Keep up to date with all the latest news happening in school at the moment.
Graham Crory from Actisport has produced a number of fun, interactive and educational Keep Fit Videos to keep children active and motivated when they are at home. Please consider making the content available to your child and thanks to Graham for his great work and creativity in keeping children remaining active.
Sacred Heart Saint Vincent de Paul have been in touch to offer their support to families or individuals who are experiencing significant difficulty during this challenging time. This support can include financial and pastoral support. Please contact Dan on 07538 638 550 for further information. Many thanks to SVP for this kind offer!
Dear Parent,
Re: Supporting Children of Key Workers in Primary School
As Principal I am acutely aware of the current crisis everyone is facing and will endeavor to do all in my power to help ensure the health and safety of the pupils and staff in our school and wider communities.
Last night the Minister for Education in Northern Ireland, Peter Weir MLA, sent letters to Principals in Northern Ireland outlining how schools will close from the end of today, Friday 20th March, however will open on Monday 23rd March to support identified Key Workers.
It is worth bearing in mind that we have been instructed to close to minimise the risk of infection transfer at a time of national and global crisis. It is essential, therefore, that we are still able to comply with this ultimate reason for closure.
To inform that decision, we need to be able to manage who can access the care, otherwise the original reason for closure of schools becomes meaningless. In practice, this will mean we are not able to safely provide the offer of childcare from Monday morning but will aim to do so beginning Tuesday 24th March from 9am-2pm/3pm. Those children who are entitled to Free School Meals and whose parents have made contact with the Office can collect a healthy lunch, children attending school should attend school with a packed lunch.
We must also do everything we can to try and limit the number of children and adults working together in a small space in line with Government social or physical distancing guidance.
Please be aware, guidance may alter later today if we receive more specific updates from the Education Minister.
Points to consider
· A list of Key Workers, issued by the Department of Education is listed below.
· Only children with parents working as key workers and BOTH out at work at the same time should consider requesting care. In single parent families, the individual parent MUST be a key worker.
· Please note only children with both parents working as Key Workers should contact the school.
· If at all possible, alternative childcare arrangements should be sought before contacting the school. For example, with other family friends etc.
· Initially there will be no facility for Breakfast Club.
· The Minister also mentioned supporting vulnerable children but at the moment we are currently waiting more guidance from his Department regarding this.
We are thinking about all our Key Workers and indeed everyone in our school community with the challenges we will face in the weeks and months ahead.
Please contact me today if anyone needs any further information.
Yours sincerely,
Stephen Austin (Principal)
LIST OF KEY WORKERS AS OUTLINED ON DOCUMENTATION ISSUED TO SCHOOLS ON 19th MARCH 2020
· Health and Social Care. This includes doctors, nurses, midwives, paramedics, social workers, home carers and staff required to maintain our health and social care sector.
· Education and childcare. This includes nursery, teaching staff and specialist education professionals who will remain active during the Covid-19 response.
· Public safety and national security. This includes civilians and officers in the police (including key contractors), Fire and Rescue Service, prison service and national security roles.
· Transport. This includes those keeping air, water, road and rail transport modes operating during the Covid-19 response.
· Utilities and Communication. This includes staff needed for oil, gas, electricity and water (including sewage) and primary industry supplies, to continue during the Covid-19 response, as well as key staff in telecommunications, post and delivery, services and waste disposal.
· Food and other necessary goods. This includes those involved in food production, processing, distribution and sale, as well as those essential to the provision of other key goods (eg hygiene, medical etc)
· Key national and local government including those administrative occupations essential to the effective delivery of the Covid-19 response.
In light of today’s announcement from the First Minster, Sacred Heart PS will be closed to pupils until further notice. Education City Folders & Bug Club Books have been sent out today and Study Packs may be collected from school tomorrow afternoon from 2pm- 4pm. Study Packs will contain a letter to parents and weekly overviews of home learning. I will be in regular communication with you regarding the latest updates from DENI.
Wishing you and your family continued good health.
S Austin
Dear Parent,
In response to the queries I have been receiving it is highly likely that Sacred Heart PS will be opening on Wednesday 18th March as normal with our Extended School Programme in full operation.
In the event of closure we are in the fortunate position of having our online learning platform Education City well established and in place. Education City allows teachers to set Learn Screens for the teaching of new curriculum content and related online activities and worksheets to consolidate learning. Pupil performance can then also be monitored through the Tracking mechanism. Our dedicated staff will supplement this online work with differentiated packs of work for each pupil and naturally those P6 pupils preparing for transfer will have their packs supplemented with transfer work in both Literacy and Numeracy. A list of educational Apps and Websites will also be provided for revision and consolidation purposes.
We continue to follow and adhere to Public Health Agency and Department of Education Northern Ireland guidelines regarding school closures.
In the meantime we are taking all feasible precautions to minimise the spread of infection. For the imminent future we ask that parents refrain from entering the school building and continue to reinforce good hygiene practices at home with their child/children. I will do all in my power to ensure parents receive the latest updates as they occur and that the academic development of children continues despite these unique and challenging circumstances.
Yours sincerely,
Stephen Austin
Principal, Sacred Heart PS Dundrum
A massive well done to our very talented children who showcased a fantastic St Patrick’s Day Assembly this morning for the whole school community to enjoy. There was music, dance, drama, jokes and storytelling- everyone was hugely impressed. A special mention to our P2/3 pupils who opened the Assembly and worked so hard to retell the story of St Patrick in such an informative and factual manner.
We celebrated World Book Day on Thursday. Children dressed up as characters from their favourite books. They engaged in related World Book Day activities within Literacy lessons and enjoyed a visit from Author Charlie Graham who read some of his books and explained to the children how we was able to formulate some of his wonderful ideas into books and stories. The day was completed with a fantastic Assembly on why and how World Book Day is celebrated around the world. Thanks to Miss Murray & Miss Crozier for organising this special day in the school Calendar.
Unfortunately not the ones with chocolate chips.
Our cookies ensure you get the best experience on our website.
Please make your choice!
Some cookies are necessary in order to make this website function correctly. These are set by default and whilst you can block or delete them by changing your browser settings, some functionality such as being able to log in to the website will not work if you do this. The necessary cookies set on this website are as follows:
A 'sessionid' token is required for logging in to the website and a 'crfstoken' token is
used to prevent cross site request forgery.
An 'alertDismissed' token is used to prevent certain alerts from re-appearing if they have
been dismissed.
An 'awsUploads' object is used to facilitate file uploads.
We use Matomo cookies to improve the website performance by capturing information such as browser and device types. The data from this cookie is anonymised.
Cookies are used to help distinguish between humans and bots on contact forms on this website.
A cookie is used to store your cookie preferences for this website.
Cookies that are not necessary to make the website work, but which enable additional functionality, can also be set. By default these cookies are disabled, but you can choose to enable them below: