HEMPSTED CHURCH OF ENGLAND

PRIMARY SCHOOL

OCTOBER 2016 NEWSLETTER

Tuesday 4th October, 2016

Dear Parent/Carer

Welcome to the second newsletter of this school year. It has been a very busy start to the term and the summer holidays seem long gone. All of the committees that help support the running of the school have met: the Friends, the Governing Body and the School Council. Please make sure that you read the newsletter carefully so that you are up-to-date with what’s happened, and what’s planned!

SCHOOL COUNCIL ELECTIONS

On Tuesday 20th September we held the elections for the 2016 - 2017 School Council. Everyone who made a poster and put themselves forward as a candidate was included on the ballot paper for their class. The votes were cast and counted. Correct voting procedures were followed and everyone was, once again, made aware of the democratic process and how it links to our British Values. In fact given the profile of politics at the moment (Brexit and American elections) many of the children were already very interested and knowledgeable about the role of democracy in society. A big thank you to Mrs Gardner and Miss Falwasser who assisted with the voting process, and took on the roles of ‘Returning Officers’!

The results of the election are as follows:

Y3 – Imogen Mansell and Miguel Iglesias

Y4 – Theo Grinnell and Shayna Trim

Y5 – Eoin Yates and Evie-Mae Biddle

Y6 – Anna Bowman and Ethan Badham

Well done to all of these children! Their photographs and roles will be on display in the Key Stage Two corridor and on their classroom doors.

The new Council have already met for the first time. In this meeting, they learned about the role of the Chairperson, Vice Chairperson, Secretary and Treasurer. They then voted, and elected the following: Theo Grinnell (Chair); Anna Bowman (Vice-Chair); Eoin Yates (Secretary) and Ethan Badham (Treasurer).

SCHOOL COUNCIL

I must say a big thank you to the School Councillors from last year. They worked hard for the good of the school and their fellow pupils. Last year’s council were responsible for choosing ‘St James City Farm’ and ‘Winston’s Wish’ as our charities for the year. They raised £230 for each of the charities. They also took an active interest in the school community and ensured that their peers had the opportunity for their thoughts and ideas to be heard. Last year’s School Council were also involved with interviewing for a new teacher, ensuring that pupils had a voice in the selection of staff.

HARVEST FESTIVAL

As advised last Friday, Harvest Festival is on Wednesday 5th October. We will be taking the children to the church for a service at 2pm.

We would be very grateful if harvest gifts could be brought into school on Wednesday morning. All harvest gifts will be donated to the Gloucester Foodbank. A reminder of appropriate items is below.

• Long life fruit juice

• Long life Milk

• Tinned cold meat e.g. corned beef/ham

• Tinned fish

• Cereal e.g. Weetabix

• Tinned sponge pudding for families

• Small Jar of Coffee

• Packet Mash

• Packet noodles

ADMISSION SEPTEMBER 2017

Paper work for primary / infant admission will be posted out by mid November 2016. If you have not received a pack by December you will need to contact Admissions and Transfer Team at Shire Hall Tel: 01452 425407

DOES YOUR CHILD HAVE A DIAGNOSIS OF ASTHMA?

If your child has a diagnosis of asthma, then your child should have their inhaler in school at all times. Please also be aware that the school has an emergency inhaler. This is for emergency use only, when the child’s blue inhaler is not available. However, we are only able to administer the school inhaler IF you have signed and returned a completed permission form. Last year, when we advertised this, only two replies were received, which is very concerning given the number of pupils with a diagnosis.

SNACKS … A REMINDER

The children in Reception, Class One and Class Two are provided with a piece of fruit for their morning snack. This is provided free by the Government as part of the Free Fruit and Veg Scheme. The children in Key Stage Two (Classes 3, 4, 5, and 6) need to have in school

a healthy snack for their morning playtime. This might be a piece of fruit or vegetable, a piece of cheese, a fruit bar, a pack of dried fruit or an ‘easy to eat’ yoghurt. Please avoid sending your child with snacks that are high in sugar / salt (crisps/ sweet biscuits).

LOST PROPERTY

You would not believe how much lost property there is!! The box, after only four weeks back is full of lost items of clothing, all unnamed or with names that have faded so much they are unreadable. Please can you encourage your child to look for anything that is missing!

RECEPTION PARENTS’ PHONICS AND EARLY YEARS FOUNDATION STAGE CURRICULUM EVENING

Thank you to the parents of Reception children who made the time to come along to the very informative presentation by Miss Quick. Parents attending received information about the ‘Letters and Sounds’ programme, which forms the basis of our phonics teaching. Parents listened to how to say some of the sounds correctly. They were told about some of the different learning activities that their children take part in, as well as the words and type of books that they will start to bring home and how to share them with their child. Key features of The Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum were explained and the outline of key features in our Reception class was talked through including ‘WOW vouchers’!

INSTRUMENT TUITION

We are very lucky to have a wealth of musical abilities within our staff. They are supported by peripatetic teachers who work in Hempsted on a weekly basis to provide musical instrument lessons. These lessons are for small groups of children and are paid for on a termly basis. We are currently very fortunate to have the skills of the following teachers:

Woodwind –Miss Atkinson on Wednesdays

Guitar –Mrs Griffiths on Mondays

Piano / Keyboard – Mrs Roberts on Tuesdays

SCHOOL DRIVE

When dropping off for clubs, including Breakfast Club, or picking up from after school clubs, matches or Hempsted After-School Club please do not drive into school. In the morning there are staff arriving and deliveries. On some evenings there are up to four clubs taking place. There are too many cars to ensure that children are as safe as possible when arriving at or leaving school. In our Home School Agreement, which was recently sent home, and which all parents sign up to prior to their child starting school, it states that parents will:

‘Have regard for children’s safety by NOT using the school drive for drop offs, parking or turning’.

BIKES AND SCOOTERS

Whilst on the subject of safety, there are a number of children scooting to school. This is great! However, please can we remind everyone that bikes and scooters should be wheeled, not ridden whilst on the school premises.

ABSENCE

If your child is absent, please ensure that you phone the office on the first morning of your child’s absence and on every subsequent day of their absence.

PARENTS / TEACHER CONSULTATION EVENINGS – MONDAY 17th OCTOBER and WEDNESDAY 19th OCTOBER

These are an opportunity for you and the teachers to discuss your child in terms of how they have settled at the start of the new academic year, progress, targets and anything else of particular relevance. You will receive a letter early next week. Please complete the information on the letter and return to the class teacher as soon as possible and certainly by the deadline date.

If you have some flexibility within the times available, please indicate this in the letter by ticking more than one time slot. Staff will endeavour to give you a time that meets with your request. They will also liaise with the other teachers to take account of times allocated to brothers / sisters.

CLASS ASSEMBLIES

Class assemblies will be starting very shortly. All classes will perform 2 assemblies over the course of the academic year. Please check the dates at the back of the letter for those that are taking place this term.

The Friends of Hempsted – our Parent Teacher Association (PTA)

The Friends of Hempsted had another very active year in 2015-2016. Below is the Chair’s End of Year Report. I’m sure you’ll join me in thanking Jenny and everyone else who supported the Friends, for their hard-work and dedication to the children of the school.

Hempsted School Friends Chair End of Year Report 2015-16

Jenny Shephard

Introduction

Thanks again to everyone who has helped to make this another very successful year for the

Hempsted friends, especially those on the committee. The committee has been smaller than in

previous years, and with a large number of members leaving again as their children have moved on

to secondary school we really need to get some new members for the coming year. We have again

been able to put on a wide variety of events, as well as supporting a variety of events and activities.

During the year we have raised £3,257.96 with £4,340.90 spent for the benefit of all Hempsted

primary school children.

Events and money raised

Our most profitable event this year was the barbeque, it was a fun evening enjoyed by all and we

raised £1,550.73, which is similar to last year’s total. As noted in previous year’s reports we continue

to struggle recruiting enough helpers, which can result in long shifts, however all helpers did turn up

when they said they would. This year we had to pull several stalls at the last minute due to a lack of

help, we need to continue to address this situation. Also this year, for the first time, we tried to

allocate the running of 7 stalls to parents from each class. This worked well for some classes, but not

for others where we had no one willing to organise helpers.

The fireworks evenings in previous years have raised in excess of £500. Due to new health and safety

restrictions and the locality of newly built houses, the location for the fireworks was moved to the

Gordon League, with the Gordon League taking on responsibility for the evening. The friends

provided support and sold sweets, raising a total of £104.39.

The Easter hampers, valentines disco and leavers disco were all very successful events bringing in

£406.00, £419.98, £313.72 respectively. The Easter hampers and discos are yearly events and

continue to be very profitable, the discos are also very much enjoyed by the children and are not

solely about making money, this year all of these events made more than in the previous year.

Second hand uniform sales are always popular and raised £149.51, almost double last years total. At

the end of 2014-2015 we moved the uniform sale to the last Tuesday of every half term so parents

are aware of when it will happen.

We raised £38.40 through the donation of old clothes to clothes for a cause and £282.78 from

donations at the Infant nativity and year six leaver’s event.

In total we raised £3,257.96.

Expenditure

We have spent significantly less this year than last, but still spent more than we raised.

Our main expenditure was £1200 on the WW1 whole school mosaic, which was created by all of the

children and is now on display. Also £1,150 was spent on coaches to take the whole school to the

pantomime in Tewkesbury, this is a much enjoyed biennial event.

As last year, £700 was spent on our annual visit from the Life Education Van, a visit that all children

look forward to keenly and recall happily over their time at our School. Classroom expenses

remained constant at £525 over the year.

A new expenditure that we have started as of the end of this year is to pay £150 termly to provide a

prize for the house that has collected the most house points that term. In the summer term we paid

for a drumming experience.

We had various other small expenditures during the year, such as providing refreshments at various

events. In total we spent £4,340.90 during the year leaving £6003.42 in the bank as this year’s

starting figure. The end of year bank balance remains healthy even though we spent approximately

£1100 more than we raised. It will be important to consider this year whether we could introduce a

new regular fundraiser especially now that we no longer put on the fireworks.

Full details of the accounts can be found in the end of year accounts summary 2015-16.

Closing Comments

I would like to thank everyone who has worked on the committee with me during the last year and

helped to make 2015-16 another successful year, as well as everyone else who has helped at our

events. Thank you especially to Sophie Crompton, who has continued in the role of treasurer and

Francesca Martin and Louise Falwasser who have been co-secretaries during the previous year. I

would also like to thank Francesca Martin and Steve Martin for all of their help over many years,

they have left the committee as their child has now moved on to Secondary school.

I look forward to another successful year with lots of exciting events happening and new people

joining the committee. It will be good to see some new faces and I hope that we can work together

to get more support at our main fundraisers – the fireworks and barbeque next summer.

Preparations are already under way for our fireworks night on the 4th

November. However, as my

youngest child is now in year 6, whilst I will remain on the committee during her last year at

Hempsted, I have decided after 7 years that is now time to hand over the position of chair to

someone else.

Thank you to everyone who has supported me in this role during this time.

You will note in Jenny’s closing comments that after many years of dedicated service to the committee, she is stepping down from the role of Chair. On behalf of everyone at the school, may I thank Jenny for all of her work for the Friends, and ultimately for the children of the school. THANK YOU JENNY!

At the recent Friends’ meeting, I am pleased to inform you that Mrs Jo Wilkinson has been voted to be the Chair for this coming year. Thank you, Jo!

FIREWORKS EVENING

Preparations are underway for this year’s firework display. The event is once again being organised by Gordon League RFC, in association with the school. We hope that you will be able to join us on the 4th November. Gates open at 6pm with the display scheduled for 6.30pm. Tickets will be available soon from the school, club and post office and cost £3.50 for adults, £2 for children. You can also purchase tickets on the gate (£4/£2.50).

Stone Age day - Class 3

On Tuesday 13th September, Class 3 had a Stone Age day. A lady called Sandra came to our class and taught us about it. She showed us some fur, a leopard, a hare and a tiger. She showed us some amazing arrowheads. They were big and small.

We did some chalk hands and then smudged them. We did some colouring and we became archaeologists and dug objects out of the sand. We had to decide whether they were from the Stone Age or not. We did some cave painting and built Stonehenge out of Kapla (wooden blocks). She showed us some Stone Age necklaces made out of horses hair as well. It was a great day.

Written by Miguel and Imogen

YEAR 5 SCIENCE

In recent weeks,Class 5 were lucky enough to have two visits from Mrs Green from The Crypt

School. Mrs Green is a primary outreach officer for The Crypt School and is passionate about Science

learning. Under her close supervision, the children learned that light is made up of many colours,

proving this by making a rainbow spinner. The children designed their own investigations and

discovered that light travels in straight lines. They recorded data and discovered what ‘variables’

are! We are very grateful to Mrs Green for making Science fun!

WELL DONE EX-PUPIL FRASER MARTIN!

In last year’s October newsletter, I celebrated two of our pupils for acting roles that they had landed. One of those pupils was Fraser Martin, who was a Year 6 pupil last year. Fraser was chosen to play King Henry III following the “Search for a King” competition. King Henry III was the last British King to be crowned outside of London and this was 800 years ago in 1216. Incredibly he was only 9 years old at the time, hence why he was known as ‘The Boy King’. A big well done to Fraser, whose previous big performance was as ‘Gran’ in the Year 6 production of The Amazing Adventures of Superstan’, earning him the coveted HAFTA – the Hempsted Academy for the Arts’ award. I have a feeling we will see more of him in the future!

YEAR 2’S TIME CAPSULE

The Year 2 children were recently spotted in the outdoor learning area. Rather interestingly, they were seen to be burying something – their writing. They have put their writing into a time capsule, and hopefully, if they can remember where they put it, will dig it back up again in the summer to discover how much their writing has improved!

CROSS COUNTRY

For the last 3 weeks we have had a huge number of keen and dedicated runners arriving before

school for cross country trials. It has been amazing to see their enthusiasm and determination

running laps of the field and playground with their fellow schoolmates and parents cheering them

on. This week the qualifying runners will receive their letters and classes 4, 5 and 6 children will

continue to train before school on Wednesday mornings and classes 2 and 3 will now train on

Wednesday lunchtime. These children will need to bring in a packed lunch.

The Primary Cross Country Championships will take place on Tuesday 15th

November from 10:30 –

2:30 at Plock Court. Please come along and support your child and the Hempsted Team.

NETBALL

With the help of 2 amazing netballers from Ribston Hall Sixth Form, Susie Ward and Kiah Hunter,

Hempsted’s netball team have started the season at the Primary High Five Netball tournament with

a great start. They played 4 games; winning 3 and losing 1.

Hempsted 6 Dinglewell B 0 ; Hempsted 0 Dinglewell A 5; Hempsted 2 Longney 0

Hempsted 1 St Peters 0

We took a squad of 12 children with everybody taking part. This Tuesday we have our first league

game against Kingsway Primary School. Good luck team.

GIRLS FOOTBALL

With the girls having only 1 training session we kicked off the season with an away game to St

Peters. The girls played in a variety of positions and played some amazing football, both in attack

and defence. The score ended in a 0 0 draw. Freya Elias-Harvey showed great skill on the ball up

front with Bismah Bhaiyat and Charlotte Chambers showing great support in mid field alongside

Shakira Wilson. Anna Bowman came on in defence but was pushed up to midfield where she

dominated. Isabella Kemley-Franklin, Amy Hajer and Mae Gleadow Quick played strongly in defence

supporting Charlie Beresford who saved some amazing goals. Well done girls…keep it up.

SPORTS

Already several matches have taken place. Can we please remind you, and the children, of the following:

HEMPSTED C OF E PRIMARY SCHOOL SPORTS TEAMS

Codes of Conduct

For Players

1. Always play by the rules and respect the referee’s decisions.

2. Work equally hard for both yourself and the team. In this way everyone’s performance will improve.

3. Be a good sport and appreciate good play whether by your team or opponents. After a game we have ‘3 cheers’ and shake hands.

4. Remember that the real goals of the game are to enjoy it, improve your skills and

feel good – don’t show off.

5. Hempsted has a long tradition and a good reputation for success and good play in team support. It is your responsibility to continue in the same spirit.

For Parents

1. Always encourage your child to play by the rules.

2. Do not openly question the referee’s judgement – nor his/her honesty.

3. Support all efforts to remove verbal abuse from the touchline.

4. Applaud good play by both sides.

5. Remember that children are involved in sport for their enjoyment and benefit – not yours.

6. Help your child to be gracious in victory and defeat. Losing must be accepted without undue disappointment.

7. Monitor the number of games your child plays. Make sure he/she has fully recovered from injury before playing again.

8. Above all support your child and the school.

9. As parents (as well as sports coaches) we know the parental role can be both demanding but very rewarding. Your responsibility may include:

• taxi service to matches

• laundry for kit

• counsellor after defeat

• nurse after sports injury

• supporter on the touchline

• practice in the garden/the park

• agent, realist and general gopher

Once again, thank you for your ongoing support.

Yours sincerely

Mr R Waller

IMPORTANT DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

OCTOBER

Wednesday 5th

2pm

Y6 Science session delivered by Crypt School

Harvest Festival at St Swithuns Church

Thursday 6th 9.20am Y5 Class Assembly

Tuesday 11th 6.30pm Y4 Parents Information Session for the

residential to The Wilderness.

Wednesday 12th Y6 Science session delivered by Crypt School

Monday 17th pm Parent / Teacher Consultations

Wednesday 19th pm Parent / Teacher Consultations

Thursday 20th 9.20am Y1 Class assembly

TERM 1 ENDS (FOR PUPILS) 3.15pm

Friday 21st INSET DAY – STAFF ONLY

Monday 31st 9am Term 2 Starts

Deadline day for Secondary School

Application forms (Y6 pupils)

NOVEMBER

Friday 4th 6pm Firework Display at Gordon League

Monday 21st am School Photographer – Individual/sibling photos

DECEMBER (Advance Notice)

Wed-Fri 7th-9th 9.30am KS1 Christmas Performances (details to follow)

Tues-Thurs 13th-15th 9.30am KS2 Christmas Performances (details to follow)

Friday 16th 2pm End of Term 2