Dear parents and carers

Dr Bike

Is your (or your child’s) bike in need of a bit of maintenance? Is the chain a bit rusty? Do the brakes work properly? Do the wheels need a bit of attention? If so, why not bring your bike along to school next Monday for some free maintenance? Jon from Sustrans will be here with his trusty toolbox and he’s keen to get the population of Southill moving on safe and smoothly-working bicycles. All bikes are welcome – both adults’ and children’s; just bring them along at drop-off time next Monday and they’ll be ready for you to collect at the end of the day.

Poppy Appeal

We are pleased to support the British Legion Poppy Appeal again this year and have stocked up with various items, including poppies (for clothes and bags), wrist bands and slap bands (always a favourite). Year 6 will be selling the poppy merchandise every day this week and a suggested minimum donation is £1 per item.

Behaviour (Relationships) Policy

Before half term I sent out a section of our updated Behaviour Policy for parents to see and comment upon. Thank you to everyone who replied – the policy has been amended in light of your observations and will go to the Governors at their next meeting for ratification. I’ll then post a copy on the website for your reference.

Attendance

You will know that we keep a close eye on children’s attendance and speak to parents when their child’s absence drops to worrying levels. As always, our aim here is to look for ways we can support parents and bring about improvements for their children. Having reviewed attendance at half term, we are about to send out letters to some parents whose children are struggling at school due to high levels of absence. These letters say nothing new however, as they simply remind parents of two key points:

• every day missed disadvantages your child in terms of the learning they have missed. It’s really hard to catch up.
• good attendance is an important to maximising future life chances. It is a fact that children with good attendance do better later in life than those with poorer attendance.

Attendance really does matter. Please can all parents make sure they avoid term time holidays and otherwise aim to keep children’s absence to a minimum.

FIFA World Cup

Now, I love football as much as anyone, but the forthcoming World Cup can only be considered with mixed feelings. There is no question that there are certain moral problems with Qatar’s hosting of the tournament – such as the well-publicised poor working conditions of the migrant workers used to build the stadia and the general lack of tolerance for diversity.

With all this being said, we have an opportunity as a school to gather together and watch the national team when England plays Iran at 1pm on Monday 21st November. My compromise to the moral conundrum that is the Qatar World Cup is to invite interested children to watch the second half together in the hall, while teachers will be asked to discuss the ethical issues in class assemblies beforehand. In this way, we will be able to enjoy (let’s hope) watching the team together as a school, while also learning about the human rights issues that have been brought into the spotlight by the tournament itself.

A message from the School Nursing Team: confidential text messaging service for parents of 5-19 year-olds

As you may be aware the School Nursing team in Dorset currently offer the ChatHealth confidential text messaging service to Children and Young people in Dorset aged between 11 and 19, allowing them to seek advice and support from a member of the School Nursing team.

We are delighted to now also be able to provide a confidential text messaging service to the Parents and Carers of children and young people aged between 5 and 19. This text messaging service will be called ParentLine 5-19 and from 1st November parents will also be able to gain advice from a member of the School Nursing team via text message for topics such as Development, Healthy eating, Weight management, Behaviour management, Emotional health and wellbeing, Toileting, Sleep and more.

How it will work:

• Parent/carer sends a text message to the ParentLine 5-19 number: 07312263131
• An automated reply confirms the message has been received.
• A trained healthcare professional from the School Nursing team will respond to the message between 9am and 4pm Monday to Friday (Excluding weekends, bank holidays and School Holidays) within 24 working hours.

Please note that ParentLine 5-19 will initially only be available during School Term times and will be closed during School Holidays and this should not be used as an emergency service – urgent help should be sought from an NHS walk-in centre or call NHS 111, or in an emergency, dial 999 or go to A&E.