Some schools are reopening today for reception, year one and year six pupils and we are doing what we can to help facilitate this process.
Back to school
Today we have launched our “Barnet – Helping Children Back To School” campaign where we’ll be sharing useful resources and guidance for supporting parents, carers and teachers with their children’s mental health on a phased return to school. This will be communicated across our social media channels including Twitter, Facebook and Instagram as well as through our website and email correspondence.
While we encourage parents to start sending their children back to school, we appreciate that it is a challenge to decide whether it is in fact safe for your children to return. Our priority is to ensure that Barnet’s learning spaces are safe for them. Every school has been doing comprehensive risk assessments over recent days - plans for a return to learning will vary from school to school. Headteachers have been working with school staff, governors, unions and parents to devise arrangements that both allow social distancing and minimise the risk of infection.
The past two and a half months have been amongst the most difficult that any of us have had to deal with in our lifetimes. The challenging nature of life under COVID-19 has been significant for our children. The structure of going to school every day stopped suddenly and has been replaced with a mixture of emergency schooling and remote learning with teachers and classmates. Some children have coped with this very well, but others have struggled.
Childhood, however, is about so much more. It is about social interaction, learning from your peers, playing together. It is about cultural experiences, all of which have been curtailed during the lockdown.
We hope for all parents, carers, teachers and children to manage this phased school reopening in a way that suits you and your child and that our resources will be useful for you.
We’ll be constantly uploading mental health related content on our new Back To School page.
You can also follow us for the latest mental health support and guidance on: