Friday 20th January 2012

Dear Parents/Carers,

This week has seen two exciting developments in school.. On Monday our new attendance mascot ‘Cookie’ arrived in school. He has spent the week with Class 5 and has had the time of his life! Each day, one of the children has taken Cookie home and recorded his special adventures in his diary. From what I’ve seen so far, he’s been treated like a King as a fully fledged member of a remarkable, high achieving and high attending class! Our second exciting event arrived in the form of a visitor into school on Wednesday. Debbie Hepplewhite - Government advisor, author and program writer who has developed the new Oxford Reading Tree phonics materials we are beginning to use - visited us in school. Debbie was most impressed with the staff and children and the wonderful atmosphere across school – and she’s right about the energy and excitement that is alive and well in Cookridge! She has given us some great ‘top tips’ to get us going and will be back soon to do some work in class with us. She is keen to work with Cookridge to develop model practice in this field, and this is something we are very excited about...


Raving about Reading – Playing with Poetry
As you may remember, back in November a fantastic poet called Nick Toczek visited our school. After giving a wonderful assembly full of poems and magic, he worked with children from Cookridge and other local schools to develop their skills in poetry.  Fiona Shakespeare, Jack Hoyle, Emma Rushfirth, Cerys Jones, Phyllis Hoyle and Lewis Bird - 6 of our brilliant pupils - took part in the workshop. They had a wonderful time writing poems inspired by Nick’s own work and were absolutely buzzing after the day.  This week, they presented some of their work to the school and now you can enjoy it in the leaflet we have sent home. It really is of a very high standard and we are very proud of their efforts. Following this presentation (to keep us all ‘raving about reading’ at Cookridge) a travelling box of Nick’s books has started a journey around school, visiting each class on it’s way. So please ask your child what they have read and join in our passion for reading at Cookridge!

Sports News

In Basketball news... there are two further basketball training sessions on Monday 6th and Monday 20th February with the tournament on Thursday 23rd February at Horsforth High.

Netball club has resumed again on a Tuesday after school. Any child in Year 5 or 6 that would like to join, please see either me, Miss Fowler or Miss Golia.

Football Club - will hopefully be starting again for both Y3/4 and Y5/6 end of Feb/ early March. A letter will be sent out nearer the time. Can children who no longer wish to come please let me know as there is a waiting list for places!

The Year 5/6 team have a friendly match on Tuesday 7th Feb (weather permitting) against Holy Name, at Holy Name Primary. There is also a league game at Cookridge (again weather permitting) on Thursday 9^th February against the reigning league champions - Adel St John. Wish us luck!


International Comenius Project

Our thanks to parents and pupils who completed and returned their questionnaires to help us get our project underway. If you haven’t yet – there’s still time! Please spare a few minutes to lend a hand.

Foundation Thinking Day

Brownies, Guides, Scouts, Cubs & Beavers are invited to wear their uniform to school on Wednesday 22^nd February 2012 to commemorate Lord Baden Powell’s birthday.

Much Ado About The Grand

Class 8 have launched an aggressive marketing campaign this week to get their enterprise project underway. Class 8 have joined the blogging frenzy and have created their own – see it evolve at www.class8cookridge.blogspot.com. A reminder that tickets are now on sale for their stunning performance on 1^st February and can be bought in the school hall after school every day. The children are very excited by their Alan Sugar style task and we are all very eager to see if they manage to turn a profit on their first money making venture. With talents like theirs, I will be very surprised if they don’t!

Fun Time Childcare: February Half Term Holidays Cover 2012

We are looking at the possibility of opening on Monday 13^th and Tuesday 14^th February this year for half term cover. If you need any childcare for these 2 days then please obtain a form from Funtime room or the office this week. Completed forms need to be returned with a deposit of £10 per child by next Friday 27^th January to Ann Sadler at Funtime.

Fees are as follows: -

· £12.00 - ½ Day (8.00am to 12noon/12noon – 4.00pm)

· £21.00 – Full Day

If we do not get sufficient bookings by this date then we will not open for half term holiday cover on Monday 13^th and Tuesday 14^th February. It is necessary to make this decision, as during previous half terms there were very low numbers of parents using the holiday club. Childcare vouchers accepted.

Attendance

Our attendance this week was a healthy 96.6% This is a great improvement on recent weeks, sees us achieve our Leeds agreed target of 95.5% and is a good 2% above the Ofsted benchmark for ‘satisfactory’ attendance. Thank you very much to those parents who are supporting our drive to improve attendance - every choice you make on this really does count.

Please remember, we are legally obliged to make first day contact with the parents of pupils who are absent from school. This is a safeguarding measure to allow schools to ensure all children are accounted for – either safely in school or at home with an adult who knows their whereabouts. Please telephone the school office to notify us of a school absence by 9.30am.

And finally...

Zainab – Class 5 – came to see me on Thursday for a Head teacher’s award. She asked how many more days there are until the weekend. Thinking she was growing tired and looking forward to the weekend (as only adults do!) I reassured her only one. Only then did I realise her disappointment. “I don’t want it to be the weekend,” she said. “I would rather come to school every day....” What a wonderful note to end the week on!

Have a great weekend.

Mrs Bailey