Head Teacher’s News – Page 2 – Stane Primary School and Nursery Class

Head Teacher’s Blog – Thursday 9th February 2017

I was in and out of school all day today as I had to attend various meetings.

I was working with Mr. Robertson, Head Teacher at Calderhead High School, and some of the other Head Teachers from the cluster to look at the assessment data for maths from P7 to S6. We discussed our ideas to strengthen the links between primary and secondary in terms of maths assessment to ensure the best transition for our pupils. I will keep you informed of our progress in coming weeks.

Since I took up post at Stane Primary, I have been liaising with the local authority to try to improve the safety in and around our car park and nursery entrance. I am pleased to inform you that I have finally had confirmation that a pedestrian walkway will be created in front of the school and a new pedestrian gate with zebra crossing to allow safe passageway to the Main Entrance and Nursery will be built. This work should begin in the next couple of weeks. Thank you to our Parent Council who have assisted in getting this work approved.

After school today, lots of the staff stayed a little later than normal to help set up our Art Exhibition for tomorrow. It looks AMAZING – we hope you can join us to see the work and hopefully purchase your child’s art.

Also, for August P1 parents, don’t forget that we are taking part in the Shotts Transition workshop at Calderhead High School between 10am and 11.30am. We hope all of our parents for August 2017 can attend.

A quick reminder: school and nursery are closed on Monday 13th and Tuesday 14th February to all and Wednesday 15th February for pupils.

Head Teacher’s Blog – Wednesday 8th February 2017

Wednesday is one of my favourite days in school as we have our ‘Celebrating Success’ assembly in the morning. The children enjoyed singing ‘Happy and You Know It’ and ‘Build Up’ and the JRSOs delivered an excellent presentation about Zebra Crossings and how to use them safely.

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We also celebrated with all of the children who have remained on Green so far this week or have even been moved up to Silver or Gold! Two girls showed off their Dance Exam trophies and certificates and we celebrated four birthdays as well. We sang the weekly ‘Well Done’ song to all of our achievers and ended the assembly with our school song, ‘As We Go Now’. This is such an important song to us as it reminds us that we must ‘treasure one another’ and realise ‘how important we all are’.

The teachers were very proud to present two pupils from their class with the ‘Stane Superstar’ trophies for excellent behaviour or excellent classwork. Have a look at who earned it this week:

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Jonathan, our school chaplain, visited the children during assembly today and joined the staff for a ‘cuppa’ at interval. It is lovely to have him join us regularly and the children enjoy his company too. In the afternoon, he visited P5/6 and P6/7 and was teaching them about forgiveness through the parable of ‘The Lost Son’.

I was able to join P2/3 for their Taught Writing lesson after interval as they worked on their preparation and planning for a persuasive piece of writing. Based on their story of ‘Lost and Found’, they will be writing a persuasive letter to earn place on a trip to ‘The South Pole’. They were considering what would be the best items to pack in their case. Many of the children were coming up with some great ideas such as waterproof trousers, boots, hats and gloves. Some even thought about packing a flask and sandwiches – after all, it will be a long journey! I was very impressed with how well P2/3 concentrated and worked co-operativley together to come up with idea. I can’t wait to read their stories tomorrow.

In this week’s Wishaw Press, our P6 Enterprise Group are featured as they pitched to the Parent Council last week for a donation toward their Edinburgh excursion. Check out the coverage we got:

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In the afternoon I had the pleasure of escorting some of the P6 Enterprise children to a local Cash and Carry to buy sweeties! They have decided to host a ‘Pick and Mix’ sale in school over the next few days. The children thought carefully about the best sweeties to buy that will be popular with the other pupils. Mix-ups will go on sale from tomorrow.

There has been a huge interest in our new after-school clubs and letters have started to be issued to children who have successfully been allocated a place. Clubs start next week!

Our nursery children have loved looking after the chicks for the past two weeks but sadly they are now too big to stay! Tomorrow will be their last day with us before they go to live on a lovely, free-range farm! Well done to all of the children for looking after the chicks so well.

Don’t forget that our Art Exhibition takes place on Friday and this means a few changes to the daily routines. Tuck shop will be open at 8.45am and not at 10.30am. Lunch will only be Snack2Go option available from the canteen and children are asked to order that with their lunch option on Thursday. The children will eat their lunches in class that day too.

We hope that as many parents/carers can pop in to our art exhibition, even for just 5 minutes to see the wonderful work and purchase their child’s art work!

And finally, if you are concerned about your child’s speech/language there are drop-in sessions available in the local area. Here are the details of the next one:

Head Teacher’s Blog – Tuesday 7th February 2017

Our wonderful parents continue to support our school in many ways and today was no exception. One kind parent has donated a wonderful bespoke hut that we will use to store our Loose Parts Play materials in. Today, it was fitted into our playground and it looks wonderful! I am so grateful for this act of generosity and kindness – it will make a huge difference to our playground.

A small but hard working team of volunteers have also been in the school today to help improve and tidy up some of the office spaces. Thanks to the grandparents and parents who gave of their time this week – we are blessed to have such a supportive community.

This community spirit extended into the evening when the Parent Council held their annual Valentine’s Disco. The children had a great time partying with ‘Looney Tunes’ disco and loved the prizes and certificates too. The children looked wonderful in their disco outfits – it was a lovely night. It was also great to have our school chaplain, Jonathan, join us for the discos too! Thank you to the Parent Council for their ongoing commitment and support.

Today, I was able to visit P5/6 and P4/5 to join in with their Taught Writing lessons. Both classes were working on persuasive writing techniques and were thinking about how to convince their audience with emotive language and succinct key facts. P5/6 were trying to convince their reader to purchase specific types of technology while P4/5 were writing letters to convince their parents to attend the Art Exhibition on Friday. There were lots of Star Writers in the classes – a fabulous achievement.

As P4/5 outlined in their writing, our Art Exhibition takes place on Friday this week and the children are looking forward to their parents coming along to see the work and hopefully to buy some too! You can pop in between 9.30am and 10.30am or 1.45pm and 2.45pm.

Friday will be a very busy day as it is also the first day of our P1 Transition programme. Staff from Allanton, Shotts Family Learning Centre, Dykehead, St. Patrick’s and Stane will be sharing information about moving on to P1. We hope to see as many of our parents there.

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Unfortunately, the planned Warburtons Healthy Eating workshop had to be cancelled at the last minute this morning due to an unforeseen problem with the people delivering the session. I hope the children weren’t too disappointed. I’m pleased to say that they have been able to offer an alternate date of 28th February. I’m sure it will be worth the wait.

Tomorrow is my favourite day of the week as it is Celebrating Success Assembly. We will announce the week’s Stane Superstars, count another week on the Good to Be Green Pathway and share any achievements outwith school.

The Junior Road Safety Officers will also share the first in a series of three presentations about crossing safely – this week will focus on Zebra Crossings.

The latest edition of the Stane Primary Newsletter is out now and will be sent home with pupils on Wednesday 8th February. You can download a copy here.

Don’t forget that school is closed to pupils on Monday 13th to Wednesday 15th February 2017.

Head Teacher’s Blog – Monday 6th February 2017

The nursery children were very excited to have the chicks back in the playroom today after their ‘wee break’ over the weekend. Mrs. Lindsay took them home with her on Friday afternoon and took very good care of them – they even got to watch the rugby on the television! The children in the nursery have been so caring to the little chicks and are looking after them very well. We will miss them on Friday but are pleased that they are going to a lovely farm to have a happy life.

I had a lovely morning visiting P6/7 and then P3/4 to join in with their Taught Writing lessons. Primary 6/7 were writing in the persuasive genre. They had chosen to write letters to persuade their audience to improve the provision of outdoor activities in Shotts. They were able to use some very persuasive language and used facts and data to make their arguments. I was very impressed with their hard work and concentration.

Mrs. Robert’s class were working on Narrative stories linked to their interdisciplinary topic ‘Knights and Castles’. They used their topic vocabulary about a knight to make their narratives very detailed and used a video clip of ‘Mike the Knight’ to help develop their descriptive language. I was very pleased to see the children involved in peer assessment to improve their work and was delighted with the concentration and focus of all children.

As a school, we encourage daily activity to focus the children’s attention and concentration. I joined P6/7 for a little bit of their afternoon activity where they were running a mile around the trim-trail. It was nice to see the children energised and enthusiastic for their work afterwards.

I am always very grateful by the kindness and generosity of our parents/carers and families. Today alone, our school has benefited from parent helpers working in classes, grandparents and parents helping with some DIY and ground maintenance and other parents donating items for our Loose Parts Play. Thank you to each and everyone of you who has given of your time over the past few weeks to assist.

Tomorrow, P1/2 and P2/3 will be taking part in a healthy eating workshop with Warburtons. I will be visiting P5/6 and P4/5 to join in with their Taught Writing lesson and to finish the day, the Parent Council will hold their annual Valentine’s Disco. Glad rags on everyone!

Head Teacher’s Blog – Friday 3rd February 2017

It’s been a while since I last added a Head Teacher’s Blog to the school website. I will make it a belated New Year’s Resolution to try and blog more often!

January has been a very full month in our wee school and it is hard to believe it has zipped past already.

Enrolment of the next intake of Primary 1 pupils who will begin in August 2017 took place in the second week of term. 22 children from our catchment area enrolled for next session – our biggest intake in a few years! This will bring our school role to approx. 145 pupils in August.

The nursery children have had special visitors this week – 10 little eggs to look after and hatch into chicks. The children were excited to welcome the chicks this week and are amazed at how quickly they have grown. Their learning has centred around caring for the chicks – the children wrote their own rules for taking care of them. The chicks will stay with us for another week until they are big enough to go to a local farm where they will live in a free-range environment.

The children in P1-7 have been enjoying ‘Art Focus Fortnight’ which ended today. Everytime I have visited a class throughout the week, the children were painting, creating or learning about art by focussing on well know artists. Each child has created a canvas inspired by their work and every class except P6/7 have also produced a framed print too.

Instead of a second piece of artwork, P6/7 were set the task by Mrs. Parker (Senior CLD Worker) to create a piece of video art as part of a ‘Voluntary Action Fund’ project called ‘What My Mother Means to Me’

Mrs. Parker and Mrs. Byrne from Calderhead High School worked together with pupils from S3 to offer a ‘Special Effects Make Up’ tutorial for our pupils in P5/6 and P4/5.

All of the work from our Art Focus Fortnight will be displayed during our Art Exhibition on Friday 10th February 2017. We hope you can join us.

January has also seen some building work in our playground. Thanks to an Awards for All Grant of £9600 plus donations collected from non-uniform days, we have purchased an Outdoor Classroom for our playground. We are so pleased with it – we are just waiting for a final panel to new be supplied to finish it off and the children will be able to start using it.

We’ve also purchased new outdoor games and storage and the children were very exciting when these were being put out for them to use.

Last Friday, the Parent Council held their annual Family Film Night. I would like to extend my gratitude to them for organising a hugely successful evening and also to the friends, families and relatives who came along and supported the school. The children who attended were extremely well behaved and a great night was had by all.

Next week, I will be completing ‘Learning Visits’ to every class in the school to see their ‘Taught Writing’ work. I am looking forward to seeing the wonderful work of the children and staff!

Don’t forget that the Parent Council Valentine’s Discos take pace on Tuesday 7th February 2017. Nursery to P2 from 5.30pm-6.30pm and P3-7 from 6.45pm-8pm. The cost of entry is £1.50 which is payable on entry.

Have a lovely weekend.

Monday 14th March 2016

It was lovely to have some sunshine today – the children really enjoyed playing outdoors in the warmish sun.

The nursery am children had a bit of an adventure to start their session – the door wouldn’t open and the children had to arrive via the P1 doors. The fact that not one of the children was phased by this change to their routine just shows how confident and comfortable the children are at nursery. Thank you to everyone for their patience today. Thankfully, the issue was resolved for pick up time.

Our brand new tracksuit tops arrived today – they look wonderful. Thank you so much to the two companies who purchased them for us. Tomorrow, two children will be debuting them at the NLC Cross Country Finals. Good Luck to both of them!

The children in P3 and P4/5 have been busy rehearsing ‘The Donkey’s Tale’ for the Easter Assembly next week. The children were rehearsing this afternoon and sounded wonderful. You are in for a real treat if you are able to attend at 9.30am next week.

Don’t forget that pupils can enter the decorate an egg competition by bringing their creations in to school next week. Winners will be announced at the Spring Assembly.

Friday 12th March 2016

Primary 6/7 had a great time at the annual Shotts and District Rotary Club Quiz this morning. It took place in St. Patrick’s Parish Hall. Teams from St. Patrick’s, Dykehead, Allanton, Alexander Peden, Kirk o’Shotts and Stane Primaries entered a team of four pupils. The quiz comprised of eight rounds, one based on each area of the Curriculum for Excellence.

At the interval, our team were in second place but unfortunately by the end of the quiz, we didn’t manage to place. However, I was very proud of the effort and attitude of the team and the rest of the class who were there to spectate. The event was extremely well organised by the Rotary Club.

Primary 1/2 and Primary 2 had a great morning with the nursery children from the ‘am’ session today as part of the monthly shared structured play learning morning. The children were working in stations based on ‘People Who Help Us’ and had great fun together. In the afternoon, the pm session children joined in Golden Time activities. This programme has been such a success for the school as the nursery children are becoming so confident being in and around the school.

Friday evening was the annual Parent Council Bingo night. I would never have believed that last year’s wonderful evening could have been topped, but it certainly was. The Marble Club was absolutely packed with friends, relatives and supporters of the school. The grand total raised was £1029 – a phenomenal amount which will make a huge difference to our children. Already this year, the Parent Council have contributed to new football strips and track-suits, the Pantomime excursion and the P6 Theatre Outing.

I would like to thank each and every person who contributed to the success of the evening – those on the Parent Council who worked tirelessly to organise it; everyone who came along to support and also to the people who donated raffle prizes or made a donation in lieu of a ticket.

It’s during events like this that I am reminded how fortunate I am to be the Head Teacher of a school that is the at the centre of a thriving and supportive community!

Thursday 10th March 2016

I had a lovely day working with P6/7. They were practising their badminton techniques by working cooperatively with partners to serve, return and smash the shuttle. Afterwards, they played a whole class game of non-stop Badminton. After interval, the class focussed on Narrative writing in the weekly Taught Writing lesson. The theme of this was ‘Adverse Weather’ and the children were learning to focus on characters feelings and reaction written in more expressive ways. They also worked hard to create interesting, expressive introductions to each paragraph to hold the reader’s interest. I was very impressed with how hard each pupil worked on this. I am looking forward to working with them again tomorrow and accompanying the class to the Shotts Rotary Club Quiz at St. Patrick’s Parish Hall.

Primary 1/2 and 2 had a brilliant visit from two Paramedics this afternoon – you can read all about this here.

Our new cashless system is still working very well – but there was a big queue to top-up cards at interval today. It’s a much better idea to provide children with enough money to last a week to reduce the amount of time they need to spend at the machine.

Tickets for the fabulous hamper donated by the Parent Council went on sale today at 50p a strip. The school captains and vice-captains were selling the tickets round the classes and will continue to sell them tomorrow and next week too.

Our transition to nursery programme continues every week with children in the nursery taking part in Soft Start or Golden Time on a Friday. Tomorrow we will also have our monthly Transition Play Session, with children from the am nursery session visiting the open area to take part in lots of ‘People who Help us’ structured play activities.

Primary 4/5 will also be out of school for a time tomorrow as they visit Wishaw Sports Centre to take part in a Tennis Tournament. I am sure they will have a lovely day.

And finally, our busy week will end on a real high note tomorrow with the annual Parent Council Bingo night taking place at 7.30pm in the Marble Club. I am looking forward to it and hope to see you there!

Wednesday 9th March 2016

Our new cashless cafeteria system is up and running and the pupils have been great at using it this week. They have been able to use ‘Ronnie’ the Reval Cash Machine to top up their cards and I was pleased with how quickly the children have got used to the new system. The children can top-up their card between 8.15am and 9am every morning and also during interval. Next week, I will send home details about the Online payment system, which parents will be able to use to check the card balance, see what their child has bought and also add funds from a Credit/Debit card.

All of our after-school clubs have finished for the term, apart from P4-7 Football, which will run until the summer holidays. New clubs for April to June will be announced soon.

Work has started on the conversion of the old Noisy/Quiet room into a central resource cupboard. Last weekend, the old staging was removed. The new rolling storage units are ordered and should be fitted soon.

Raffle tickets for the fabulous Easter Hamper donated by the Parent Council will go on sale tomorrow – children can purchase a strip of tickets for 50p. These will be on sale unti Monday 21st March 2016, with the winner announced at the Spring Service on 22nd March. Children must not put the money for tickets onto their dinner card as this can only be used for the canteen.

And finally – a huge thanks to the Grandad who has very kindly come into the school over the past few days to weed and tidy up around the playground! This is very much appreciated!

October Non-uniform Day (in November!)

Don’t forget that tomorrow (6th November 2015) is the date of the next non-uniform day. This would have been last week for October, but was held back due to the junior department’s assembly.

£1 per pupils, with all proceeds going towards our ongoing School Improvement Fund.

Thank you!