As promised we have met this week to review and streamline our communications to you. It's always hard to get the balance for so many different parents, but taking into account your feedback from the beginning of the year this is how things should look going forward:
Emails: The majority of messages will come out via email with separate messages for separate events or information with clear headers to allow you to search more easily for them. We will put the text of the message directly into the email wherever we can so you don't have to click to open an attachment. If an attachment is necessary we will make this a PDF and only use MSWord where it is unavoidable.
App notifications/ Texts: These will be for urgent/immediate messages. We only get a small allowance of text messages in our package so you won't get a text if you have the app. Currently 64% of our parents have the app so if in your family, that's you, either make sure you pass the message on or try and get your partner on the app as well. Please make sure your push notifications are turned on to ensure you get these messages. Really urgent things like snow closure will come out on all the forms of communication that we have!
Calendar events: We will endeavour to keep the calendar page on the website up to date with all the events going on in school. Where we can, we will attach any additional information such as the original trip letter so that you can click onto events that you need further information about.
Newsletter: The fortnightly newsletter will continue to come out as a link to the website page. This will have non-urgent information about things that are happening in school as well as the updates on what classes have been up to.
New Community page: Adverts, flyers, information about things going on in the community etc. will now be on our Community Webpage. We will send out a link to this when we send the link to the newsletter as a reminder to check what else might be on locally that could be of interest. This should reduce the number of non-urgent emails that come out from groups that are not actually connected to school. Please note that these events are not checked by school for things like safeguarding or risk assessments so parents should make their own checks on the suitability of organisations and events.
Please note: our office is a very busy place and our ability to keep up with accurate communications can be hampered by lots of parents making individual enquiries, dropping off items that children have forgotten or asking for messages to passed to children. While we will always try to meet parents' needs with such things, the more they can be kept to a minimum the more our office can function efficiently for all.
Ten Pin Bowling
Last week a group of key stage 2 children were invited to attend the Leeds Well Schools ten pin bowling event at Hollywood Bowl. The event was well attended with 28 teams taking part.
The children worked hard, aiming carefully and using their super skills to generate a high score. As a team they managed to earn plenty of strikes, creating a total of 560 points. Their efforts and persistence paid off and the children secured a clear first place win!
The children were excellent ambassadors and role models, cheering each other on, helping one another, being resilient when the scores weren’t going their way and overcoming anxieties around failure.
We are so proud of this achievement – congratulations to the ten pin team!
Toy Appeal
A reminder that we are collecting gifts to donate to Leeds Children’s Charity at Lineham Farm. The charity’s toy appeal aims to donate gifts to children across Leeds who are less fortunate. It would be greatly appreciated if you could send a gift into school to contribute to the appeal. Toys for all genders and ages, from babies right through to teenagers will be warmly received. Suggestions for gifts are
- Dolls/Barbie dolls (or similar)
- Action figures
- Lego
- Accessories for dolls/action figures (i.e. clothes, furniture, vehicles)
- Small animal toys (farm, zoo, dinosaurs)
- Board games (for family engagement)
- Musical instruments
- Play mats (has roads on it, to play with)
- Creative making kits
- Building blocks and construction toys
- Arts and craft items
- Pencils/crayons/drawing and colouring books
- Art sets
- Pyjamas, slippers and snuggly clothing
- Toiletries and cosmetic treats for slightly older children
- Books
- *Please no toy guns or knives*
Thank you very much for your support!
We can all be quick to find things wrong and slow to remember to recognise all the good that happens in schools. The Thank a Teacher campaign recognises ALL staff working in UK schools and colleges; school leaders, teachers, teaching assistants, and all support staff such as lunchtime supervisors, caretakers and cleaners. If you’re feeling shy you can send a card anonymously! Please consider giving our staff a boost by following this link:
Weekly Attendance Award. A certificate is given to the class in each Key Stage with the best attendance for that week, which will be award during Friday's celebration assembly The winners for last week and this week are:
w/e 19.10.23 w/e 26.10.23 w/e 9.11.23 w/e 16.11.23
KS1 - 2CD - 99.6% KS1 - 2VSJH - 97% KS1 - 2VSJH - 99.3% KS1 - 1VE - 99.3%
KS2 - 3OB - 100% KS2 - 3OB - 97.3% KS2 - 5EB - 98.1% KS2 - 4HA - 98.7%
w/e 23.11.23 w/e 30.11.23
KS1 - 2CD - 99.3% KS1 - Reception Butterflies - 98%
KS2 - 4HA - 98.3% KS2 - 5WO - 97.3%
Well done to all classes. Keep it up!!