Dear Parents and Carers,

Another week complete, another one closer to Christmas! I can certainly start to feel the excitement building (in school and in the Fidgett house) as Christmas events are drawing nearer. The Christmas Fayre, performances, a visit to church, decorations and Christmas dinner are but just a few of the events we always look forward to in the coming few weeks. That said, the additional experiences Christmas brings can put us all (adults and children alike) in danger of overwhelm and burn-out. In school, we are already carefully considering our timetabling and will continue to run a normal routine of lessons, keeping our expectations consistent with the PRIDE code to ensure that we can all enjoy December to its very best.

Lunchtimes

The Midday Supervisor team all recently took part in training promoting ‘Positive Playgrounds’. We really value and appreciate the work of our MDS; lunchtimes can be rewarding and challenging in equal measure as children navigate the most unstructured part of the school day. The training has provided us with some excellent ideas on how to improve lunchtimes further, both on the playground and in the dinner hall. Preparations for these are already ongoing and will be shared with you as the year continues. We are soon to implement a sticker incentive for all year groups this term. The class with the most ‘Golden Step’ stickers awarded to individuals each week will be recognised in our celebration assemblies, with marbles in our class reward jars and given an extra 10 minutes of playtime to enjoy. The Golden Step refers to the top layer of our behaviour system and recognises children who go above and beyond our expectations, demonstrate our learning tools and provide a role model to others. I look forward to celebrating our first winning classes soon.

Whatever the weekend holds for you, I hope it’s a happy one. See you all next week!

Mrs Fidgett

Director of Learning

^{Photo by Erol Ahmed on Unsplash}