In Lockdown 3 staff and parents at Ramsbury Primary School have been working hard to ensure all children are learning, engaged, supported and having fun. This has led to many highly creative ideas and activities. The highlight of this term is the annual Ramsbury School’s Got Talent Competition run by the Year 6 children. This year entries will be video submissions and can include the whole family, even pets!
Reflecting the national picture, the numbers of children attending school in Ramsbury are higher than in the first lockdown. The children use the online platform Google classroom. Joanna Price, Head Teacher, explained, “Each in-school class bubble work in their own classroom, with their teacher(s) and teaching assistants. For the older years, following a full class live meeting in the morning via Google Classroom, their teacher works with the in-school bubble and teaching assistant with the at-home children, and this switches in the afternoon.
Throughout school we are employing a mixture of live teaching and pre-prepared work with the aim of maximising teacher/pupil contact as much as possible to ensure our at-home children continue to feel as involved from a learning and social perspective as if they were at school. Clearly it is very difficult for parents who may also be working full-time, and we have staff teams ready to respond to parental requests for support.”
Year 6 pupil, Olivia, who is learning at home via Google Classroom, said, “Each day begins with a Google Meet with my teacher and the rest of the class. This is a good opportunity for me to see all of my classmates even if it’s virtually. When that is finished, we get our lessons started. The teachers are also doing a great job at making home-schooling especially fun. We are having a bake off for the next few weeks. Every week there is a new category and at the end of the week a star baker is announced.
We have also managed to walk the length of the Grand Canyon (which is 277 miles) as a class. We have been walking at least a mile every day and adding it to an excel document. Because we have finished we are now going to try to achieve the length of the Mississippi River which is a whopping 2317 miles, (this may take us longer than 2 weeks!) We are so lucky to have so many lovely walks around here so we can enjoy the countryside as we go on our walks.
A Ramsbury Primary School lockdown tradition has been Miss Price’s, ‘Who’s in the barrel?’ She will take a video of someone who is at school and they will be in the barrel. Those of us at home will have to guess who’s in the barrel.”
Assistant Head Teacher of KS2 and Year 5 teacher, Sophie Pollock, commented, “For our children who have had to switch to home learning, they (and their parents) have managed brilliantly. The Year 5 children have collaborated to make a whole-class video performance of the poem, ‘The Raven’, with home-based children using props and dressing up to perform their stanza. The whole class catch up every day online for a story.”
Meanwhile excitement is mounting about Ramsbury’s Got Talent. Annabelle W, one of this year’s judges who will be dressing up as ‘Simone Cowell’ for the finals, commented, “I have looked forward to being a judge in Ramsbury’s Got Talent since I started at Ramsbury– it’s not going to be exactly the same, but at least we get to do it, I just have to convince my mum not to sing!”
And a final word from Olivia, “I am so lucky to have a school that can provide the help and the resources over this challenging time. I am really looking forward to lockdown coming to an end and going back to school so I can see all my friends again.”
Witness appeal following fatal road traffic collision near Avebury
