Yet another week filled with our children representing our school in a whole variety of ways, each one demonstrating their commitment to our school and showing their wide range of talents and skills.
Monday morning saw 65 of our children represent our school in the Glasgow Music Festival singing in both Primary choir section and Hymn Singing. Choir was, as always, magnificent and they won a well-deserved 2nd place in Hymn Singing. Adjudicator’s comments included:
‘Excellent tuning, beautiful range, lovely happy faces who brought the song to life.’
Well done to our entire choir who has given so much of their own time to rehearse, we are all enjoying a well-earned rest for a few weeks now. Choir will resume after Easter break.
Thanks also to the great number of parents, grandparents and supporters of our school who came along on the day to assist with supervision and to show their support for our children and indeed our school.
Evening Times last week published a lovely picture of our choir at the Festival.
Monday afternoon all area head teachers were called to a meeting to discuss forthcoming savings to be made within Learning & Leisure Service. This was not such good news for us as the proposal is for our management structure to be altered cutting the number of senior and middle managers in our school. The savings have to be in place for 2016 but as yet they are proposals. More information will be given as more detail is provided.
Tuesday and Wednesday evening were very special times for our P3 pupils from St. Luke’s Parish and O.L.G.A Parish as they celebrated the Sacrament of Reconciliation for the first time. Both evenings were spiritually uplifting and our children were a credit to themselves, their parishes, their parents and to our school. Our grateful thanks to Mgr Millar, Canon O’Mahoney & Fr Krzysztof for their contributions to the celebrations. Well done to our P3 children and their teachers, Mrs Blaney, Mrs Collins, Mrs Duffy, Miss McIntyre, Mrs McDerment & Miss Brannigan.
Thanks also to the number of staff who came along on both nights to support our sacramental celebrations.
Lenten Charities:
Last week our children were involved in bringing non-perishable foodstuff to help those who are in need. What an incredible response we got! Absolutely brilliant. Miss Stack organized all of this and she has been overwhelmed by the generosity shown by our children. Miss Stack has collated 42 hampers filled with a huge variety of foods to be given to SVDP in our local area. We also have a large amount of surplus foodstuff, Miss Stack has been in touch with local NLC foodbanks and they are very grateful for this tremendous donation to their cause. A fantastic way to begin our Lenten Charity Appeals. HUGE thanks to Miss Stack for the organization of all of this. Each hamper has been decorated and sealed – a lovely gift to give to those families in our locale who are in need. This display of generosity has really brought to life the phrase ‘ Charity begins at home’. Well done to all involved.
This Friday ‘bounced’ in with all of our nursery and school children involved in this week’s Lenten Alms Giving. Our sponsored bounced was great fun and incredibly well organized. A HUGE thanks to Mrs Loose for organising all of the activities and the timetable on the day. We will let you know the amount of money raised as soon as all monies are received.
Next Friday – Crazy Hair Day!
Throughout this week I have had opportunity to visit P1, P2,P3 &P4 classes, to sit in on lessons. What a pleasure this has been. I am amazed at the creativity of our staff. Every lesson saw children fully involved in their learning, with lessons being personalised to allow children choice and breadth of learning indiscriminate of their ability. I thoroughly enjoyed working with the classes and admiring all of the children’s work on display in and around the class.
Parent Evening:
I look forward to all of our parents being just as impressed this coming Tuesday at our bi-annual Parent Evening.
Tuesday evening our appointments begin at 3.20pm through to 5.00pm and then again 6.00pm to 8.30pm. Should you not have an appointment as yet please contact the school as soon as possible.
As well as having opportunity to view the work in and around the class, look through your child’s won jotters and workbooks this March we have added a little something extra.
Easter Fayre:
Our Enterprise Committee has been working very hard organizing activities for each class to produce a raft of resources and gifts for Easter. All of the items are being put on sale on Tuesday evening and every item has been custom made by our children. Please come along and purchase some lovely Easter gifts.
Again HUGE thanks to Miss Stack and Miss Mooty who have been working after school with the Enterprise Committee to construct and collate many of the items.
New 2 U:
Also on Tuesday evening our Fabulous Fundraisers have on show an incredible amount of school clothing, which has been left in our school.
We have returned any item to their original owners but many, many items of clothing remain un-claimed. Coupled with this we also have a great number of uniform items which have been donated to the school and are all still in perfect condition. Our Fundraisers have laundered all of the items and these will be on sale on Tuesday evening – we simply ask for a donation.
There will also be a lost and found section of clothing, which is not school uniform. ENORMOUS thanks to our fabulous fundraisers who have, once again, been a great support to our school.
Nursery News:
It looks like the search for Blackbeard will get fully underway this week, as the ship is about to sail for faraway lands. The children have been busy preparing the ship to sail. They have scrubbed the decks, hoisted the sail, caught enough fish for the journey and all that is left to do is to fix the ships wheel on the helm. On Tuesday they arrived to find Pirate Pete had climbed out of the crow’s nest and climbed across the rigging along with Tinkerbell. It looked as if they were heading for the helm to sort out the navigation equipment.
In the maths/science area the children have been experimenting floating and sinking. They have used a variety of materials and have recorded some of their findings.
In the literacy/sensory area they have been exploring the Tropical Island in the corner of the playroom. They have been investigating their senses, using their feet in the sand, looking, touching and smelling tropical fruit.
In the art area they made their own anchors from saltdough and will get a chance to paint them this week. They made ships from different shapes and they can be seen displayed on the art area wall.
In the snack area they made pirate porridge and pirate pasta building up their strength for the journey ahead. They made and decorated their own pirate biscuits and they tasted tropical fruits.
Outside the children have been learning all about recycling, they have been busy tidying up the outdoor area and looking for the recycle symbol on various items in the playroom. They have been working on their very own eco song and hopefully that will be completed next week.
At gym this week they played a physical game, they scrubbed the decks, hoisted the flag, climbed the rigging, saluted the Captain and some scallywags even got to walk the plank into shark infested waters.
The ABC music programme continued with the children listening to the instructions and moving certain parts of their bodies in different ways.
On Thursday some of the children went on a Spring walk with Susan and Clare the Greenlink rangers. They listened to the sounds of different birds, discovered new buds growing on the trees, looked at some mini beasts and their eggs and were shown the hoof prints of a deer and a badger’s pathway. It was a lovely day and the children enjoyed their time away from the nursery. Thanks to the parents/carers who came to help out. The rest of the children will get the opportunity on Wednesday 25/3/14. We are looking for helpers on this day as well morning and afternoon.
On Friday the children took part in the sponsored bounce organised by the school Health Committee. They had great fun bouncing on two different bouncy castles and trampolines. They all went home exhausted!! Sponsor money should be handed in as soon as possible.
A wee reminder Parents night is on Tuesday 18/3/14.
As they say in all the best cartoons ‘That’s All Folks’. Thanks for reading.
Mrs Shields
