REMEMBER REMEMBER – Parent Evening Tuesday 6th October for both school and nursery.

A ‘warm’ welcome to October. What a fantastic week in school and nursery with everyone enjoying some much awaited sunshine. Outdoor learning has been a huge focus this week with many of our lessons happening outdoors, making best use of our magnificent facilities.

Just in case you haven’t heard……I’m back. A HUGE thanks to Mrs Campbell, Mrs Duffy, Mrs McCoy and all our wonderful staff who have worked so hard in my absence to ensure our school and nursery continue on their journey to excellence with every child having their individual needs recognised and overtaken. A special mention for Mrs Campbell who has been holding down both my Head Teacher post and her own Depute Head Teacher post, I am indebted to her.

Big thanks also to everyone for my magnificent welcome back, especially Primary Seven and their teachers who provided such a colourful welcome in the form of 500 balloons which coered every available inch of my office – look out for the photograph on the front of our October newsletter. It was a brilliant return to school – I am delighted to be fit enough to return to work.

This was a short week in school and nursery but still lots happening.

After school on Tuesday our pupils enjoyed the Rugby club, lead by Mr Cuthbert (Jayden’s dad). Thanks to Mr Cuthbert for taking the time to share his talent and skills with our pupils. Soctland team of the future.

Continuing on our sporting theme, On Thursday Jenny, our Active Schools Co-ordinator, continued coaching our Young Leaders from P7. This is a magnificent initiative whereby P7 pupils are trianed to lead lunchtime clubs for our younger pupils. This was a most successful venture last year and we look forward to its continued success. Go Jenny – She is a star!

Even the nursery pupils are entering our Health and Well being genre through Mini Movers which is on-going in the nursery just now.

What a fit school we are – and well done to Miss McMullen, Mrs Blaney and Miss Love who all ran in the Great Glasgow Run this morning.

In Primary 7c  the fabulous song-writing project continues, can’t wait to hear their song. This project will culminate with a concert in North Lanarkshire in March 2016 – more details to follow nearer the time.

Friday was a day for us staff to work with those in our local area. Mrs Duffy attended Early Years Cluster Meeting and Mrs Cambell & I attended our Primary / Secondary Cluster meeting at Our Lady’s High. We are very keen to ensure our pupils and staff have opportunity to come together and work building a spirit of community and friendship throughout Motherwell.

For those who have been part of our school for a wee while you will be pleased to know Mrs Mary Mullen, former DHT, became a granny. Mrs Laura Irwin (AKA Mary’s daughter) and one of our teaching staff gave birth to baby Joseph Gordon William Irwin (to be known as Joe) last Sunday morning. We extend our sincere congratulations to the whole family.

Meanwhile…..Down in our excellent nursery there’s lots going on. Here’s Mrs Murphy to tell us all about it.

A short week in nursery but as always a busy week. The weather has been so good this week that the children had ice cream as a treat for their snack outside. Who would have thought we would be having ice cream in October!

The children have been discussing what they see in their local community on their way to nursery and most of the children have had the opportunity to go out and about exploring the area. From this they have been busy learning and creating through a variety of different activities.

In literacy they have been looking at and identifying environmental print. The “All About Me” wall has been transformed into an interactive wall where the children can identify signs, symbols and words that they are familiar with. Take a look and see if you can identify them too!

The house corner has been transformed into a hairdressers and the children have been roleplaying taking appointments, styling, serving the customers snacks and taking the money for the service. Prices stand at £5 per style but you need to book in advance as its a very busy hairdressers. All styles catered for!
On Friday some of the children visited a real hairdressers to look at what really happens in a busy hairdressers. Take a look at the photographs of their visit. These visits will continue from Tuesday onwards to give other children the chance to visit a real hairdressers.

At the beginning of the week the children went on a walk to collect Autumn leaves looking at their shape, colour, texture and sound they make as they dry out. We are looking for other signs of Autumn for our forthcoming Autumn display. If you see any conkers pine cones etc we will gladly add them to our display.

In the expressive arts area the children have been busy designing a junk model of the buildings of the whole school campus. They took a photograph of the building and used this to create their model. This is displayed in the art area. Please take a look at their hard work which took them all week to complete. The previous week they made a model of things they see on their way to nursery. This is also displayed in the art area.

After a discussion with all children it was decided that to help with our Golden nursery Rules the children would take ownership of a superhero/princess character. The children chose their characters and the most popular ones have now been created and each group have a particular character of their own. They have been busy decorating them all week. Hopefully they will be on display for parents night so you can see the work that the children have put into them. The characters are as follows:

Tidy Tinkerbell – Happy Heathers

Listening Luigi – Brilliant Bluebells

Busy Belle – Super Snowdrops

Sharing Sheriff Cally- Terrific Thistles

Walking Woody – Fantastic Foxgloves

Caring Captain America and Running Raphael (outdoors only) are two additional characters that the children came up with so all children will have a chance to create these specific characters.

From this the children have been looking at superheroes comic books and princess stories in the story corner.

In numeracy they have been building up their own superhero jigsaws and by the end of the week they have made their own superhero city over in the construction area. This area is tucked away so please take the opportunity to visit it on parents night. It looks fantastic.

Week 4 of the mini movers programme and this week the children were given a bear to dress to take to the beach. The children have been learning all about their bodies and the importance of keeping safe in the sun. Outside they roleplayed characters from Toy Story and Superheroes which is perfect as this is what the children have been discussing as above. These activities are improving their hand to eye co-ordination and ball skills. The mini movers graduation will take place after the October break and each child was given a letter with information for parents regarding this.

The photographic evidence…