Another week has whizzed by and I’m amazed that
December begins tomorrow. The Christmas tree has arrived, the first advent
calendars will be opening a few hours from now and there are officially only 25
sleeps until Christmas day, believe it or not! Christmas rehearsals are in full
swing and the sound of music, singing and dancing tells me it WILL be alright
on the night., though I think there are some well bitten fingernails amongst
the staff at this point...
Next Wednesday afternoon our children will enjoy a
whole school pantomime – oh yes they will! It is traditional at this time of
year to enjoy a panto, and we will be welcoming a visiting theatre group into
school for what promises to be a loud and wacky retelling of Aladdin. I’m
fairly confident much fun will be had by all!
Twitter
Mr Walker emailed me this week to suggest a school
twitter account. What a great idea, very quickly realised. I will use twitter
to update you briefly on school news, and it will undoubtedly prove invaluable
should we have a snowy winter coming our way. Find us here https://twitter.com/CookridgePrimar and be sure to follow.. Thanks to Mr Walker for this great idea – if
you have any suggestions for ways we can improve, just get in touch. Your ideas
really do lead us forward. Save our Surgery – Friday 7th December
Next Friday - in common with schools across Yorkshire - we are supporting Leeds General Infirmary in their “Wear Red” event to raise both funds and awareness of the Children’s Heart Unit’s plight to remain open, saving families of very poorly young children and babies the added ordeal of travel to Newcastle, Liverpool or Birmingham. Each participating school is being matched with a local business who will match our donation so we have the opportunity to double our money this time around. Given the great – but recent – success of the Children in Need event, I am not setting a figure for donation and simply appeal to parents to give what they can – even 20p from every child will raise £60, and doubled this will see us contribute £120.
Year 5/6 writers
Our Y56 children have had a double treat this week
– ‘that poetry bloke’ Craig Bradley treated them to a poetry workshop crammed
with fun and frolics on Wednesday, and author Alan Gibbons worked with them all
day on Thursday on a creative writing project. Alan is an ex-teacher turned
writer, and he is incredibly gifted in both his own ability to create a
brilliant range of children’s books and the way in which he talks strategy with
the children to elicit some stunning writing from young writers. I am certain
that Alan’s visit will have a lasting impact not only on the children, but also
on the teachers who saw him work his magic on Thursday! A range of Alan’s books will
take centre stage in the class 7, 8 & 9 book corners and eventually find
their way into the school library for all to enjoy.
Library
The library area is nearing completion and a great
range of new books have been stocked and stickered. Each class has a book
corner and children in each class are responsible for selecting their class
book stock for each half term, so the range of books for each reader is pretty
vast! So far, our investments have concentrated on story books – next year we
will begin work stocking up the non-fiction section so that the children can
use the library for research. Your child should continue to bring home reading
scheme books – colour banded according to their current reading levels – and
you are welcome to change these books with your child after school. Again, a
class stock is available in each classroom so you can quickly help your child
to choose a new book after school. In addition, your child should also be
bringing home a ‘free choice’ library book.
Several parents have approached us this week to
ask about using the library after school – hoorah to that, I say! If you would
like to bob into the library after school to read a book together or to choose
a book to borrow for home, then you are very welcome to do so. We have invested
£16,000 in books in the last 12 months and are proud to be offering over 3,500
new books to families at Cookridge – this is money we cannot afford to invest
every year sadly so please look after our new books and bring them back when
you’ve read them!
Friends
We are literally weeks away from our Christmas Fair
which will take place on Tuesday 18th December from 3.05pm until
4.30pm. Parents of Reception children will be able to collect their child from
2.30pm on that day to ease congestion around Santa Claus! We really hope you
can make it, and are sure the event will be as big as ever BUT we do need your
help. We are looking for donations for the bottle, chocolate and soft toy
tombola, cakes for the cafe and TIME for the glittery preparations.. A Friends
newsletter is coming out today with all the details – if you haven’t got yours
please check out their new blog via the website: click on Friends!
Sports News
On Tuesday this week, 14 of our Year 5/6 children
ventured up to
A reminder that both football and netball clubs
have now finished for the winter and will return in the spring. All other clubs
continue to run as normal next week.
Parking
I have this week received an email from Councillor
Sue Bentley expressing her concerns about parking on
Parental conduct - before and after school
I have been informed of another incident before
school where a parent has sought to discipline a child on the school
playground. Let me reiterate – it is not acceptable for parents to do so and
any parent who does take this step is placing themselves in a situation where
they may ultimately be banned from the school site. I am not asking anyone to
overlook a child’s inappropriate behaviour but I must insist that parents
follow the correct course of action and report the matter to a member of school
staff - available on every door once the school bell sounds and the doors open
– so that the matter can be managed appropriately. Thank you.
Attendance
Less than a fortnight until our 100% attendance
award, and there are currently 117 children who have not missed a single day of
school since September. Well done guys – and keep it up! This week’s attendance
is great again with Class 5 achieving a fabulous 100% - well done!
National Minimum ‘Good’ Expectation
|
Target
2012-13
|
Attendance this week
|
Year to date
|
||||||||
95%
|
96%
|
96.4%
|
96.2%
|
||||||||
Class attendance figures for this week are:-
|
|||||||||||
Rec
|
Class 1
|
Class 2
|
Class 3
|
Class 4
|
Class 5
|
Class 6
|
Class 7
|
Class 8
|
Class 9
|
||
A 95.6%
B 95.0%
|
97.3%
|
98.3%
|
95.5%
|
98.5%
|
100%
|
94.7%
|
92.6%
|
95.5%
|
97.4%
|
||
Dates for the term ahead are all available to view on the blog: don’t miss out – check the dates and be sure you know what’s happening across this term. http://cookridgeprimaryschool.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/thursday-25th-october.html
The next coffee morning will be on Wednesday 12th
December @ 9am – please come along if you can make it: the more the merrier and
it’s always good to welcome new faces to the crowd that gather. As this one is
so close to Christmas, I will be splashing out on some Christmassy treats to
help our coffee go down! See you there.
Have a wonderful weekend,
Mrs Bailey
