Thank you to all who came to the Concert this afternoon and supported the children’s performance as well as the Parent Council stalls.

Message from Parent Council

We have a busy couple of weeks ahead!

Please check you know the dates:

Monday 12th December

P1-7 parents, please send in your child’s costume for the Concert. Details are here and in the letter that came home with P2/3/4.

Tuesday 13th December

As part of the consultation process on the re-zoning to formally incorporate the old Rathillet catchment area into the Madras catchment area, Education Scotland will be writing a report on the proposal. This report will be completed by Robert Hynd, an Inspector with Education Scotland. He will visit Balmerino Primary School on 13th December to meet with a group of children. He is also visiting other school in the area and later in the same day, he will meet with any parents who would like to share views on the proposal. This meeting will take place at BALMULLO Primary School (not Balmerino) at 2pm. You are warmly invited to attend that meeting at Balmullo Primary School on 13th at 2pm.

Wednesday 14th December

Visit to the Panto at the Byre – details cam home yesterday.

Thursday 15th December

A small group of children will sing at the Thursday Café to entertain the people there. There won’t be room for us to take everyone as the Café has become very popular again. Please only come to the Café if you would be going anyway.

Friday 16th December

10.00: Dress Rehearsal for the the Christmas Concert. Any family member who can’t come in the afternoon is welcome to come along at 9.45 to form an audience for the Dress Rehearsal. I don’t anticipate the hall reaching capacity but if it does we will let people in on a first come first served basis.

1.30: Teas and Coffees and Parent Council Stalls in the village hall. Christmas Concert will start at 2pm. Entry is from 1.30 and by ticket only.

Every child will bring home a Christmas Craft gift for their parents today.

Tuesday 20th December

P2-7 Party – your child can come to school in party clothes – no uniform needed!

Wednesday 21st December

Nursery Party – your child can come to school in party clothes

School finishes at 3pm today for the Christmas Holidays!

Christmas Charity Day – Thursday 8th December

Everyone is invited to wear a Christmas Jumper (or a favourite jumper) to school. No uniform needed! If you are able to, please send your children with a donation for Save the Children and/or an item for the foodbank. In the run up to Christmas, they particularly need tins of soup, meat and vegetables. Through our charitable donations we are supporting the Rights of the Child to food, healthcare and education (UNCRC Articles 24 and 28)

Christmas Concert – Updated Info

Our Christmas Concert will be held on Friday 16th December in the Morison Duncan Hall. All children from Nursery-P7 are taking part. Nearer to the time, each family will receive two tickets – sorry we can’t give out more due to fire regulations. On the day of the show, please come to the hall from 1.30 for a 2pm start. Refreshments will be on sale by Parent Council before the show. Please bring your ticket – you will hand it in at the door and it will be entered into a raffle to be drawn at the end of the concert.  To avoid overcrowding, entry will be by ticket only. If any family doesn’t need both of their tickets, they are welcome to give one to a friend. Tickets are free but there will be a donation on the door and we ask that you pay what you can to contribute to the cost of staging the concert.

If your child is in P2-7, don’t forget to send their costume to school in a carrier bag marked with their name on 12th December, they will come home with these clothes on the Friday after the show. If your child hasn’t given you the letter about their costume, please check their bag or contact us to let us know. Nursery children also have a most important part in the concert – the staff will be in touch if they need you to help with any items for costumes.

There has been limited interest in a second showing of the concert the following week but I am pleased to be able to tell you that we are going to do a performance of the songs at the Thursday Café on Thursday 15th December 2022 at 11.30. Any family members not able to come to the show on 16th are welcome to come along to the Thursday Café and see the children perform. I am grateful to those who running the café for giving the children this additional opportunity to perform.

We will ask you not to take photos or film during the performance but we will take photos of a dress rehearsal and share them on Seesaw.

Cost of Living Support

Click here for updated information.

Parental Survey

Thank you to all those who completed our parental survey. Click here to read the feedback: ParentalSurveyNov222

Winter Bugs

Please help us to keep everyone well in the run up to Christmas. If your child is sick or has diarrhoea, they must stay off school until a full 48 hours has past even if they seem well sooner. For example, if they are sick on Saturday afternoon, they can’t return on Monday morning as they will still be infectious, they need to stay off until Tuesday. I know it can be frustrating with work commitments if you need to keep your child off and they seem well but no one likes a tummy bug and I ask everyone including staff to keep the 48 hour rule. You should also keep your child off school if they have a temperature, unexplained rash or are too lethargic to manage the day.

Donations Wanted

Do you have any board games your family no longer plays with? We are looking for donations of games for the children to use in school to develop maths skills:

Extended Learning Partnership Report

I am pleased to be able to share the report of our Extended Learning Partnership with you. Click here to read it. This is part of our ongoing Self-Evaluation Work.

Christmas Concert

Our Christmas Concert will be held on Friday 16th December in the Morison Duncan Hall. All children from Nursery-P7 are taking part. Nearer to the time, each family will receive two tickets – sorry we can’t give out more due to fire regulations. On the day of the show, please come to the hall from 1.30 for a 2pm start. Refreshments will be on sale by Parent Council before the show. Please bring your ticket – you will hand it in at the door and it will be entered into a raffle to be drawn at the end of the concert.  To avoid overcrowding, entry will be by ticket only. If any family doesn’t need both of their tickets, they are welcome to give one to a friend. Tickets are free but there will be a donation on the door and we ask that you pay what you can to contribute to the cost of staging the concert.

Now to the exciting part…P2/3/4 are learning what part they will be playing in the concert today. They will bring a letter home in their bag with a request for a costume. Please can you look out for this letter and help them to find the items to bring to school if you have them. P5/6/7 will also need a costume – they should bring jeans and a Christmas (or colourful) Jumper to school in a carrier bag marked with their name on 12th December, they will come home in these clothes on the Friday after the show. Nursery children also have a most important part in the concert – the staff will be in touch if they need you to help with any items for costumes.

We would consider staging a second showing of the Concert in the following week if there was enough demand and the hall is available. If your family would like more than two tickets and some of you would come to a second showing, please email me at lucy.jess@fife.gov.uk to let me know and we will look into whether this is possible.

Parental Survey

An email came home on Tuesday with a link to a parental survey – please complete  it if you haven’t done so yet. We welcome your feedback. The survey will close on Tuesday. Thank you to those who have already completed it.

Family Learning Pages

Thank you to everyone who attend the Read, Write Count and Spelling Frame Parent Workshops this week. We hope you will find this helpful in supporting your child’s learning at home. I also wanted to remind you about the family learning pages on the school website (click here). These provide lots of ideas for learning from home.

Don’t Forget School and Nursery are closed to pupils on Friday 18th November for an inset day. Our Pupil Support Assistants will be taking part in Child Protection Training, our Early Years Officers are taking part in training relating to Personal Learning Planning and our Teachers are attending a moderation session with colleagues from across the Madras Cluster as well as an input on French from Madras colleagues.

Flu Vaccine Message from NHS

Dear parent/carer,

All children aged 2 to 5 years and Primary and Secondary school children are eligible for a flu vaccine this winter (children must be aged 2 years or above on 1 September 2022 to be eligible). If your child has missed their flu vaccination appointment and you want to rearrange this, please call the number on their invitation letter or call 0800 030 8013.  There is still time for your child to have the flu vaccine this winter. It’s not too late.

The flu vaccine is an easy, painless and safe way to help protect your child this winter. Children aged 2 years and older are usually given the flu vaccine as a quick nasal spray into each nostril. The vaccine offers protection against the most common types of flu virus that are around each winter. Even healthy children can become seriously ill from flu.

For more information visit www.nhsinform.scot/childflu or call 0800 030 8013.

from PHS Vaccine Confidence, Informed Consent and Equity team

Message from Active Schools

Madras Rugby are once again offering pupils within our cluster the opportunity to take part in community rugby sessions. Here is the information about the sessions:

Madrascals NEW PLAYERS 2223 (1)

Assembly Today

The Nursery joined us at Assembly to share their French singing and they listened to us sing Happy Birthday in French. We celebrated Stars who have been living our values of effort, enthusiasm and curiosity. Well done: Isla A, Evie and Finlay. We started to make some plans for our Christmas Concert – more info to follow! Thank you to all the fmailies who have looked after Seaenna and Snowie so far, we love reading about their adventures with you.

Next Week

Monday 14th – No Outdoor Learning for P2/3/4.

Monday 14th – P2/3 parents are invited to come into school at 2.40 to do an activity with their child with the Read, Write, Count bags. Please arrive slightly before 2.40 for a 2.40 start.

Tuesday 15th – P2-7 parents are invited to come into school at 2.40 for a Spellingframe workshop with Mrs Jess and Mrs Purves. Please arrive slightly before 2.40 for a 2.40 start.

Friday 18th – Inservice Day, school and nursery closed to pupils

Panto

There is still plenty of time to pay the £10 contribution towards the cost of the panto – you can make pay via iPayImpact and please contact the office if you need help with this.

School Mascots

We have been pleased to welcome Snowie and Seaenna to our school this week. They are our new mascots and are going to help us learn about the Wellbeing Indicators and the United Nations Conventions on the Rights of the Child. Each child will get a chance to bring them home to look after them and reflect on how they are looking after their wellbeing and rights. There is a bit of information for parents in the pack that comes with them. If your child can write a diary entry (or you can write it for them) then it will help them share their ideas with their class. This builds on the work already being done with Poppy and Henry in Nursery.

Toy Drive

The North East Fife Toy Drive is running again this year. Toy Drive collects  presents and gifts them to children whose parents or carers will struggle with the cost of Christmas this year. Donations can be dropped off at a variety of points including Wormit Primary School. If any parent wants to donate but can’t make it to Wormit, feel free to drop off at Balmerino and I can take it down for you. There is more info here: Toy Drive Poster.

If your family might struggle financially this Christmas, please contact me in confidence and I will arrange to refer you to Toy Drive – lucy.jess@fife.gov.uk 

Stars

Well done to Mya G, Ciaran and Sophie who have been living our school values of Effort and Perseverance this week.

House Competition

I have introduced a House Competition today – click here for more information.

Attendance

Everyone in Fife is committed to supporting school attendance. Please click here to read some information from Fife Council on attendance procedures for our school: Attendance – what you need to know

It’s Just One Day!  Random absences, not just those on consecutive days of school, matter. Before you know it – just one or two days a month can add up to nearly 10 percent of the school year.

#SchoolAttendanceMatters

Nursery attendance is not compulsory in law but Nursery parents should always tell us if their child will be off, just as primary parents do and we will be in touch to check all is well if we haven’t heard from you.

Building Blocks: Attendance matters as early as nursery. Children who miss too many days in nursery can struggle later with learning and friendships.

#NurseryAttendanceMatters

Our School, Our Future is our Vision for Balmerino PS. Click here to read it in full.

Our School, Our Future is what we all want our school to look like.

We know the school aims really well because they are our OWLS (Opportunities, Wellbeing, Learning and Support). Calling them the OWLS helps us remember them.

We all know and live our values for wellbeing and learning but we can’t always remember them all.

So…

…your challenge is to make a poster to show the values for learning or the values for wellbeing. You should design it in a way that will help us all remember the values. You can use the ideas I shared at assembly or come up with your own.

Values for Learning

Perseverance

Independence

Effort

Curiosity

Enthusiasm

Teamwork

We are all a PIECE of the Team!

Values for Wellbeing

Friendship

Inclusion

Respect

Personal Achievement

Picture your personal achievement if you climbed to the top of a tall Fir Tree!

Bring your entry to school by Friday 7th October (end of term). Put your name and house on the back. You will win house points for entering and more if your entry is the one chosen for us to display.

Assembly

It was a busy assembly today. We started by reflecting on the life of the Queen and the changes that are going to come now.

We spoke about the football match on Wednesday – what a pleasure it was for me to see the pupils from both schools playing so well together. I felt proud of both teams and we celebrated their success and teamwork at assembly today.

Well to our stars who have been spotted living our values of effort, perseverance and teamwork: Ava C, Holly, Jackson and Scott A.

Beatbox

P5/6/7 have worked with Beatbox today to write and record a school song – we will look forward to being able to share it with the whole school when it is finished.