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LAWN PRIMARY SCHOOL
NEWSLETTER Dear Parents and Carers What a great start to the new academic year! Our new Reception children are settling in really well, new shoes and new uniform certainly being put to the test. I hope that you all had a lovely summer break and feel refreshed for the long weeks to Christmas. This week we had a wonderful visit from Andy Cope, author of the Spy Dog books. Andy is a Derby man and loved being in a Derby School. Years 2 to 6 listened to a very inspiring assembly from him and his dog Star about how the stories of Spy Dog came about, including the walks on Markeaton Park! The children then went off to write a story. Year 5 had to write a story with as many chocolate/sweet names in and they were fantastic. Hopefully we will have some up on the wall soon. Andy then spent most of his lunchtime signing books for the children. He delivered a great,inspiring and positive afternoon for Y5 and 6, followed by some positivity training for staff and a few parents. I certainly enjoyed the day and I know from talking to the children they loved it. Thank you so much to the LSA for funding this great day, we couldn’t have experienced this without the funds you raise. Next week we celebrate our annual Harvest festival. All the donations will be gratefully received by the Padley Centre in Derby who work hard with families. I hope that you have found the curriculum evenings useful this year, especially in light of the new curriculum being statutory from
September. I know the teachers are looking forward to teaching some great topics this year. Key Stage 2 have started to learn Spanish via two fluent Spanish teachers who are delivering the lessons each week during the teacher’s PPA (planning, preparation and assessment) time. From the conversations I have had with staff and children this seems to be having a great impact. As part of our drive to get Lawn to be a good or better school we have introduced a few new things this September. Each class now has a name and a class motto, please ask you child what theirs is. These are all based on an animal theme that the children have decided as a class. Some examples are Miss Ayub’s dolphins, Mr Walter’s wasps, Miss Alexander’s dragons. Also we have introduced a system of class ambassadors for when we have visitors in school. If you have the fortune of a visit round school, two children in the class will welcome you to their classroom and tell you what they are learning. Apart from a little confidence boosting, the children have started their new jobs really well. If you follow the school on twitter you will know that we have been having some handwriting training in school. We have been working with a consultant for the last couple of weeks on improving the presentation of children’s work. Mrs Clarke and Mrs Cousins our literacy leaders have added a piece later on in the newsletter with more detail. They are hoping to deliver a couple of parents sessions in the next couple of weeks.
Issue 1 26th September 2014
You may have heard from the children that we had a photographer in school last week. As part of drive to being good or better, our school website is going to have a make over. In the next couple of weeks work will start to make the website more informative, easier to use and update and to show what Lawn is like. I will update you when it will be going live. Thank you for those parents who would like to be involved in the logo/uniform consultation. If you could either send me an email or speak to me on the gate to say you are still interested in being involved as I am hoping to get an initial meeting sorted this half term. Our assessment results for last year are fantastic and in the next newsletter I will be providing you with a brief overview of how well Lawn has done compared to other local schools. We are really proud of these results and I thank all the staff for all their hard work last year. Finally, I would like to say thank you for all the lovely positive comments that school receives, it certainly helps Lawn’s staff continue to do a great job and be positive day after day. Sometimes we don’t get it right and if this is the case please come in and see us and talk it over. Here’s to a great year and a year to put Lawn back at it’s rightful place.
Sarah Allison
Head Teacher
Clubs
Due to our security procedures at the end of the school day please come into school at the main reception door to collect your children from after school activities. Staff will be available to help you gain access.
Staffing for 2014/15
Foundation Stage 2 – Mrs Richards/Mrs Levesley, Miss Ayub and Miss White
Year 1 – Mr Cooper, Mrs Shepherd and Mrs Sowerby
Year 2 – Mr Walters, Miss Yates, Mrs Burton and Mrs Hathaway,
Year 3 – Mrs Clarke/Mrs Cousins, Mrs Harland and Mr Fox
Year 4 – Mr Archer, Miss Golding, Mrs Brown and Mr Fox
Year 5 – Mr Molineux, Miss Alexander, and Mrs Cordwell
Year 6 – Mr Green, Mr Wilkins, Mrs O’Hare, Mrs Smith, Mr Fox
Mrs Hutchinson and Mrs Brown will be undertaking interventions.
Mrs Goodman will be cover supervisor and doing 1:1 teaching.
Mrs Hallam will be doing cover supervisor and booster groups and leading improvements in teaching and learning.
Medicine
The school staff are only able to administer medicine that has been prescribed by a doctor to be taken 4 times a day. Should your child need to be given medicine during the school day please complete a form at the school office. Can we please ask that children DO NOT carry any medication in their school bags or on themselves as this is potentially a serious health risk to other children.
Appointments, collections and
Absence
If your child is absent from school due to illness please contact the school office by 9.15 a.m. This will need to be followed up by confirmation in writing to their class teacher. If no message has been received by 9.30 a.m. a text message will be sent asking you to call to authorise the absence. Although we do not encourage your child to be late or absent from school we are aware that sometimes this is unavoidable. However where possible please arrange appointments outside the school day. If your child is going to be late to school or needs to be collected early please send a note to the class teacher or call the school office. If you arrive after the school gates have been closed please remember to bring your child into the main reception area and sign them in. If your collection arrangements change please let us know in advance who will be collecting your child from school.
DIARY DATES
Tue 30th Sep LSA meeting at 7.00 p.m. Wed 1st Oct FS2 Curriculum/Phonics 5.30 – 6.00 p.m. Thur 2nd Oct Y6 Curriculum Evening Fri 3rd Oct Harvest Festival at St Nicholas Church Tue 7th Oct FS2 Stay and Play Thur 9th Oct FS2 Stay and Play Tue 14th Oct Open Day for new FS2 parents Wed 15th Oct INSET day Wed 22nd Oct Parent Evening Thur 23rd Oct Parent Evening Thur 23rd Oct Open Day for new FS2 parents Thur 23rd Oct Y1 Stay and Play Fri 24th Oct School closes for half term Mon 3rd Nov School opens Mon 10th Nov WW1 History Week Fri 14th Nov Children in Need Day
Mon 17th Nov Anti Bullying Week Walk to School week Mon 17th Nov Family photo sessions Thur 27th Nov KS2 Romeo & Juliet
performance Fri 28th Nov LSA Christmas Fayre
Fri 5th Dec Open Day for new FS2 parents Tue 9th Dec FS2/Y1 Production to parents Tue 9th Dec Y3-6 to Derby Theatre Thur 11th Dec FS2/Y1 Production to parents Fri 12th Dec Christmas Jumper Day Mon 15th Dec Y5 Christmas Party Tue 16th Dec Y5 Carol singing Park Farm Wed 17th Dec KS1 to church Wed 17th Dec Y5 Carol singing at Park Farm Wed 17th Dec Y1 Stay and Play 1.30 p.m. Wed 17th Dec Lawn Panto to parents Thur 18th Dec KS2 to church Thur 18th Dec Lawn Panto to parents Fri 19th Dec School closes for Christmas
break Mon 5th Jan School re-opens
Class Assemblies
Class Assemblies this year will be held in the Davies Hall at 9.00 a.m. unless otherwise notified.
Friday 24th October Y4A Friday 21st November Y6G and Y6W Friday 12th December Y2W Thursday 5th February YRL Friday 27th February Y3C Friday 6th March Y5M Friday 20th March YRA Friday 27th March Y4G Friday 24th April Y1C Friday 1st May Y3H Friday 15th May Y1S Friday 22nd May Y2Y Friday 19th June Y5A
Whilst every effort is made to ensure that all dates are correct when each newsletter is published
some dates may be subject to change
School Year 2014/15
Autumn Term 2014
Thursday 4th September – Friday 24th October
Monday 3rd November – Friday 19th December
Spring Term 2015
Monday 5th January – Friday 6th February
Monday 16th February – Friday 27th March
Summer Term 2015
Monday 13th April – Friday 22nd May
Monday 1st June –Thursday 23rd July
Bank Holidays
Christmas: 25th December 2014, 26th December 2014
New Year: 1st January 2015,
Good Friday: 3rd April 2015
Easter Monday: 6th April 2015
Monday 4th May 2015, Monday 25th May 2015, Monday 31st August 2015
INSET Days 2014 - 2015
Wednesday 15th October 2014
Friday 6th February 2015
Monday 13th April 2015
School Year 2015/16
Autumn Term 2015:
Monday 7 September 2015 – Friday 23 October 2015
35 days
Monday 2 November 2015 – Friday 18 December 2015
35 days
Spring term 2016:
Monday 4 January 2016 – Friday 12 February 2016
30 days
Monday 22 February 2016 – Thursday 24 March 2016
24 days
Summer Term 2016:
Monday 11 April 2016 – Friday 29 April 2016
15 days
Tuesday 3 May 2016 – Friday 27 May 2016
19 days
Monday 6 June 2016 – Tuesday 26 July 2016
37 days
Total (including up to 5 days to be set by schools as inset days)
195 days
Bank Holidays: Christmas - 25 December 2015, 26 December 2015 New Year - 1 January 2016 Good Friday – 25 March 2016 Easter Monday – 28 March 2016 May Day - 2 May 2016 Spring Bank - 30 May 2016 Summer Bank - 29 August 2016
LITERACY
If you've already attended your child's curriculum evening you may have discovered that one of the (many) things we are focussing on this year is presentation. We want our children to be proud of the work they produce here at Lawn and one of the first things to tackle is handwriting, not just in literacy but across all subjects. Handwriting? Why? In the age of emails and social media, why on earth would children be taught how to form letters and join their handwriting. Well, it's a dying skill and, we believe, an important one. Many employers now ask for handwritten applications from potential candidates and so it's important to make good handwriting and letter formation habitual from an early age. If you follow us on Twitter (@lawn_school) you may have seen pictures from our staff meeting where we have had specialised training on handwriting. We're introducing a semi cursive (which essentially means joined but not all letters joined) form of handwriting and from Foundation through to Year 6 your child will be taught discrete handwriting. This will be an intensive programme (10 minutes a day for the next few weeks. The intention is to raise standards of presentation for all children across the school. Now, if your child struggles with their handwriting, or doesn't think their handwriting is very good we know that this programme will help and support them. It's about building confidence in our children and enabling them to understand that they CAN produce beautiful handwriting. It's not just about handwriting, it's about self esteem. We already know, from feedback at the curriculum evenings that some of you are interested in supporting your child with their handwriting at home (this is wonderful to hear!) and so we are going to be holding some literacy "drop in" sessions so we can show you how we will be teaching this. These sessions won't just about handwriting, but about literacy in general and how you can help your child at
home. Our literacy co-ordinators, Mrs Clarke and Mrs Cousins will be in touch very soon with the details of these workshops and we hope lots of parents/carers will come and find out more.
MATHS CHALLENGE
Find the word that links the
pictures
Answer at the end of this newsletter
Newsletter Distribution
Our newsletters will be emailed to parents and will also be available on the school website. If we do not have your email address or it has changed please let the school office know as soon as possible. Copies will be available at reception if we cannot contact you by email.
Harvest Festival
Our annual Harvest Festival service will be taking place at St Nicholas’ church on Friday 3rd October. With the exception of our FS2 children all classes will be attending the service. If you would like to make a donation to the Padley Centre please bring your items in to school on Thursday 2nd October.
Battle of Bosworth
On Wednesday 10th September 2014 Year 6 did a re-enactment of the Battle of Bosworth. We have a quote from one of the people who took part (Honey Hickson) ‘This battle was great fun and I enjoyed fighting Taylor and winning’. There were three sides to our Battle of Bosworth. King Richard 111’s army, Henry Tudor’s army and Lord Stanley’s army. King Richard 111 had Lord Stanley’s poor young son captive so in the middle of this battle Lord Stanley changed sides. Henry Tudor was crowned King when King Richard’s army was destroyed. It was a great, fun experience of a historic, gruesome battle for the English throne.
Written by Oliver Riley, Francesca Rainsford and James Young
Staff in the Spotlight
Hi my name is Donna Hallam and I have only been working at Lawn Primary for a short amount of time but I am loving it. All the staff, children and parents have been so welcoming, thank you. Previous to working here and becoming a Deputy Headteacher I worked at another school in Derby City, and have lived in Derby all my life. However, I did spend three years by the seaside, in Bournemouth, studying for my degree and then I moved to Lincoln to obtain my PGCE. I loved both of these places but my favourite was Bournemouth as I love being by the sea! As much as I love being by the sea I really enjoy visiting capital cities and exploring different cultures and ways of life. I would love to go to places ranging from New York to Iceland. When I am not working I love spending time with family and friends. My favourite time is with my two little girls. We love being outside and and playing games and most of all reading books and creating things. We really like baking and trying new recipes out on the rest of the family. I am looking forward to being part of all aspects of Lawn Primary and to meeting many more of you in the future.
Governors Corner
Dear Parents and Carers, Hope everyone had a lovely summer and you are back into the school routine. School had a very busy and successful summer as major building work took place in the kitchen , front of the school and the floor in some of the infant classrooms. September has already seen some fantastic new initiatives with a handwriting expert going into every classroom and staff room and Andy Cope coming to work with our children. Governors have had a busy start to the year. Already this term we have evaluated our skills to check we have all the necessary skills , we have completed a self evaluation and agreed an action plan for 2014/15 and we have to review our constitution in line with statutory changes. When this has been approved by the local authority I will update you fully. Could I remind you how to contact Governors. You have various options: 1) Email [email protected]. Replies will be within 2/3 working days. 2) You can leave a message at the Office and a Governor will call you. 3) You can send a letter to school for the attention of the Chair of the Governing Body. 4) See a parent Governor at school ( see end of year report for a list of all Governors). Regards
Debbie Haynes Chair of Governors
Governor in the spotlight
Hi I’m Suzanne Dixon and I’m a parent governor here at Lawn. I have been a governor for just over a year and I sit on the finance, premises, health and safety committee. I am married to Wayne and we have three little girls. Olivia is in Mr Coopers class in year 1, Summer (4) and Amber (1) are at nursery. I work part time as a health and safety consultant and delivering training courses. In my spare time (I don’t have much!) I love spending time with my family. We are national trust members and can normally be found at one of their estate on a weekend. I’m a bit of a home baker and would love to be on bake off one day!
LSA News – September 2014
Welcome back !!! Thank you to everyone for
supporting our events last year. In total we
raised a brilliant £8,571.64. Due to the
continuing support and help offered by
parents and teachers, the children continue
to enjoy the benefits of the funds we have
raised during the year.
LSA Spending Overview
2013/14 – where the money
went !
Over the last school year we have funded :-
New outdoor equipment for play times;
annual visit from Pocket Panto; lots of books
through the commission received from
Scholastic and the Travelling Book Fair; two
outside storage sheds, revamp of infant
library; materials to run the KS2 Gardening
Club; megaphone to use at events, CD players
and earphones for infant children; equipment
for role play areas in FS2; various storage
units for all infant classrooms, Artist
workshop for Arts Week, magazines for
junior library; prizes for Lawn’s Got Talent;
the floats for Money Week; the Y6 Leavers
Party and finally fish tank supplies to keep
the fish happy and healthy in the Davies
corridor tank.
We are also contributing to the purchase of
a bank of iPads to benefit the whole school!
Tea and Tissues We held a ‘tea and tissues’ morning
for the new reception parents on the first day
of school. It was lovely to meet lots of new
parents over tea, coffee and cake ! All the
reception children took home at the end of
the day a ‘welcome’ yummy homemade
gingerbread man.
CD Bell
To all those who usually order
Autumn and Summer plants, the
wholesaler who supplies them has sadly
closed due to rising costs. We will be
looking in the future to see if we can find
any alternative company who would offer us
commission on plant purchases.
Rags2Riches
A big thank you to everyone
who supported the recent
rags2riches collection. We raised a
fantastic amount of £264.68. We really
appreciate you carrying your bags into school
for our collection.
Thank you to Y6W for moving the bags to
the van, there were 97 of them. You were
fantastic and the driver said how nice it was
to have you all helping so willingly,
enthusiastically and how much you seemed to
be enjoying doing it!
Another collection has been arranged for
January (date to be confirmed).
Scholastic Book Club
New catalogue will be circulated
at the beginning of November
after half-term. For every £1
you spend on books through Scholastic Book
Club, Lawn School receives 20% commission
to stock the library and classrooms. If in
the future you do order directly online then
please REMEMBER to select Lawn so we
receive the commission!
The Lawn Lottery
Give yourself the chance to win a
CASH PRIZE every month and School wins
every time!
Prize money currently stands at £79.
We want to try and get the prize up to a
huge £100 per month, but we can only
achieve this if we get just a few more
members. You have to be in it, to win it !
It only costs £2 a month - £1 goes to the
prize fund and £1 to School – and is
collected by a monthly direct debit or one-
off annual payment.
Please pop into the school office to find out
more and pick up a registration form.
Lottery Winners - July Ball No 34 Amanda
Clarke wins £84.00
August Ball No 21 Jill
Alcock wins £84.00
For those of you who
don’t know about the
Nearly New Uniform Rail,
it is available all year round
and is stocked from your donations of good
quality unwanted uniform.
Do you know that every time you shop online
you could be raising money for the school for
FREE! Over 3,000 retailers (including
Amazon, M&S, Boden, Argos, Debenhams,
Vodafone, Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Ebay, Toys r
Us, Next and many more..) will donate a
percentage of what you spend when you shop
with them, via fundraising website
http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk. Instead
of going directly to the retailer’s website, go
to http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk FIRST
- click on "I want to support a good cause"
then select Lawn School Association (LSA)
School PTA – Derbyshire, Allestree using
the easy search box and click ‘Support’,
sign up in just a couple of minutes and then
choose the retailer you want to shop with, you
will then be redirected back to the retailer’s
website and then everything you spend with
that retailer earns a donation to school. It’s
completely free to use and your shopping
won’t cost you a penny more – the stores
donate the money not you !
Some of you may have heard of (or even
used) Easy2Name products before but for
those who haven’t, they specialise in iron and
sew on labels, stickers and tags for school
clothing, lunchboxes, shoes, gym bags,
backpacks etc.
Easy2Name will give our school 20%
commission every time an order is made! You
can order over the phone or via the internet
www.easy2name.com. Be sure to quote our
reference Lawn School Association DE22 on
all orders.
We have a few samples of labels and tags if
you would like to take a look, please ask at
the school office. Many thanks for your
support in this fundraising activity
Yellow Moon
Parents now order online
throughout the year, so please remember to
always quote the LSA’s source code when
ordering – SLA1157.
LSA Noticeboard
Don’t forget, we have our own
LSA noticeboard on the wall next to the
Nearly New Uniform rail in the Smedley
Hall. This will be kept up to date with all our
forthcoming events for the school year –
please come and have a read ...
Lawn School Association
(“LSA”)
The LSA is our school parent-
teacher association (PTA).
PTAs are best known for their fundraising
work but they have a useful social function
too as fundraising events provide an
opportunity for parents, staff and pupils to
get together. The money raised at our
events (e.g. Christmas Fair, Easter Bingo,
School Discos, Travelling Book Fair, Dinner
and Dance, etc.) are intended to provide
‘extras’ not already provided by the school's
main income – often 'fun things' that make
learning more interesting and exciting.
A new LSA Committee will be elected on
30th September 2014 - Louise Hubner (Y3
and reception mum), Terri Gotts (Y1 mum),
Clare Shelton (Y4 and Y6 mum) and Emma
Taylor-Brittan (Y1 mum) !!! If anyone
would still like to join the committee then
PLEASE get in touch as it is really useful to
have as many committee members as
possible.
If there are any parents/carers who don’t
fancy being on the committee but would like
to help the new committee with running of
events, etc. but who only have a limited
amount of time or would like to form a sub-
committee for helping with a particular
event, then please get in touch via the LSA
Hotmail address to let them know what you
would be comfortable doing – we never turn
away any offers of help, however small – the
more parents involved the easier it all is !
If you would also like to be on our circular e-
mailing list to be kept in the loop e.g.
receiving the minutes of our meetings, etc.
then please send your email address to our
Hotmail account below.
The next LSA Meeting and
AGM will be on
Tuesday – 30th September,
2014 at 7.00 pm at school
Everyone please come along
to our next friendly meeting
to find out what the LSA will
be planning
for this school year !
The LSA Team
Maths challenge answer: rotate