The transition to return to school                                                 1 October 2021

Staged return to onsite learning for schools: Metropolitan Melbourne

Remote and flexible learning will continue to be delivered to students, only on the days they are not scheduled to attend onsite.

*As per Victoria's Roadmap: Delivering the National Plan, the dates listed below are indicative dates, subject to Public Health consideration of epidemiology at the time.

Source: State government

We are very excited at the prospect of a return to school and face to face learning. We also realise that families with multiple children could have some children on-site, while others learn remotely at home, throughout each week for at least several weeks. This unfortunately creates some challenges, at a time when we want school to be positive and predictable for students, staff and parents.

We have also considered the additional aspects of LFH that have been introduced throughout the last 20 weeks of remote learning, following 2020 parent feedback, including Webex Plus, Check-in and Extra, online Specialists@Webex, designated Webex Essential tasks, ClickView Interactives, STA sessions, Sentral task submission and Google Classroom. All of these now-familiar elements will be maintained during Term 4. In adding the on-site transition schedule above, there is a lot to consider, particularly for those families who are starting at LPS in Term 4.

We have today published LFH pages for next week, using a third new schedule that could allow us all to work around these challenges. Of course we understand that some families schedule remote learning around work commitments, including flexible, casual and shift work. We also acknowledge that our senior students reported that a highlight of 2020 LFH was planning their own daily schedules and having agency over their learning. Additionally, we appreciate the feedback from parents about the organisational skills that many students have been learning, and are keen to maintain those.

As flagged before the break, this 'new' LFH schedule will be used for Weeks 1 and 2. We encourage families to then reflect on which model (3 day, 5 day, or the 'new' 5 day LFH) will best help your children transition back to 'part-time' onsite schooling, before a full return to school, and allow you to support your children through this time. 

Later next week, we will email the 'preferred contact' person in each family the Pulse Check link, to vote for your preferred LFH arrangement. This will be provided via Survey Monkey, which accommodates our community languages, and include links to samples of the three options. Every preferred contact can complete the survey once, to be fair to every family, and it should take less than two minutes to complete.

The survey link closes at 9 a.m. on Monday 11 October, giving our staff time to organise Week 3 learning tasks, with the results helping determine the format of our LFH planners for Term 4.

This week will give everyone an opportunity to reflect on Lockdown 5 and 6 LFH planners and try this latest option. Although there are pluses and minuses with each, we are entering another phase of LFH, so look forward to receiving your preferences. 

Finally, as Mrs Mandy Ryan is on leave for the first three weeks of term, her Literacy Intervention sessions are unfortunately cancelled. 

Let's hope that return to school dates are confirmed by the government soon and thanks for your continued support - perhaps the end of remote learning is in sight!

Take care,

Kim