October newsletter

Value of the Month – “Self-control: I behave myself in school”

Dates for your diary

16^th October

-                   -  8.15 to 8.45am – Year Three Open Classrooms

-                   -  8.15 to 8.45am – Year Five Open Classrooms

-                   - 9.00am – Infant hall – 30 minute meeting for parents to explain teaching and learning in Phonics

17th October – Industrial Action day (see message below)

18^th October – 8.15 to 8.45am – Year Six Open Classrooms

22^nd October - 8.15 to 9.15am – Reception Open Classrooms

23^rd October - 8.30 to 9.15am – Year Two Open Classrooms

24^th October – Parents’ Consultations (part 1) from 3.30 to 8.00pm

Week beginning 28^th October – school closed for half term holiday

4^th November – school closed for staff training

5^th November – children return to school at the usual times

8^th November - Infant hall – Parents’ Values assemblies held at 9.05am and 2.45pm

11^th November – Parents’ Consultations (part 2) from 3.30 to 5.00pm

13^th November - 9.00am – Infant hall – 30 minute meeting for parents to explain how we personalise the Early Years

15^th November – Children in Need charity day (more information to follow)

27^th November - 9.00am – Infant hall – 30 minute meeting for parents to introduce learning in Year One

28^th November – Year Six educational visit to Tate Britain

20^th December – last day of term + non-uniform day

News and events

1.  Industrial Action on 17^th October

A number of teachers will be taking industrial action on Thursday 17^th October (please see earlier news on the blog).  It will be necessary to send a number of classes home on the day.  The remainder of the school will be open as usual though.  Mr Drew will write to those classes affected before 11^th October with an update and detailed news will be posted on the blog during the coming weeks.

2. Mrs Hadley

Mrs Hadley has been the appointed Deputy Head in the Junior school for many years and has served the school with dedication and loyalty in all that time.  She has decided that the time is right for her to pursue her career in another school as of the end of this term.  She will be leaving us at that point to take on a new challenge.  We will keep you informed of our plans to say farewell in due course. 

The Governing Body has agreed to advertise for her replacement later in the school year.  As an interim measure Mr Lea, our Lead Practitioner and Senior teacher, has been appointed as Acting Deputy as from January 2014.  We are beginning to plan his change of duty and will let you know our decisions as soon as possible.  He will however maintain the majority of his class teacher duties during this period.

3.  Nominations for Parent governor vacancies

The closing date for receipt of nominations for the two parent governor vacancies is 9am on Monday 14^th October:  full details from Mr Drew.

4.  London Mayor’s Excellence Grant

The school recently made a successful application for a substantial grant from the London Mayor’s Excellence Fund to develop an aspect of research we have been engaged in over the past year.  We have been developing more effective ways of supporting children’s reading comprehension with an approach called Reciprocal Reading.  We have been partnered in this project with the other schools in our Gants Hill Partnership: Highlands Primary, St Augustine’s Catholic Primary, Cranbrook Primary and Fullwood Primary, with support from Dr Tennent from the University of East London.  Our work has been successful so far and we are now very excited to have the opportunity to extend our research further with this grant.  We will be supporting other schools in learning the approach and refining our own practices to ensure children make even further progress in this key aspect of learning.

5.   Music provision

The school has continued its negotiations with the Redbridge Music Service to complete our plans for music support to the children.  So far we have secured the following:

Year Two – whole class singing lessons on Mondays

Year Three – whole class recorder lessons on Mondays

Year Four – whole class African drumming lessons (for later in the year)

Year Five - whole class African drumming lessons on Wednesdays

Year Six - whole class singing lessons – date still to be finalised

Instrumental tuition (lunchtime lessons) – Piano (on Mondays) – due to very high demand for this we are trying to secure more lessons

We have not yet been able to organise the lunchtime violin/viola lessons we had hoped to continue.  Negotiations are still underway.  We will let those who booked lessons know as soon as there is news.

6.  Club updates

This is the current list of clubs being run in school.  Our thanks to all the staff and coaches who run these for the benefit of the children.

Infant site

	Before school	Lunchtimes	After school
Monday	Football  (Premier Sport)
Tuesday	Gymnastics  (Premier Sport)	Bollywood Dance  (M Sharma)	Multi-sports  (Premier Sports)
Wednesday		Gardening  (S Ryan)	Tennis (Premier Sport)
Thursday	Books for Breakfast (D Lea)	Recorders  (M Cotton)	Girls’ Football Team (R Cross) Cookery Club Computing Club (V Barker)
Friday			Olympic skills  (S Dhaliwal)

Junior site

	Before school	Lunchtimes	After school
Monday	“Fit and Funky”   (S Dhaliwal)		Football  (Whizz Kids)
Tuesday	Cricket  (Premier Sports)
Wednesday	Gymnastics  (Premier Sports)	Drama (Rascals)	Bollywood Dance (B Hall)
Thursday	Street Dance  (Rascals)	Bollywood Dance   (M Sharma)	Olympic sports  (S Dhaliwal)
Friday	School Choir  (N Anand and A Garland)		Football (Whizz Kids) Family Drumming  (Music service)

7.  New website

The school will soon have a brand new website.  It is being designed and we hope to launch it before half term.  It will have a very different look and contain more information than previously.  News updates will be posted shortly.

8.  Playground upgrades

The KS2 playgrounds have been upgraded with new installations recently.  You will have noticed the gated football pitches in the main playgrounds.  These have been very popular with the children.  They will be joined over half term with new trees to be planted along the Gants Hill Crescent border.  A major climbing frame installation is currently under construction in the back playground and is scheduled to be completed before half term.  It is looking quite challenging and we hope the children will enjoy the new addition to our provision.

9.   New toilets for Reception

A much-needed new toilet block next to the Reception classrooms is nearly finished and should open in the next few weeks.