Streamers, balloons and even a red carpet greeted Illawarra students as they returned to school on Monday.
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Thousands of students around the state returned to the classroom full-time, two months after COVID-19 restrictions forced around 800,000 children to study remotely.
While the jury is still out whether students were happy to return, it seems teachers at Windang and Corrimal public schools were happy to be back on deck.
A red carpet greeted students as they arrived to school at Corrimal, while Windang teachers formed a pink and grey guard of honour to welcome their students back to school.
"Even the cold weather couldn't dampen my teachers' excitement to welcome all our students back to full time face-to-face learning this morning," Windang Public School principal Loreta Kocovska said.
"It has been seven long weeks of remote learning for our students. Today, we were absolutely delighted to welcome back our incredible students to full time face-to-face learning.
"The staff organised a massive balloon arch in our school colours and all staff wore a specially made shirt with the quote:
I will teach you in a room, I will teach you now on Zoom, I will teach you in a house, I will teach you with my mouse, I will teach you here or there, I will teach because I care
- Windang Public School teachers
"I will teach you in a room, I will teach you now on Zoom, I will teach you in a house, I will teach you with my mouse, I will teach you here or there, I will teach because I care".
Mrs Kocovska said some students were super excited while others were a little nervous and apprehensive.
"The silver lining to this pandemic has been transforming our teaching and learning overnight from traditional pedagogies to a true blended learning environment," she said.
"I am extremely grateful to the incredibly dedicated, committed and caring teachers at Windang Public School who not once, twice but three times changed their teaching and learning programs over the last seven weeks to ensure students had access to rich learning programs from home.
"Teachers used Zoom to connect and deliver explicit teaching along with developing rich learning experiences via the SeeSaw and Google Classroom platforms."
Mrs Kocovska praised the role parents and carers played over the last two months.
"From this experience we have strengthened the parent teacher relationships into true learning partnerships," she said.
"For now, we will focus on identifying and evaluating where each child is at with literacy and numeracy and develop a plan to ensure gaps that may have occurred due to the last seven weeks are addressed immediately.
"In addition, we will be focusing on the wellbeing of all students and staff."