional key workers wishing to access childcare at OLOL will need to

phone the school office at 8.45 am and we will fill whatever spaces we have based on staffing and

acceptable ratios of adult to child. Some days are busier in school than others so if you have flexible

work patterns and can take advantage of that we would ask you to do so – Friday for example is

usually a quiet day when many families have not been accessing the limited provision. For new key

worker children who join us via this route from Monday, I want to remind you that I cannot guarantee

social distancing and that there is no universal free school meal so all meals except for free school

meal eligible pupils have to be paid for.

I apologise in advance if this creates issues for families returning to work in the next two weeks but I

am not in a position to make a different offer. From 1st June the key worker group will be the priority

group and this may mean that other classes will not be returning on 1st June so please do not promise

your child in Year N, R, 1 and 6 that they will be back at school until you receive a letter confirming

that. Next week key worker parents will be asked their status and requirements for childcare and on

what days. This is a fluid situation and will change on a daily basis as more guidance is issued but I will

get more information to you.

Yesterday the ONS released their pilot survey based on COVID-19 testing, indicating that despite

what may have been inferred, children seem just as likely to catch this virus as almost any other age

group.

With the death rate and infection rate still so erratic and limited transparency about the science, my

strong advice will remain as follows; if you and your child can stay at home, please stay at home. If

there is someone at home who can care for your child please take that option for now.

The school office will still be open for admin calls from 8.00 – 11.00 am daily from now until we open

fully. Your call will not be answered if you telephone outside these times as teachers will still be calling

If we reopen on 1st June no class at OLOL will have

more than 10 pupils – please look at the photos

showing what each room will look like with a safety

exclusion zone for my teachers and 10 spaced seats.

You will see that it is impossible to create a 2 or even 1

metre distancing with 10 or more pupils. Pupils will

have to follow a one way system and will not be

allowed inside the teacher zone in each room.

In reality I would rather less children than this in the

space but that will depend on projected pupil

numbers.

out of the building doing safe and well checks. You can still email me directly or our enquiry address

and someone will get back to you as soon as possible.

Free School Meals Apologies but Edenred have still not

fulfilled vouchers that should have been

delivered on Monday 11th May. I am

checking daily and will update you when I

can. You can assume vouchers for next

week will also be late.

Working from Home

The school website page found at

https://www.ourladyoflourdesprim

ary.com/covid-19-information-

and-pupil-work-links-2020/

When you access this page you

will see lots of admin and

information for parents at the top,

underneath is a set of year group

folders with lots of work specifically

for your child’s class, underneath

that are lots of additional activities

organised by subject and links for

further activities.

Updated with English, science and

more history this week but not as

much as I had hoped…the DfE

kept me quite busy this week!

Liturgical Season of

Easter - Prayer During this Season of

Easter the Bishops ask us

to pray for

• New Members of the

Church

• Vocations especially

on the World Day of

Prayer for Vocations

• Human Work

especially on St Joseph

the Worker

• The Right Use of the

Media especially on

World Communications

Day (Seventh Sunday of

Easter)

• The Church (Especially

at Pentecost)

Coming into School – New Procedures URGENT As of now we are permanently changing the way that your child

comes into school in the morning. Key Worker children are used to this

already. For your child, it will start as soon as they return.

At 8.30 am Mr Maye and I will open the school gates and at that point

only children will be allowed into school. Parents will not enter the

school gates to wait with their child or to deliver them to the relevant

door. When your child enters there will be a member of staff on the

playground with them to minimise large groups of children and to

monitor pupil’s wellbeing. Miss Grant and another member of staff will

be on the EYFS gate and pupils from these classes will be directed to

that gate to go into their classrooms.

At 8.40 am all pupils will go to their classrooms to start learning as usual.

The gate will be locked at 8.45 am as it is now and we have made no

change to our expectation that pupils are in their classroom by 8.40

am ready to learn. It will be more important than ever moving forward

that pupils are in school for that first lesson each day which

consolidates calculations and grammar.

I will take urgent messages on the gate but any non-urgent messages

for staff should be phoned through to the school office or parents can

drop their child and walk up to the office.

A Word from Pope Francis:

“We need to see each child

as a gift to be welcomed,

cherished and protected.”

Ascension of the Lord 21st May 2020

Congratulations to all children celebrating their

birthdays over the last two weeks – Happy Birthday to

you!

5 Thomas Wheatley

8 Evie Woods

9 Jack Birks & Ashley Eyoum Kwedi

11 Ella-Louise Bailey, Amelia Busby, Cara

McCann & Amy-Leigh Raughter

Year 6 Mrs McCann (mum of Cara) is organising the traditional Year 6 hoodie this year. Mindful that this has

been a strange year for Year 6 I am sure this is something lots of you will wish your child to have and

treasure as a memory of their time at OLOL. If you would like a hoodie please contact Mrs McCann

at marie_mccann@hotmail.co.uk

OLOL Virtual Balloon Race 2020 Our OLOL balloon race is steadily growing and we now have 131 balloon

scheduled to fly. It is environmentally friendly and we hope will be a fun

experience as children follow the journey of their balloon. The race takes place

on 2nd June and the site uses accurate weather data each day of the race (7

days) to propel your balloon. £3 per balloon at

https://ecoracing.co/user/page/110 if you want to join us!