St John Vianney School Newsletter 11.10.2024

Headteacher's Message

Dear Parents and Carers,

I do hope you have had a good week? It has been another busy week in school with the pupils now displaying better responses to our School standards and expectations. It has taken a few weeks longer for some of our new pupils to familiarise themselves with SJV routines and we feel now these pupils have turned a corner and are much better settled in school. We hope this will continue.

Mr Harris and Miss Wilkinson took 2 Post 16 students yesterday on a day visit to see the Concentration camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau in Poland, as part of a Manchester School’s activity. Although a very sad experience in many ways, the staff and pupils had a great visit and will be next week sharing their understanding of the visit with pupils back at school in our Assemblies. It is really important that events, like those that took place in 1930s and 1940s in Germany and Poland, are remembered and talked about so we are all able to ensure they do not happen again. A fantastic experience for those that were involved.

On Wednesday this week, 10 pupils represented the school at the Manchester ‘City in the Community’ Girls’ Football tournament. They had some great success in the competition, scoring lots of goals and represented the school really well, showing excellent teamwork and cooperation and a real understanding of fair play. It is lovely to hear that our pupils represent the school so proudly, when provided the opportunity to do so. Well done to all the girls and staff involved.

Could I remind you please that we have our Harvest Festival on 16th October (next Wednesday) and any food donations from families for the South Manchester Food Bank will be really well received. Please send in any donations with your child to their Class teacher early next week.

NB Building Information

We have now been given a provisional date for the handover of the new build to the school, which will be during the Easter Holidays, 14th April 2025.

We will need to plan with the builders, Kier Construction, on how we will manage this move and it is highly likely that we will need the days after the published Easter break, (which is Friday 4th April to Monday 21st April), to manage the move. That will mean that all pupils will not be able to return to school after the Easter break until Monday 28th April 2025. We are writing to inform parents of these dates, which I will confirm officially with you at the start of the spring term, in January 2025.

If you have any concerns with these plans please do let us know.

Best wishes for the weekend.

Mr A Moloney, Headteacher

Key information and Dates

Dates for your Diary

• Tue 15th Oct - Whole School trip to Chester Zoo
• Weds 16th Oct - Harvest Festival
• Fri 25th October @ 3:15pm - School closes for the Autumn Half Term break.
• Mon 4th Nov @ 9am - School re-opens for Autumn Term 2.

Key Info

Allergies

Please be aware that we have a number of pupils in school with severe nut allergies. To reduce the risk of exposure for these young people, we aim to keep the school nut free. In order to support us with this we kindly ask that you:

• Do not give children nuts or nut products in their packed lunches.
• Do not give nuts, nut products or snacks/bars containing nuts for break time snacks.
• Do not send cakes or food items, containing nuts, in to school for birthday celebrations, cake sales or events.

Thank you for your support.

Lunches

Stars Of The Week

• Class 1 - Oskar - For a great music session with OMF.
• Class 2 - Jaylen - For making a fantastic start to life at school and always trying his best.
• Class 3 - Tyler P - For improvement in his behaviour.
• Class 4 - Meera - For great engagement in drama.
• Class 5 - Ruby - For trying hard and being helpful.
• Class 6 - Kian - For being a positive member of the form and handling change well.
• Class 7 - Ryan - For great Maths work.
• Class 8 - Sana - For making a superb start to the term.
• Class 9 - Charlie - For being very kind in class 9.
• Class 10 - Heaven - For working really well in all lessons this week.
• Class 11 - Mia - For increased independence in lessons.
• Class 12 - Nesrine - For increased confidence and trying hard in all areas of the curriculum.
• Class 13 - Liz - For having an excellent week.

Employee Of The Week.

Highlights of the Week

Krakow Trip

Our Catholic School

In our Catholic school this week, our school focus was:

'Let us try to be open to God’s word, and open to the Lord’s surprises when he speaks to us'

- Pope Francis

During October we celebrate our Lady of the Rosary. We use this month to thank Mary for her prayers for us. Throughout this month, the whole school will pray parts of the Rosary with the help of a PowerPoint sent by Father Nick.

The Chaplaincy/GIFT team have been thinking about those less fortunate than us and how we can help them during this Harvest Festival season. South Central Food Bank is a charity established by local people who are concerned about isolation and food poverty in the area. They work to make life more affordable for people on low incomes, to build a stronger local community and reduce food waste. At this current time, it is even more vital to support our local community and we would be very grateful for any donations you can make towards our Harvest Festival.

Within RE lessons this week, we have been looking at the Sacraments; Key Stage 3 have learnt about Baptism and how it welcomes people in to the Church, Key Stage 4 have been looking at vocation within Holy Orders and Key Stage 5 have been looking at Reconciliation and questioning whether some situations are unforgiveable?

This week's Wednesday word is 'Happiness'

Mrs Garfin

Poetry Corner

This week we celebrate the month of October in Poetry News, and what better way to do that than by sharing this amazing poem titled 'Poem in October' by Welsh Poet, Dylan Thomas. Dylan is always an inspiring writer for young people to connect with because his adolescent years were a time of incredible creativity, between the ages of 15 and 20 he played with words and phrases and produced hundreds of poems, including some of his most famous, such as 'And Death Shall Have No Dominion', 'The Hunchback in the Park' and 'The Force That Through the Green Fuse'. Forty of these poems were included in full in subsequent collections, though many ideas and phrases are once again used in future poems. We hope you enjoy his 'Poem in October' both on the printed page and on this amazing recorded version in Dylan's distinctive voice way back in 1949:

Oliver Lomax

Useful Information

National Autistic Society have published Tips for an Autism-friendly Halloween see below:

"Halloween is an exciting time of year for many autistic children and adults, but it can be difficult for those who struggle with unexpected changes or who have sensitivities to noise, touch and light. The unfamiliar treats and sweets, scratchy costumes and unpredictable nature of the day can trigger a lot of anxiety and leave people feeling completely overwhelmed. Around 1 in 100 people are autistic, so good planning and good communication can make a huge difference*. Whatever your plans, simple changes and preparations can help to ease stress and anxiety. Thanks to the help of our Facebook community, we have put together a list of handy tips to help autistic adults, children and their families have a ‘wickedly’ good time this Halloween."

https://www.autism.org.uk/what-we-do/news/tips-for-an-autism-friendly-halloween

- autism.org.uk

Click on the following link to open a directory of useful links and information about facilities, activities and support available to you and your young person: INFORMATION DIRECTORY