Tel: 01698 274950
E-Mail: office@clydevalley.n-lanark.sch.uk
Web: www.clydevalleyhighschool.org.uk
Date: 08/01/21
Online Learning
Dear Parent,
Firstly, I hope this letter finds you and your family safe and well. Hopefully you managed to have an enjoyable and restful time over the Christmas and New Year period, despite the restrictions.
As you will be aware, on Monday 4th January, the Scottish Government announced that young people will not return to school as normal, but will engage in online learning until the end of January 2021 at the earliest, due to further COVID-19 developments. While we are disappointed to hear this, the safety of everyone (pupils, families and staff) is the single most important factor. I have outlined our plans below and hope that this reassures you that we are keen to support and progress the learning of our young people during this challenging time.
We have made strenuous efforts to ensure that all our young people have access to a laptop/device that allows them to engage with online education. If you have any issues in this regard, please contact the school directly and we will make every effort to rectify the situation. Based on this, our plan is for pupils and staff to follow their current timetable online as much as possible. Monday 11th of January is the beginning of Week 2 in our timetable rotation, so pupils should follow those timetabled classes. Staff have already set up Microsoft Teams for all their classes and pupils can access this through their Glow account. All pupils should be used to logging in and accessing these materials, but again if there are any issues, please contact the school. Work will be posted and updated daily.
It is absolutely vital that we try to keep engagement and motivation levels high for all pupils. For pupils who are completing National and Higher qualifications, it is obviously especially important that work is completed as it may form part of the evidence bank teachers will use to estimate grades. We would suggest that you maintain that sense of routine and purpose by encouraging pupils to log on at 8.55am when their normal school day will start. Our staff will make every effort to make the work purposeful, interesting and varied, within the inevitable limitations of online learning. They will also be available for one-to-one feedback and advice for pupils through Microsoft Teams. Please note the following:
· All interactions on Teams must be respectful
· Interactions should only be between pupils and teachers. It is not a chat room for pupils.
· Any parental queries should go through the normal channels (contact the school and ask to speak to Pupil Support).
Our school will be open for the children of key workers, who have no other access to childcare, and for identified young people who would benefit from the support of being in the school building. All of these pupils will be following the same online work as the pupils at home. The school will be staffed on a rota basis at all times for the duration of the lockdown, so if you have any issues there will be someone to help you.
For those of you with young people in the Senior Phase and concerned about the gathering of evidence for SQA awards, we are awaiting further information from SQA. As soon as this is received, we will share this information with you. Senior reports will be sent to parents over the coming week and any planned assessments will be postponed until pupils are physically back in school.
Can I finish by thanking you once again for your support during these extraordinary times. With a vaccine on the horizon, we will hopefully emerge from this term into a much more positive future. In the meantime, be assured that our main priority is to ensure that every young person is supported to continue to progress through this period of lockdown.
Stay safe and take care.
Nick Quail
Head Teacher
Clyde Valley High School
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