Whole School Update - 5 January 2021 Hamilton

Dear Parents

We wish all our families a Happy New Year!

Following yesterday's Government announcement as regards the delayed return of schools (1st February at the earliest) there will be a communication to parents later in the week as regards the practicalities of prelims, parents' evenings. etc.

However, in the meantime, we wanted to provide a reminder on tomorrow's return.

All Junior and Senior School pupils commence on-line learning as from tomorrow - Wednesday 6th January.  The Nursery remains closed as per Government requirements.

Remote Learning - General

Our Microsoft Teams platform will be used and school work will be posted each day by staff. Your son/daughter will need to check posts in each subject Team and the Assignments associated with each Team to see what the instructions are for different subjects. Once your son/daughter completes work and submits it, teaching staff will review it and offer feedback. 

We understand that home learning is difficult to organise when parents are also working from home. We are operating an asynchronous model of learning and teaching where work should be completed when pupils are able to do this.  This allows families to plan pupil days to fit with the demands of home life and other commitments. We have scheduled online sessions where teachers will be free to work with a group of pupils either through a live lesson or a question and answer session or to work with small groups.

If pupils are struggling to get online please let their class teacher, guidance teacher or Head of Year know so that we can inform the relevant people. The IT Support helpdesk is available and there is also an IT Support page on the school Chromebooks (J6 – S6) that pupils can access for help.

Wellbeing

Wellbeing across this period remains key - please ensure pupils also enjoy some down-time away from screens and that they manage to exercise and enjoy some fresh air.

Junior School

An update from Mrs Paterson regarding Remote Learning and daily registration in the Junior School can be viewed here.

S1 to S3
In addition to the above, from Monday 11th there will be ‘live’ sessions for pupils to drop in to and ask questions about their work. These are optional but are useful if your son/daughter wishes to ask their teachers questions. These will appear in the Teams calendar once teachers set them up, so your son/daughter should check it regularly.

S4 to S6
From Wednesday 6th there will be ‘live’ sessions for pupils to drop in to and ask questions about their work. These are useful if your son/daughter wishes to ask their teachers questions. These will appear in the Teams calendar once teachers set them up, so your son/daughter should check it regularly.  A further communication regarding prelims etc. will be with you by the end of the week.

Senior School Morning Registration
 We ask senior pupils to register each morning by 10am, using Teams. Your son/daughter should go in to the ‘SS Pupils’ Team and click the ‘AM Registration’ tab from the options along the top. Your son/daughter should then complete the form that they’ll see to register. This allows us to know if pupils are well and ready to learn each day, and also if they have any wellbeing concerns they can notify us and a member of the Pupil Support team will contact them.  There is also a channel on this team to link to Health and Wellbeing resources, PE activities and study skills courses.  Pupils should tap into these resources as and when required.  

ParentApp 
As you will be aware, we are moving to ParentApp for all school and nursery communications, general information and updates. If you have not already done so we would encourage you to look at the following instructions and download the app for simpler access to all Hamilton College updates. 

If you have questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Kind regards

The Senior Leadership Team
Hamilton College