Head teacher blog 25th September

Attendance has been improving this week: over 90% again now following a big drop in week 2. Self-isolation and delays in testing results are still causing issues – the longest wait having been over a week! I think we are all getting better at making judgements about whether or not we need a test.  Thus far, no children or staff at Farfield have had a positive test in term time.  Many, many schools have though and the balance of probability is that this will happen here too at some point. With this in mind, we have been reviewing and developing our home learning plans this week and preparing resources for individuals or cohorts that have to stay at home.

The weather has turned this week. With our playtime zoning system, some cohorts are going to have to be on the grass all year round. If you haven’t done so already, we would strongly recommend wellies are brought in to school if your child’s cohort is assigned to a grass zone.

I have delivered a couple of important remote assemblies to the junior children this week. On Monday, I introduced the word diversity and we watched and discussed the recent BLM-inspired dance by the group Diversity. Over the coming weeks, we will learn again about some key figures from black history: figures such as Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela. Importantly, these figures will be put into some historical and contemporary context. On Tuesday, I added the prefix bio to the word diversity and we watched two videos on this theme: https://www.farsleyfarfield.org.uk/biodiversity/ . The WWF Living Planet report should really be headline news: wildlife populations cut by a devastating average of 68% over my lifetime, almost all due to human activity. Fundamental change is needed. At school, we are close to securing solar panels – hopefully, on both buildings – and lighting conversion to LED is due to start at October half term. I am inclined to increase the number of meat-free school meal days, and we are looking to plant more trees across the site this winter or early spring. We also hope to remove areas of turf next spring to try to establish some wildflower, meadow-type borders across the site.