Mrs N’s Notes ~ 1.2.19
We are proud of our Class Charters and continue to explore how we can exercise our rights as children living in Scotland. However, we also believe that you, as parents and carers, have the right to know what is happening in our school each day. You have chosen Kirkshaws as the school for your child as you believe it is the best school for them and we want to provide you with the evidence to back this up! We value the partnership we have with our parents and want to build on this each day, each week, each term.
We continue to explore ways to build on our home/school communication, ensuring you are kept up to date of all that is going on in Kirkshaws. We are always open to ideas and continue to make changes that will benefit those in the Kirkshaws community to all work in partnership together.
At the moment we are using a number of methods, using various platforms that suit different families. Our Monthly Newsletters have been replaced by the following means of communication:
- Daily Twitter updates
- Weekly news roundups on our website & Twitter ~ Mrs N’s Notes
- A Diary for the week ahead, including lunch menus posted at the beginning of each week on Twitter & the website
- A free app (Piota), where you will find News updates, a Calendar of Events, Information on a whole host of topics from after-school clubs to weekly menus, homework grids, home/school partnership information & gym days! Take time to explore the app…and if you think something is missing, let us know.
- A termly newspaper, written by our learners (next issue due in March)
- A Calendar of Events for the session, posted on all digital platforms, but also available on paper from the school office on request.
- A text messaging service for urgent and personal information
- Letters are still sent home at times, especially when a return slip is necessary.
- As well as all of this, remember to explore our school website, using the drop down menus at the top. You will find lots of background information about our school and nursery here.
In addition, please remember we operate an open-door policy, where telephone calls and face-to-face meetings can be arranged to discuss urgent and private matters.
LAST WEEK’S HIGHLIGHTS
We’ve had another busy week – no surprises there! Claire, our Oral Health Nurse made one of her regular visits to check up on the toothbrushing project that continues in the school and nursery. We continue to encourage our learners to brush in school and obviously at home too.
Some representatives from our RRSA Committee visited the local Cancer Research shop to deliver the kind donation you made before Christmas. They learned more about how the shop operates and how the money would be used. We are always looking for positive ways to contribute to our local community, so we were delighted to build this new partnership.
Our Literacy Mornings in P.1 were a huge success, by all accounts. The pupils loved showing off to their parents and I know the parents and carers who joined us were impressed at the learning demonstrated. Following in the success of this initiative, we are planning our Maths Open Session for parents at all stages.
Our sporting stars continue to make us proud. Mr Gall and the Football Team are training weekly. We are indebted to our partners at St Timothy’s for the use of their all-weather pitch during these winter months; it makes training much less messy! Our Netball Team are also working hard in their local league matches. Excellent effort and super sportsmanship – I can’t ask for more. P.5 swimmers still have four more weeks of their block to complete, but already many are seeing themselves set personal bests in the pool.
The weather caused us a bit of bother on Wednesday. Our Euro Quiz team were due to travel to Airdrie to compete on Wednesday morning. Unfortunately a risk assessment of the weather at 9am would not allow a journey on the roads, so a change of plan was devised! They are now hard at work creating a Euro presentation and subsequent Inter-House Quiz! Look out for news of this coming soon.
Some P.6 Mathematicians took part in the Coatbridge High School cluster Maths Challenge on Wednesday. We may not have come first, but I am delighted at the effort, resilience and confidence shown by each member of the team.
We started a new programme of Language Land in our nursery this week. Miss Findlay will monitor how this is developed in partnership with Speech & Language Therapy.
And then to finish the week off, yet another Quiz team was formed. I am delighted that 4 avid readers have agreed to represent Kirkshaws in the NLC Primary Reading Quiz. Their books should arrive early next week, then it is ‘all systems go’!
