Friday, 9 May 2008

9th May, 2008.

Dear Parent/Carer,

Ethiopian Water Crisis

In recent weeks the people of Ethiopia have suffered a severe water shortage. The water wells, built with money raised by the children of St. Joseph's, proved to be a valuable lifeline for the people of Addis Alem, when all other water dried up. This is an incredible example of how this school community, has not only contributed improving the lives of others – but also saving the lives of others! We should be proud of what we have achieved and look forward to making more of a difference in the future.

Reception

The reception class will be buying fruit from Tesco next week to make a fruit salad. Please let Mrs. Rollings know if your child can’t take part or has any allergies.

Holiday Request Form

When you request a holiday form for your child/ren to take a holiday during term-time, parents also need to attach a letter explaining the reason for the holiday. We have several forms in the office, without letters explaining the reason for requested leave. Please can any parents who have submitted a form only, send a letter in to the office as soon as possible.

Absence

If your child/ren are absent from school, could you please telephone the school office or inform the school in writing. If we do not receive a message, the school will telephone to confirm your child is at home for a valid reason.

Celebration of Achievements

Luke Staddon, Estella Maloney-Danvers, Marissa Peart, David Koleczko, Harry Barton,
Matthew Klamanski.
Monday's Celebration Assembly will be held in the school hall at 3pm. All parents are welcome.

Year 3-4 Parents – KEEPING UP WITH THE KIDS COURSE

Flyers will be sent out today to parents of children in Year 3 and 4 about this exciting course. The couse has been designed to enable parents to develop their own Maths and Computer skills whilst working with their children, who are improving their own skills. It is a 6 week course that will take place every Tuesday afternoon in school. Half of the session will be adults only and the second half will be with the children.
If successful we hope to plan similar sessions and open them to other groups of parents. Please see the flyers for futher details.

After School Activities

Recently we received a couple of comments (thank you!) in the suggestion boxes regarding after school activities. The parent asked whether more activivities could be arrange for different age groups of children and whether parents can be more involved?
It is the schools aim to provide a wide range of activities for all ages of children and we have managed to provide something for all ages this year. We hope to develop this in school more next year, but we are finding managing this additional provision quite a challenge (managing finance, managing staff from outside school, ensuring health and safety requirements are met – that your children are looked after and are safe).
We are very plaesed with how this side of school life has improved this year and more will be on offer next year. This will include more activities shared with other local schools and sometimes offered in different locations.
As far a parental contributions are concerned, we all know that parents have much to contribute and I welcome any suggestions. However we need to ensure that children are always safe and that we follow all proper procedures. This can make it difficult to invite parents in to work with children without CRB checks (which we can do easily) and a school member of staff (who is a First Aider) to help supervise the activity (this is sometimes more difficult to arrage). We have also had to ensure that adults volunteering to coach PE activities are fully qualified and we are trying to get a parent onto a Food Hygeine Certifivcate, so they can take small groups for cookery. So it can be done, it just takes a bit more organisation!
If there is something that as a parent you could contribute for an after school activity, please let me know and we can start organising things now.
A big thank you to the parent who made these useful comments.

Clifton Cathedral

Year 6 leavers will be going to the Clifton Cathedral on Wednesday, 18thh June, at 1.00pm.
All parents are welcome to join us at the Cathedral.

Dates for Diaries

Monday 12th May Start of KS2 SATS week
Tuesday 20th May Mrs Rollings/Miss Wright’s – Bristol Zoo
Tuesday 20th May Mrs Ford/Mr Sherwin’s – SS Great Britian
Friday 23rd May End of Term 5 – School closes
Monday 2nd June INSERVICE DAY
Monday 2nd June Start of Term 6 Wednesday 11th June Y6 – Bristol Cathedral
Wednesday 18th June Y6 – Leavers Mass (Clifton Cathedral)
Saturday 21st June Summer Fayre
Friday 25th July End of Term 6 – Summer Holidays.

Wednesday, 7 May 2008

7th May, 2008.

Dear Parent/Carers,

PTFA Meeting

Just a reminder that the PTFA meeting is tonight at the Cross Hands Pub, Fishponds – 7.00pm.

School Celebration Assembly

There will be a school celebration assembly on Monday 12th May at 3.00pm; this is because of SATS week. Children’s names for the achievement awards will be in Friday’s newsletter.

Non-Uniform

St Mark’s Team the points competition last term, so it will be a non-uniform day for them. Well done.

Tesco/Sainsburys Vouchers

We are going to start a competition between the four school teams to see who can
Collect the most supermarket sports vouchers for the rest of the school year. Each voucher point will equal one point to the total. A chart will go up in the hall to show how many vouchers each team has collected so far. The team who has collected the most vouchers by the end of term 6 will get to have a non-uniform day as a reward! All you have to do is bring in all the vouchers you can from home and put them in your teams coloured voucher box in the foyer.

Year 6 SATs

Year 6 have worked tremendously hard and have been very focused on their learning. I have been genuinely impressed by how well they have worked as a team. We all know that they will do their best. Good luck for next week!

I hope you are all enjoying the sunshine!

Best wishes

Matt Condon
Headteacher

Friday, 2 May 2008

2nd May 2008

2nd May, 2008.

Dear Parent/Carer,

Behaviour

Occasionally during discussions with parents, we are told that advice has been given to children to ‘hit back’ if they have been hurt. This advice does not support our behaviour policy and makes it very difficult to resolve situations fairly. The best advice parents can give, is to make sure their child tells an adult immediately if they have been hurt. Any problems can be then dealt with swiftly.

Collecting children from school

To ensure the safety of all children we must insist of the following:

· Children can only be collected by legal parent/carers if the school is informed by telephone or letter – no verbal messages to staff other than office staff
· If you wish another adult (even Grandparents) to collect your child on regular basis, we need written permission

Thank you for you co-operation.

School Uniform

It has come to me attention that girls have started wearing leggings as wear as their dresses/skirts. Leggings are not part of school uniform. Tights are a perfectly acceptable alternative.

My First Poem

Some of the children’s work for ‘My First Poem’ series has been selected for publication in
one of the books representing the best of the children’s work. The children were helped to
write their first poem and dedicate it to someone special, and here are the names:

Lara Brown, Jeleil Manmohan, Jordan Toy, Emily Webb, James Ayton-Lambourne, Alfie Ferris, Harry Barton, Charlotte Petrie, Andre Chipperfield, Luke Briones, Johann Manosh
Jakub Spocinski, Hannah Richards, Tejal Sebastian, Izza Chaudhry, Bethany Prasad, Samuel Toye, Geore Hickey and Joseph Calloway.

Postponed School Trips

The postponed educational school trips will now take place:-

Bristol Zoo – Mrs Rollings and Miss Wrigth’s Class – Tuesday 20th May
SS Great Britian – Mrs Ford and Mr Sherwin’s Class – Tuesday 20th May


School Activemark 2007
We are proud to announce the school has been awarded this prestigious mark.
This mark was awarded due to the high quality PE and school sport enjoyed by children in school and in after school activities. Well done to all the children and staff and Mr. Tilmouth who has led the improvement in PE this year.

Dates for Diaries

Wednesday 7th May Joseph Performance at St Joseph’s Old People’s Home
Monday 12th May Start of KS2 SATS week
Tuesday 20th May Mrs Rollings/Miss Wright’s – Bristol Zoo
Tuesday 20th May Mrs Ford/Mr Sherwin’s – SS Great Britian
Friday 23rd May End of Term 5 – School closes
Monday 2nd June INSERVICE DAY
Monday 2nd June Start of Term 6 Wednesday 11th June Y6 – Bristol Cathedral
Wednesday 18th June Y6 – Leavers Mass (Clifton Cathedral)
Saturday 21st June Summer Fayre
Friday 25th July End of Term 6 – Summer Holidays.

25th April

Dear Parent/Carer,

Welcome back to you all. We look forward to an exciting spring of learning in St. Joseph’s.

Attendance – A Reminder

As you know good attendance is the key to successful learning.

If your child needs to see the Doctor, Dentist or other for a medical reason, and an appointment outside school hours is not possible, it is far less disruptive to learning if these appointments are made for the end of the school day.

We would like to thank parents for your support in this important area.

Jewellery

Children should not wear jewellery to school. The school will not be responsible
for any loss or damage to property or person resulting from the bringing of
jewellery into school. Please note: children with pierced ears whose parents
wish them to wear earrings must, for safety wear studs rather than other types
of earrings. Children who wear earrings must remove (or tape) them for all PE and sporting activities on Health and Safety grounds.

Netball

Netball resumes next Monday, 28th April.

Postponed School Trips

The final closing date for these educational visits is today. Hopefully we will have
secured the majority of funding so that the visits can go ahead as planned.

Parents to support children reading for KS2 SATs

We are in need of readers to support some of our Y6 pupils when taking their SATs
on the following dates; Monday 12th May, Thursday 15th May, Friday 16th May.

This support would be incredibly helpful. Please contact the school office or see Mrs. Joseph or Mr. Conlon if you can help (by early next week if possible).

Celebration of Achievements

Dates for Diaries

Friday 25th April Infant Party
Wednesday 7th May Joseph Performance at St Joseph’s Old People’s Home
Monday 12th May Start of KS2 SATS week
Friday 23rd May End of Term 5 – School closes
Monday 2nd June INSERVICE DAY
Monday 2nd June Start of Term 6 Wednesday 11th June Y6 – Bristol Cathedral
Wednesday 18th June Y6 – Leavers Mass (Clifton Cathedral)
Saturday 21st June School Summer Fayre
Saturday 28th June Parish Summer Fayre
Friday 25th July End of Term 6 – Summer Holidays.

Tuesday, 22 April 2008

4th April

Dear Parent/Carer,

PTFA Infant Party

There are only limited spaces left for the infant party, so as not to be disappointed
hurry up and buy yours.

Postponed School Trips

Can I again confirm that the planned trips to the SS Great Britain and Bristol Zoo are
now postponed until May. This is dependent on us receiving funds to cover costs (currently we have not received a sufficient amount).

Some parents have requested a breakdown of costs for the planned school trips (all
costs per child):

SS Great Britain – Coach = £6.66, Entry = £3.95, requested contributions = £10

Bristol Zoo – Coach = £5.35, Entry = £6.47, requested contributions = £10

As you can see we are already making a loss on these educational visits, even with 100% of contributions received.

The final closing date for these visits (money and permission slip) is now Friday 25th April.

Spring Holiday

The school closes for the Spring Hoilday today Friday 4th April, and re-opens
on Tuesday 22nd April. Monday 21st April is an In-service Day.

Holidays during Term Time

If you request a holiday form, you also need to enclose an explanatory letter.

Absence Policy

A reminder if your child is unwell and unable to attend school we ask you to please
inform us by telephone or by letter by 9.30am. If a message has not been received
we will need to contact the home address to confirm the whereabouts of your child.
We cannot take a message from a child it has to be from the parent/carer.

Dates for Diaries

Friday 4th April End of Term 4 – School closes for holiday
Monday 21st April INSERVICE DAY
Tuesday 22nd April Start of Term 5 – School re-opens
Friday 25th April Start of Term Mass in the School Hall
Friday 25th April Infant Party
Monday 12th May Start of KS2 SATS week
Friday 23rd May End of Term 5 – School closes
Monday 2nd June INSERVICE DAY
Tuesday 3rd June Start of Term 6
Friday 25th July End of Term 6 – Summer Holidays.

School Website and Blog

The Blog (www.stjoesblog.blogspot.com) is being updated daily, with lots of work, comments, photos, video and audio clips. We think it is amazing and really shows what a great time we have learning in St. Joseph’s. Please have a look with your families and make a comment!

We all hope you all have a happy and peaceful Spring Holiday.

Yours Sincerely

Matt Condon



Headteacher

Friday, 28 March 2008

Dear Parent/Carer,

Student Support Centre

Packs will be sent home early next week from the ‘Student Support Service’. This is a private company who provide home learning support at a financial cost. Whilst we are happy to send this information home we are not recommending any particular product.

However, for every reply slip that is returned into school the ‘Student Support Service’ will make a contribution into school funds. They will make a contribution even if the reply slip says you are not interested! So please return the slips so we can raise some additional funds.

Postponed School Trips



KS1 Multi Skills Club

After an initial funded period we are now able to offer this club to children already involved, for a small fee. The cost will be £15 for 15 sessions between now and the end of the summer term. If you would like your child to continue in these sessions, please send a cheque for the amount into the school office, payable to ‘St. Joseph’s School’.

PTFA Events

The PTFA held a very successful meeting this week. They are now able to announce the dates of several events:-

Infant Party Friday 25th April – 7.00-9.00pm
Tickets £3.00 each – Family Ticket £10.00

Friday 4th April – Cake Sale

Summer Fayre - Saturday June 21st.

More information will be coming from the PTFA next week.

Spring Holiday

The school will close for the Spring Hoilday on Friday 4th April. School re-opens
On Tuesday 22nd April, as Monday 21st April is an Inservice Day

St George’s Day

Rainbows, Beavers, Cubs, Brownies, Scouts and Guides can were their uniform to
school on Wednesday, 23rd April, to celebrate St George’s Day.

Celebration of Achievements

Owen Ridler, Sandra Paslawska,

All parents are welcome to Monday’s Celebration Assembl

Assistant Headteachers

Last week the school Governors appointed two permanent Assistant Headteachers: Mrs. Rollings was appointed to lead the Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 (Infants) and Mrs. Joseph was appointed to lead Key Stage 2 (Juniors). These permanent posts will begin this September.

Mrs. Patton and Mrs. Joseph are currently acting Assistant Headteachers and will
be able to assist you if I am unavailable.

Dates for Diaries

Friday 4th April PTFA Cake Sale
Friday 4th April End of Term 4 – School closes for holiday
Monday 21st April INSERVICE DAY
Tuesday 22nd April Start of Term 5 – School re-opens
Friday 25th April Infant Party
Monday 12th May Start of KS2 SATS week
Friday 23rd May End of Term 5 – School closes
Monday 2nd June Start of Term 6 – School re-opens
Saturday 21st June Summer Fayre
Friday 25th July End of Term 6 – Summer Holidays.

Wednesday, 12 March 2008

13th March, 2008

Dear Parents/Carers,

Mrs. Rollings Class Assembly

As many of you are aware, Mrs Rollings has not been into school the last couple of
days due to ill health. This means her class’s assembly will now take place next Wednesday at 9.15am. All parents, carers and friends are welcome.

St. Joseph’s Day Celebrations - Tomorrow

Due to the cancelation of Receptions assembly we have organised a special St. Joseph’s Day Liturgical service in school. This service will begin at 9.15am. All parents, carers and friends
are welcome.

Also as part of St. Joseph’s Day celebrations we will be having a special non-uniform day tomorrow. Each child needs to contribute 50p which will be donated to Cafod to help others around the world.

Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat performance – Video

We are recording these performances on video. The PTFA plan to edit and sell the performances on DVD to raise funds. If however, your child is in the performance, but you would not like them to be included in the video, please put your request in writing and pass it
to the school office.

Holy Week Celebration

We would like to invite all parents, carers and friends to a special Holy week celebration on Maundy Thursday (20th March). This service will take place in the school hall and will begin at 9.15am

Best wishes

Matt Condon
Headteacher