Blundeston Primary news December 2024

Head Teachers Update

The autumn term is always a busy one. It feels like there are exciting activities and events happening all the time. The school has been taking part in a range of sporting tournaments again, many of which are described in more detail further in the newsletter. Of course, for a church school like ours, the most exciting of all events is now upon us, where we celebrate Jesus's birth and his light blessing the world. As a result, a lot of attention has switched to gearing up for Christmas productions and carol concerts, running alongside our curriculum offer.

Goodbyes & New Staff

Many of you will know that we are saying goodbye to Mrs Houlgate at the end of this term. After a long career in teaching, Mrs Houlgate has decided to step away from the classroom and embrace other challenges life has to offer. Mrs Houlgate has been an integral part of the school for a number of years and we wish her the very best in her new adventures. We will have a formal celebration at the end of term to recognise and celebrate the many ways in which she has helped so many children over the years.

We have been very lucky to be able to replace Mrs Houlgate with an outstanding teacher, Mrs Womack. Mrs Womack will be starting with us in January. She has a wealth of experience in the classroom and has been responsible for all manner of roles in her current school, including acting headteacher! I am sure she will be able to bring fun and creativity to the curriculum, in order to help the children know more and remember more.

We are also delighted to welcome two new faces to our support team, who has started with us already. Mrs Harrison is currently supporting the Y4 class but her background in family support work and nurture means she has already been doing some excellent mental health support work with groups of children as well as nurture based activities with others across the school. Mr Freeman is primarily supporting children in YR to manage their feelings and help with the learning. Mr Freeman has a background as a support worker at a Pupil Referral Unit so has excellent behaviour management strategies and has worked in Nursery and Early Years in his previous roles.

Water Bottles

I thought it was worth mentioning about the importance of everybody in school having access to water throughout the day. At Blundeston, we actively encourage the children to regularly drink water. There are many reasons why we do this. The most important is that it keeps the brain hydrated. This enables the brain to function more efficiently and stay focused - a key skill if we want the children to learn.

In class, the children always have access to their water bottles, except when the teacher deems it to be disruptive to the lesson. For most lessons, this would be when the children need to be at their most focused - during the teaching input. All the children have been reminded that we want to see good attitudes to their learning, so getting up and walking around while the teacher is delivering the most important learning part of the lesson is not a good time to go for a drink of water. It not only stops the child drinking water from learning but probably a great number of others are they get distracted by the movement and noise around the classroom.

What we are encouraging the children to do is to take responsibility for managing their own bodies. Gradually, as they move through the school, they shouldn't need to get a drink during the lesson because they will have done so, for example, on their return from break or before the lesson starts. The same applies to going to the toilet during lessons. (Of course, if a child has a confirmed medical condition, allowances would be made to enable them to go as often as is needed)

PARENT WORKSHOP - BEHAVIOUR

You have spoken and we have listened. We are aware that many people would have liked to attend the recent Mental Health Team support meeting that took place during school hours but were unable to make the time. As a result, the mental health team have agreed to be available for one of our Parent Consultations in the New Year, on Thursday 6th February. They will be on hand to talk to any parent wishing to know information about how they can help support any concerns you may have around the mental health of your children. When the time comes, please reach out and talk. It is really important to have that outlet. The resources from the mental health workshop on anxiety and neurodiversity will be added to the school website with a link on dojo.

Of course, February is a long way off and you may be experiencing issues that cannot wait that long. Speak to us or the mental health team direct. Don’t just hope for the best and that these problems will simply go away. We want to support the children and our families as best as we possibly can so may be able to give that help direct or signpost to other services who can deliver a specialist approach.

HOLIDAY CLUBS

SPORTING EVENTS

The year 4 children went to a basketball festival at the EPA and they went around 8 stations to practice different basketball skills. The children showed some really good technique especially shooting and passing.

ATTENDANCE

I thought it would be helpful to share our attendance figures for the start of the year. The school average attendance rate is currently 95.8%. That is 1.0 percentage point above the national average of 94.8%. This places the school in the top third of schools nationally, a good achievement for our school of 177 pupils.

Within this figure, there are still too many persistent absentees. My concern is how the cut off point is viewed. Whilst 90% is the cut off figure, this is still a poor attendance. This means a child is having the equivalent of one day off every two weeks. Over the year, that works out to be four weeks of school. This is a huge amount of lost learning time and will affect the child's progress. Children under 90% are obviously missing even more learning and this is why it is such a big deal not just to us, but everybody in education.

I appreciate that there have been some really nasty bugs, coughs, colds and sickness going through school and it is therefore understandable when children are kept off in line with NHS guidelines so they can recover properly and stop the spread of infection. If you are unsure of these guidelines, click on this link for more information: https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/is-my-child-too-ill-for-school/ . However, having extra time off for holidays makes managing attendance particularly challenging. In the current National debate, the government has made it clear to all schools that they will not accept taking any holidays in term time as a valid reason for missing school and as such they should not be authorised.

CHILDREN IN NEED

We had a lovely visit from Pudsey in November. Pudsey went round to all the classes and met some of the children. He was very impressed to hear about Jasmine and Jay 's fund raising efforts - they made and sold cakes in aid of Children in Need and raised over £70!