WELCOME TO THE AUTUMN TERM!
I hope you had a good Summer holiday, despite the weather! I realise that many of our families were affected by the terrible flooding and still suffering now. I really hope that you will soon be back to normal and back in your houses once again.
CHANGES TO OUR NEW
SCHOOL UNIFORM
I am delighted
to see so many children in our new school
uniform. I hope that you agree with me that the colourful logo looks
really
nice against the jade, and the girls look super in their jade cardigans.
I hope that our
new ordering system is working well, and you had no problems with this
over the
Summer holidays. We are very keen to ensure that ordering is easy for
you, so
if you do have any problems ordering the uniform or school bags please
let us
know as feedback is important.
Just as a
reminder about ordering uniform. Simply
collect an order form from the noticeboard just by the school office,
and then
phone or e mail your order through to National School Wear Centre in
Alcester,
and the uniform will be delivered to school directly from the shop. Or
you may
hand the completed order form back to the school office.
SCHOOL OFFICE
Unfortunately
Mrs Jane Hodgson, our very valued
administrator, will not be in school at least until after the half term
in
October as she has been very poorly during the Summer holidays.
Mrs Sarah
Gisbourne, who supports Jane in the office,
is working really hard to ensure the smooth running of the office,
along side
some of our teaching assistants. We would ask you to bear with us,
especially
at the beginning of the day, when you may find that no one is manning
the
office. We will get to you eventually so please be patient!
Thankfully Jane
is making a good recovery, and I am
sure you will join with me in wishing her a very speedy recovery.
Thankyou.
SUPER READERS SUPPORT PROGRAMME
Last
year we highlighted reading as an area we wanted to really target
across the
school in order to improve our children’s reading.
We
do have a few trained mums that come into school on a regular basis to
help our
super reading programme throughout the year, coming into school every
week for
two half hour sessions and supporting one child with their reading. It
really
is a very rewarding job, but we really could do with more volunteers!
·
Can
you spare our school one hour a week to help with reading in a
structured and
highly effective way?
·
Would
you like to be able to use these ways to help your own child with their
reading?
As
a school, we are constantly seeking ways to help children to become
better
readers, by supporting their reading in the most effective ways
possible. If
your answer to the above questions is “yes”, then I
would very much like you to
let us know so that we can organise some training for this excellent
reading
programme. Look forward to hearing from you.
SCHOOL ENVIRONMENT- HELP?
GOOD AT WEEDING?
The Friends of
the school have worked really hard to
improve our school grounds with their fund raising, and we now have
some wonderful
wild life areas. However these things do need constant looking after so
they do
not become overgrown! We do have contractors coming in to look after
the field
and some parts of the forest school, but our grounds are so huge we
desperately
need volunteers to help keep the weeds down and stop it from becoming
untidy
and jungle like!!
Could anyone
spare a few hours each week or just once
every half term to try and keep our lovely school grounds tidy and weed
free?
We could just have a working party every so often to tackle this.
Drinks and
biscuits provided of course!
Please see Mrs
Caine or the
school office if you could help us with this. Thankyou.
ASSEMBLIES
This year we
have made a few changes to our school
assemblies. In the past, each class has performed a class assembly and
parents
have been invited. This year we will not be having these type of
assemblies,
but we will still
look forward to
inviting parents to our termly welcome assemblies and all our special
events
throughout the year.
We are now
going to hold a GOLDEN assembly, where the
children will receive weekly certificates for special
achievements as they do now. In
addition, the children will receive ‘star of the
week’ certificates if they are
selected by their teacher for a high standard of work, working hard ,
making a
great improvement in
their behaviour
or work during the school week.
We hope the
children will enjoy these assemblies where
we can continue to encourage and celebrate our children’s
achievements. Of
course they will bring home the certificates so that you can also share
in the
celebrations! We shall also continue to present very special
certificates at
the end of each term during our welcome assemblies.
ARRANGEMENTS IN THE MORNING
Please can
parents send their children onto the main
playground before school ready for the whistle to
go at 8.45 a.m. There
is always a teacher on duty on the playground to supervise , but it is
very
difficult for the teacher on duty to know if a child is with their
parent or
not. So if ALL children are on the playground at 8.40 a.m, there will
be no
confusion and children are kept safe.
Children MUST
NOT enter school BEFORE the whistle goes
at 8.45 a.m, unless for a special reason. We are finding that some
children are
in the cloakrooms and also come into the classrooms putting their bags
away
first thing in the morning . The teachers are very busy in the mornings
setting
up for the daily lessons and therefore cannot supervise children. We
would
appreciate you helping us in this matter.
We would be
very grateful if parents could try and see
the class teacher after
school if
at all possible rather than first thing in the morning; or if need be
please
could you go to the office, and we can pass any message on to the
teacher as
soon as possible.
As already
mentioned , the teacher is very busy setting up the classroom for the
days
teaching, and we
are keen to have a good
brisk start to the mornings lessons. We hope you can appreciate that it
is very
difficult if there are many parents waiting to speak to them in the
morning. We
do have an open door policy, and it is vital we have contact with you,
but we
would be grateful if you could bear the above in mind so that we can
provide
the very best for your children.
Thankyou for
your support.
COMMENT BOX
Just a reminder
that we do have a comment box in the
entrance to the school by the office. If you wish to make any comments about what you think we are doing well, and
also suggestions about how you think we might do better, and how you
think we
might improve then please feel free to write your comments down using
the
slips, and then post them in the comment box on the table in the
entrance. You
can make it anonymous if you wish.
NEIL GRIMSHAW – FAMILY SUPPORT WORKER
Neil will be in
school on the following dates: 25th
September, 6th November, 20th
November, 4th December
and the 18th December.
Please pop in
and see him about any concerns or
questions you might have about bringing up a family, or about your
child. He
can also give you information about what is available for your children
during
the Summer holiday. Please don’t forget that you can also get
in touch with
Neil on telephone number : WAND’s
Children’s Centre, Droitwich, 01905 827391.
Monday 17th September……………………Football and Spanish clubs start
Monday 1st October ……………………….Other clubs start ( letter soon)
Thursday 11th October at 9.00 a.m……… Harvest festival .
Monday 15th h October to 18st Oct……… Parent Evenings for Rec to year 4 parents.
Thursday 18th October at 9.00 a.m……… Welcome assembly.
HALF
TERM
Monday 29th October – Fri 2nd Nov ………… Eco school week
Thursday
8th Nov
…………………………….School
photographs
Friday 16th November ………………… Book Fair arrives
Wednesday 21st Nov…………………… Last night for the Book Fair.
Monday 10th Dec sometime this week… Reception Christmas performance
Mondy 10th Dec at 9.30 a.m ……… Christingle service in the Abbey
Tuesday 18th th December……Whole school visit to see panto at the Swan Theatre – not nursery
Thursday 20th December……………… . Party day
CHRISTMAS
HOLIDAYS – SCHOOL BREAKS UP FRIDAY 21st
DECEMBER-
Back
to school MONDAY 7th
January 2008
PLEASE NOTE TWO TEACHER TRAINING DAYS WILL BE
ON :
THURS 3rd APRIL and
FRIDAY 4th
APRIL. Returning to school after the Easter holidays on Monday 7th
April.
We still need to
arrange one more teacher training
day. I shall inform you as soon as I can when this will be.