Proposal to change the timings of the school day

Email sent to parents on 10^th December 2021

Dear Parents and Carers,

We are writing to inform you of some proposed changes to the structure of the school day here at Airy Hill.

They are:

• to introduce a staggered start and end to the school day
•  to bring the overall length of the school day in line with other primary schools

Nursery timings remain unchanged.

Current Arrangements:

Start of the day: 8:50am

End of the day: 3:30pm

Proposed Arrangements

Start of the day Reception and KS1: 8:45am

End of the day Reception and KS1: 3:00pm

Start of the day KS2: 8:55am

End of the day KS2: 3:10pm

Should these changes be approved, we believe that these changes will be beneficial to the school community and will have a positive effect on your child’s education.

Key benefits include:

• Reducing congestion on the school lane, making the journey to and from school safer for children and their families
• Bringing the length of the school day in line with other local primary schools
• Enabling additional time for class teachers and teaching assistants to work together to prepare for high quality learning experiences for all children

I appreciate that these changes may affect you, in terms of childcare or working arrangements, and in terms of your child’s education. For this reason, I would like to invite you to give your feedback by sending your responses to our school governors via email at admin.airyhill@yeat.co.uk. Please send any responses by Friday 14th January 2022.

The school offers high quality, low cost before and after school provision. We will review the session timings and costs to provide options that suit the new timings of the day.

We will communicate the outcome of the consultation following our governing body meeting at the end of January.

Yours sincerely,

Catherine Matthewman and Chrissy Yates

Email sent to parents on 15^th December 2021

Dear Parents and Carers,

Thank you for the responses we have received so far regarding the proposal to make changes to the school day.

A reminder of the proposed changes

Nursery timings remain unchanged. 

 Current Arrangements:

Start of the day: 8:50am 

End of the day: 3:30pm

 Proposed Arrangements

Start of the day Reception and KS1: 8:45am

End of the day Reception and KS1: 3:00pm

 Start of the day KS2: 8:55am 

End of the day KS2: 3:10pm

 We have been asked to provide some further details and would like to share these with you now.

Length of the school day

When reviewing the timings of the day, we identified that the length of the day at Airy Hill is longer than the majority of other primary schools by around 25 minutes.

See table below:

Over the course of the week, this adds up to over two hours of additional teaching time.

Teacher workload

Because of the length of the school day, teachers at Airy Hill are required to teach for over two hours per week more than their colleagues in other local schools, for the same pay. The Education Endowment Foundation recommend that school leaders should monitor staff wellbeing and workload to ensure that additional teaching time does not reduce quality (e.g. through less time for professional development or planning lessons).

Preparation time

By reducing the length of the school day, bringing it in line with other local schools, this would provide more time for teachers to spend on planning, preparation and marking, ensuring consistently high quality learning opportunities for all children.

Collaboration with Support Staff

By bringing the end of the teaching day forward, this would enable time for class teachers and teaching assistants to liaise and work collaboratively. Joint planning and assessment time would further increase the effectiveness of the teaching team.

We hope that this additional information is helpful and you are invited to continue to give your feedback by sending your responses to our school governors via email at admin.airyhill@yeat.co.uk. Please send any responses by Friday 14th January 2022.

Yours sincerely,

Catherine Matthewman and Chrissy Yates

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