The Link Newsletter #52

Friday 3rd November 2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

We look forward to welcoming you to our Parent Evenings next week, Tuesday 7th and 9th November. You should have already booked your appointment time, but if you have not, it is there is still time to book. Class teachers should have made contact with parents of children with One Plans to arrange a separate meeting to discuss the progress towards achieving their targets. We try our hardest to keep to the appointment times, but this can sometimes go awry.

You can help us by:

• Checking your appointment time using Arbor and arriving early.
• Appreciating that appointment times are a maximum of 10 minutes in length. We are always happy to arrange another appointment if you feel you need more time.
• Understand that our teaching staff will be bringing the conversation to a conclusion; please do not take offence.

The half term marks the beginning of preparations towards the Christmas season. Our staff teams in Foundation, Year 1 and Year 2 have already begun writing and editing the nativity scripts and casting children for the various roles. We aim to ensure that everyone participates in the production; not a straightforward task with 60 children in each year group. I have a strong belief that building the confidence of children performing on the stage leads to increased confidence in all other aspects of learning. I know that you will be looking forward to watching their performances on the following dates:

Year 2 - Tuesday 12th December at 10am in the Church
Year 1 - Wednesday 13th December at 10am in the Church
EYFS - Thursday 14th December at 10am in the Church Hall

As in previous years we will be inviting donations to support with the purchase of costumes, music licences and also a donation to our Christmas charity.

The PTA have set the date for our Christmas Fayre; Saturday 2nd December, 12pm-3pm. Further details below.

CHANGES TO READING

This is to make you aware that our approach to reading has changed this year. Parents of children in older year groups may have noticed this change more than some of our newer families. 

Firstly, our book bands enable us to help your child to choose books that matches the stage of reading that reflects your child's knowledge of letter sounds, their ability to decode the words and their understanding of the content they are reading. This year we have a greater focus on making sure that children's reading books are well matched to the criteria above. This might mean that a child who can read fluently but is not able to comprehend the story or non-fiction information, needs more practice at reading and understanding what has been read and therefore will not move to the next book band until these skills are mastered. This could otherwise lead to children making greater progress through the book bands and not enjoying their reading because their understanding is limited. We feel that it is better to broaden children's experience of books within a book band rather than accelerate their reading too quickly. Remember that we expect you to help your child with daily practice of reading and questioning of the books they are reading. This is the key to making good progress.

We continue to welcome offers of help from parents and volunteers to help children practice their reading in school. If you are able to spare some time, either within your child's year group, or another, please let the class teacher know at Parents' Evening on Tuesday or Thursday.

TERM DATES 2024 - 2025

We have confirmed that term dates for the 2024-2025 academic year. Please ensure that you refer to the term dates before booking holidays.

You can view the 2024-2025 Term Dates on our website.

CHRISTMAS FAYRE - SATURDAY 2ND DECEMBER 12PM-3PM

The PTA are working towards the Christmas Fayre on Saturday 2nd December. The gates open at 12pm. The school choir will be performing at the Fayre as well as so many fun games, teddy and bottle tombola. Please add this date to your diaries.

This year we are inviting children to enter and donate a sweet jar to be sold at the Fayre. We would like you to get creative and design a sweet jar that has been 'dressed' to look festive. After decorating the jar in whichever way you wish, we would like you to fill the jar with sweets. Jars need to be brought into school on Monday 27th November where they will be displayed ahead of the fayre. There will be prizes for the best jars in four categories, EYFS, KS1, Year 3/4 and Year 5/6.

We need your help!  Please volunteer your time to help at the Fayre. Perhaps join with another parent and share the time spent on the stall so that you can still enjoy some of the Fayre with your child. Please email pta@stjohns.efspt.org. If you are not able to help during the Fayre, are you able to help with set up in the morning or the tidy up at the end? All offers of help is very much needed.

How you can help before the event:
🧸 donate your Teddies.
🎄donate your old Christmas jumpers.
👒donate any fancy dress items
🍡 enter the Christmas sweet jar competition.
🏆 source some prizes for our raffle.

On Friday 1st December, children will enjoy a non-uniform day in exchange of donations of bottles for the bottle tombola.

INCLUSION TEAM WELCOMES YOU TO A WELLBEING COFFEE MORNING

Mrs Tinker and Mrs Jacob held the first of four wellbeing coffee mornings. They gave a wonderful presentation about how St John's staff are able to identify when children need additional support. We explained what support is offered by our team, the therapeutic team and external partners and agencies.

Feedback from the group of parents who attended last Wednesday was positive. If you missed this session, please feel free to join one of the future sessions below.

The dates for your diary are:
Wednesday 1st November 9-10am: years 5 & 6
Wednesday 22nd November 9-10am: years 3 & 4
Wednesday 17th January 2024 9-10am years 1 & 2
Wednesday 24th January 2024 9-10am EYFS

Also, Karen Bowden is starting the Nurture group next week. The course will be run at Alderton Junior School in Loughton starting for 10 weeks on 6th November. Please see the attached flyer, The Nurture Programme and contact Karen direct if you are interested in joining the course.

TEACHER TRAINING AT ST JOHNS

Many of you already know that St John's is the lead school for the West Essex School Centred Initial Teacher Training programme. The SCITT course has been judged Outstanding and has recently been revalidated by the DfE. We have two parents who are training on this programme this year.

We have just opened up applications for 2024/2025. More details can be found on the Train to Teach flyer.

...AND FINALLY...LOST PROPERTY

All clothing should now be labelled. All children should be putting clothing into their bags.

• Label all uniform with a sharpie pen or attach pre-printed labels for clothes.
• Talk to your children about putting clothing in their bags or on their pegs.

The PTA have setup an account with Easy2Name Fundraising Group, which will enable you to buy labels online and 20% of your purchase will go directly to the PTA. Visit: https://www.easy2name.com/ and use this code to support our fundraising and get free delivery: 

Please, please, please help us to help you. This photograph of our pile of lost property was taken before half term. I hope that we can all work together to reduce this time-consuming and wasteful problem,