What has my child been doing at school?! Meeting for Parents Portal - PDF document

What has my child been doing at school?! Meeting for Parents Portal Interactive Learning Diary - A Parent’s Guide 1. Intro to what is Portal & positives This letter runs alongside the meetings that were held in school to introduce the Portal Interactive Learning Diary. The power point that supports this is available on the school website. What is Portal? In Reception we are constantly observing what your child can do so that we know what they can do and what they need next. These observations are mostly what your child does in their independent learning time and some teacher led opportunities. We record these observations on the Portal Interactive Learning Diary. The observations may consist of photographs, video or written observations. The Portal is an online diary so has the added feature that you – as parents/carers - can view your child’s observation diary and add to it. Positives Some of the positives of using the Portal are;  You can share the ‘diary’ and talk to your child about what they have been learning at a relaxed time that is good for everyone.  Relatives or family members that live a long way away can see what your child has been learning.  The children can talk about and reflect on their learning.  You can discuss what your child has been doing at the parents meetings with your teacher.

How to Access the Portal School will generate a password for you to access your child’s interactive diary using the email that school has for you. This will be sent home when ready. If you would like an alternative email to use please let your class teacher know. The address for the Portal is www. interactivelearningdiary .co.uk/Parent Portal .aspx ‎ or search for Portal Interactive Learning Diary and it will give you the option – select ‘Parent Por tal – Interactive Learning Diary’ which will take you to the log -in page. Features of the Portal ‘Pupil Diary’ - this shows you all of the observations from the beginning of the academic year in September up to the end of last half term. This is available to view all of the time and you will be able to view the current half- term’s observations at the end of the half term. For example you will be able to view this half term’s observations at the Christmas holiday. ‘My Voice’ – this gives the opportunity for your child or your self to make a comment about an observation, all positive please! ‘Observations’ – this gives you a chance to add any thing you would like to add. Please add any photographs or anything that you or your child would like to share, such as a special occasion or a milestone like learning to ride a bike or learning to swim. Include what the children have said – this is always very informative!

Please be patient if there are any initial technical problems with logging on. With 240 children – there is bound to be some issues! Please come and speak to your class teacher if there are any problems, technical or otherwise and we will endeavor to fix them. Key Points Some key points for every one to remember;  Please do not feel like you have to add any observations. Only add things your child would like to be put on or you would like to share. The Portal is an opportunity for positive shared talk - parent-child; child-teacher; parent- teacher. It is not a ‘homework’ exercise for the parents! We are just really happy to share all the great things we have seen your child doing at school.  Sometimes we don’t observe your child doing things in school which they might do all the time at home. If at the parents evening meeting there is something that you see your child do at home that we aren’t seeing evidence of at school, please add something to the ‘Observations’. This does not mean that we will necessarily change our assessments but it does mean that we will consider how to change our practice and provision to give your child the best opportunities to show us what they can do in school.  Please remember – this is a working document. Although we endeavor to post all written observations with excellent grammar and punctuation, the observations are often written very quickly - as they are happening. It is more important that we are actually present and supporting the learning, rather than typing!

 THE MOST IMPORTANT - ALL observations – reception practitioners or parents/carers - are always positive! Please come and talk to your class teacher if there is something you are not happy with rather than post it. This is a record of your child’s achievements and is a celebration of all the amazing things they have done so far! To protect identities of children we will make sure that only initials are used instead of full names or a generic description (The children, the boys, the girls etc) is used in the observations made with multiple children in. These photographs will be seen by all of the families with children in the photographs. We ask that you treat the journals with confidentiality and only share the journals with family members as you would with the old style book journals. We feel that this is a positive step towards sharin g your child’s learning with you. It was a great success last year and the general feeling was that of positivity. Please come and let us know if there is anything that can improve the Portal process. You will receive a questionnaire later on in the year to find out if we can improve the process. We hope you enjoy sharing your child’s journal with them!