Since we wrote to you last week, the GFM continues to take a cautious and careful approach to reopening its schools in order to do our best to keep staff, children and their families safe. We believe doing this together, in cooperation, will be the way we can achieve a return to being in school for part of the week, whilst continuing to learn from home. Taking a steady and stepped approach to managing this situation will mean that we will find out, more securely, what can be done to mitigate risk and provide schooling onsite safely. When pupils do return to us, they will not be returning to the daily routine or offer they experienced before schools closed on 20 March. It is important to understand that the government will only make the final decision on whether to press ahead with the reopening of schools when it reviews the latest science on Thursday 28 May, and that if the evidence does not support this decision at that time, it will be delayed. In preparation for the possible return, we have assigned children to a ‘bubble number’ so that Y6 children will learn alongside the same children each time they are in school. We have communicated this information directly to our Y6 families. Our Year 3, 4 and 5 teachers will still be supporting their classes from home. So, Y6 will be staffed with teachers and support staff.  There will be no pupils in school on Monday 1 June  to enable the training  of staff in preparation for health and safety arrangements in a time of social distancing. There will also be no children in on Friday 5 June in order to enable staff to review and learn from the  week (if we have returned) and to decide whether or not it is safe and feasible to move to more Bubbles attending on any one day. Parents/carers will be informed of the outcome of our learning and assessment of the risk.  We are aiming to send a detailed letter to our families on Friday 29 May, once we have learnt from the government announcement the day before. Our provision for children of Critical Workers will remain at Brune Park with Rowner pupils too. For families who meet the criteria, we thank you  for using this provision where there are absolutely no other options.