Introduction
Welcome to the first monthly newsletter! It's been great getting to know our families and local community over the last fortnight. It's true to say that I am absolutely loving it! It has been a pleasure spending time with all our children and building relationships that provide the foundations for high-quality learning. I am looking forward to having the opportunity to teach over the coming term and feel the experience will be invaluable. Hopefully within this newsletter, I can provide you with an insight into what has been happening at Holme, and I'm looking forward to sharing it with you. Please remember if you're not following our Facebook page, like and share for regular updates!
Attendance Matters
At Holme Junior & Infant School, we fully recognise the impact of good attendance and punctuality on the success and development of young people both socially and academically.
Research has proved that any child with attendance under 95% is at risk of achieving a grade lower in every subject by the time they leave school. We expect all children to attend school regularly.
For more information regarding attendance, please refer to our school's attendance policy.
Celebration Assembly
Already after our first revamped celebration assembly, I know that this is going to be the favourite part of the week!
I thoroughly enjoyed sitting down with our 'Honour of Holme' award winners discussing over hot chocolate and biscuits, what has made them successful learners and how they are going to continue to improve in the coming weeks.
If your child receives a trophy, it is theirs to keep for the week to show off to friends and family and bring back for the next week's celebration assembly for our new award winner. If the day changes for any reason we will let parents know in advance.
Children will be selected for awards the day before our celebration assembly and parents will get a phone call to make them aware, so they have the opportunity to join us. This will only work if you can keep it a secret!
All of our community are welcome to attend the assemblies outlined on the Key Dates section at the end of each newsletter.
Shine Bright Board
I have been humbled by how many children have been shining bright during the second week of school. We've had awards for music, horse-riding, reading, dance and of course well deserved winners from the Holme Autumn Show!
Keep them coming and show the whole community just how many stars we have here at Holme!
Community Assemblies
Community assemblies will not be continuing in the guise they have done previously. We are keen to have our community involved in the life of the school, and as such are inviting parents as often as possible on a Friday afternoon at 2:45pm to join us for our celebration assemblies. We will be giving out our well deserved awards for reading, writing, maths, whole class attendance and of course our 'Honour of Holme' certificates. We will also spend some time sharing our Shine Bright board and looking at celebrating new additions each week. Celebrating birthday's will restart during these assemblies. Once every half term we will have a visit from Reverend Nick Heaton to complement these assemblies, which will start slightly earlier on these weeks. Please join us for our first celebration assembly on Friday 7th October and look at the Key Dates section at the bottom of each newsletter for forthcoming dates! Doors will open at 2:40pm.
As you will have noticed the celebration of our school through Facebook shows just how committed we are at Holme to show the rounded education our children experience. Teachers will be updating our community at least once per week as to what is going on in their class and we will celebrate achievements from our week celebration assembly. I will also be updating Facebook with any further posts that I feel will support our school community. Give us a follow and a like and share with your friends far and wide!
Meet Mr Bond
A huge thanks to those who were able to come to the coffee afternoon, I know its often hard due to work and prior commitments. As I hope you will start to see, your views and ideas really do matter and I am always available for a conversation or e-mail.
We will be planning a second coffee afternoon during the next half term, so please keep your eyes peeled on future newsletters for further information.
Holme Autumn Show
It was a fantastic afternoon at the Holme Show last Saturday. It was lovely to meet more of our community and to get to know how as a school we can support our community, but also learn about the wealth of expertise we have in the village in different areas. If you ever feel like you could offer something to the school however small, please don't hesitate to get in touch! Thank you to the whole community for such a great event!
Macmillan Coffee Afternoon
We will be holding a Macmillan Coffee Afternoon on Friday 30th September in conjunction with the Fleece Inn. This will be an opportunity for the whole community to come together in order to raise money for a good cause. Further details will be sent over the coming week via e-mail.
Food Hygiene Rating for Holme School kitchen
Many congratulations to Mrs Crowther, our catering supervisor, for achieving the gold standard of five stars for Holme School kitchen this week! The food is freshly prepared and cooked to order in the morning, and I have to say they are very delicious! If your child hasn't experienced them, it's worth giving them a try as they are very good value for money.
Holme School Harvest Collection
The new Holme School Care Crew, supporting mental health and emotional wellbeing, will be helping to coordinate the Holme School Harvest donations for the Holme Valley Food Bank. Please see the notice below:
Holme Village Community Centre
It has been an honour to able to join and be part of the meetings for the development of Holme Village Community Centre further down Meal Hill Road from the school. There will be an AGM for residents on Tuesday 11th October at the Sunday School from 7:30pm. We hope you can join to learn more about the Residents Association and how vital the Community Centre will be to the whole community as well as our school. To learn more please visit their website: https://holmevillage.org.uk
Holme DIY SOS
As a school we are in need of a refresh and would like to ask our community and those further afield if they are able to offer any suitable furniture or donations towards items in order to support brightening up our school. At the moment we are looking for...
- New comfortable chairs (and potentially a table) for our staffroom area.
- A new and updated kitchen space.
- A small table for signing in/out to replace the white chair at the front door.
- Two comfortable chairs to go where the baskets are for a waiting area.
- A screen up to 20" in length that will play pictures/video clips from a USB stick or similar media.
If you can help, please don't hesitate to get in touch with us on 01484 687632 or via e-mail: office@holmejischool.co.uk. Thank you!
Community Support
Bank Holiday - Monday 19th September
We would like to remind parents and carers that Monday 19th September has been declared as a Bank Holiday due to the funeral of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. School will re-open on Tuesday 20th September.
Dates for the Diary
As always, if you wish to speak to us about your child, please do not hesitate to talk to the class teacher and we will endeavour to help in any way we can.
Credits:
Created with images by Africa Studio - "Business people hands, top view. Teamwork concept." • Jiri Hera - "Sweet pistachio cookies and coffee mug." • George Dolgikh - "Five stars on dark background"