Introduction
I can't believe that we are half way through the Spring term already and half way through the school year. It's been exciting to see how our school has started to evolve with joy shining from all within our school community. We're only at the start of our journey and continue to strive in making experiences and learning as ambitious and memory making as it can possibly be for the children here at Holme. We have undoubtedly faced some challenges, but working as a community we can make the school the best it can be together as a Holme family.
I hope you find this month's newsletter informative and I hope you enjoy reading what we've been up to over the past month as we move forward further into February.
Please remember if you're not following our Facebook page, like and share for regular updates!
Holme Community Readers
The week beginning 30th January was National Storytelling Week. As part of the week we decided to invite parents, carers and the local community to read their favourite book to children at the start of each morning. The best bit was, who walked through the door each morning was a surprise! It was great to see a large number of interested people in our local community want to visit and read to the children. Even though nervous to start with, they came down with a smile on their face and enjoyed the experience. We would like to thank those who came to read and we hope to continue with other ways of involving our local community in school life. Here is just a sample of some of our visitors...
Staffing Changes
I would like to thank you for your understanding with the staffing changes that were made for this half term. Once I have clarification for the start of the next half term, I will send a letter to parents and carers accordingly with decisions made by the 19th February. Thank you for your patience.
Parents' Evening Date Change
Due to unforeseen circumstances within school, we have had to delay our next Parents' Evening from Thursday 23rd March to Wednesday 29th March. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. Information regarding appointments will be made available to parents closer to this date.
New Website Update
Our new school website is now live with updates being added regularly. We are currently experiencing some difficulties with our Facebook feed and are looking into this. The website will be updated over the coming terms, so please look out for updates.
Weduc
Miss Talbot has been working very hard to implement Weduc and we are proud to say that it will become live this month. We've come across teething problems due to how the way our management information systems have been setup in previous years and have had to rebuild parts of it.
Miss Talbot will be in touch to advise on how to use the new system. Please bear with us as we're finishing off the final touches. Until Weduc is live, we will continue to contact you by e-mail or telephone. We ask that you check your e-mails regularly. Thank you for your patience.
Parents' Open Book Evening
On Wednesday 8th February from 3:15pm to 4:30pm, we will be holding our termly Open Book Evening. This will give parents the opportunity to have their child's work showcased to them (if your child attends) and also the opportunity to have a discussion with your child's class teacher. We hope you can make it as it is a great opportunity to see the work we are doing in school and speak to the class teachers. We are aware that some parents find it difficult to make this time, so we are working on other ways for these parents to potentially have the opportunity to see their child's work during the Summer term at a different time. Please watch this space!
Swimming
We would like to inform parents that swimming will end for this academic year at half term. PE sessions will continue on a Monday with Dance in February and rolling/bowling for Class 1 and rugby for Class 2 in March. Please ensure that children have an outdoor PE kit in March on a Monday. On a Wednesday all children will be doing gymnastics in separate class sessions, so will require their indoor PE kit. Thank you.
Paul Whittaker OBE Visit - Sign and Sing
We were very pleased to host Paul Whittaker OBE at the start of January. Born in Huddersfield in 1964, Paul has been profoundly deaf all his life yet pursued a career as a Musician. A Pianist and Organist, he has a music degree from Wadham College, Oxford, a postgraduate performance diploma from the RNCM and holds ALCM and ARCO diplomas.
Paul is passionate about signed song and in 2017, he set up SiBSL - Songs in British Sign Language - a website dedicated to raising standards and awareness of the art form. In addition, Paul adjudicates signed song classes at musical festivals around the UK and at the National Signing Choir Competition. He also runs 4 signing choirs in the North of England.
He came to Holme to do some signing and singing with us. Here is just a taster of what our children enjoyed during his visit.
Internet Safety Day
On Tuesday 7th February, it is Internet Safety Day. We have extensive information on our website regarding Internet Safety support for parents, which can be found here and here.
Mr Bond is a CEOP Ambassador, trained by the National Crime Agency, having the ability to support other schools and train teachers in e-safety. After half term, Mr Bond will be teaching Computing throughout school, which will also include elements of e-safety at an age appropriate level. If you ever have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to get in touch. We are hoping to organise a workshop to support parents with e-safety over the coming terms.
Shine Bright Values
Our shine bright values encompass what we believe our children should foster during their time with us to become well-rounded citizens in our community and the wider world. We cultivate our children to be independent, resilient, respectful, creative, adventurous and aspirational for their future. These will be featuring more regularly within school both through being rewarded as part of Class Dojo and having a 'Shine Bright Values' award of the week. This will be one child in the entire school each week who has been recommended by all the staff in school, achieving one of our Shine Bright Values really well. We would like to encourage parents and our local community to support us with these values outside of school to ensure that the children understand the language and are able to show these life skills in order to thrive, not just now, but in the future. Here are our first few award winners, who have shown independence, respect and creativity. Great work! We can't wait to see more children actively showing our Shine Bright Values.
Parents Coffee Morning
We wanted to let parents know about our next half term coffee morning. Our next coffee session will be at 8:45am to 9:30am on Friday 17th March. Please feel free to join us to have a natter. We are open to suggestions about what themes of these you would find helpful to discuss or learn. If you have any ideas, please don't hesitate to let us know. We hope you can join us!
Celebration Assembly
It's been great to see our children continue to be awarded for Honour of Holme, Remarkable Writer, Regal Reader and Maths Mogul. We've also added our Shine Bright Values award and most recently our Spelling Shed award. Here are some of our award winners from January.
Please remember to keep those pictures of what your child is up to outside of school coming in for our Shine Bright Board. It doesn't have to be a sport, it can be anything they're proud of achieving. We do ask that you send these to shinebright@holmejischool.co.uk. When we receive them, they will be printed and placed onto our board, being celebrated in the next Celebration Assembly.
FOHS will be supplying refreshments each week and we kindly ask that you make a donation as all funds go back to the children. All of our community are welcome to attend the assemblies outlined on the Key Dates section at the end of each newsletter.
Attendance
It has come to my attention that we have a percentage of children who are at risk of becoming persistent absentees. It is vital that children attend school where at all possible in order not to miss anymore learning.
The above attendance ladder gives an indication of how many days children miss school compared to the percentage. We currently have 30% of children in school who are below the 95% mark, showing slight concern. If a child falls to 90% or below, a letter will be sent to parents to make them aware, with additional tracking and monitoring of any subsequent absences as this is a concern. If you would like to know your child's current attendance, please feel free to speak to Miss Talbot or Miss Devlin in the school office.
We do understand that children become ill and there are guidelines around how long a child should be absent for. We do take these guidelines onboard. We do ask that parents consider the period of absence beyond the guidelines as this may have a negative impact on the child missing further learning.
We take attendance seriously at Holme and follow our school procedure in-line with our policy that has been ratified by the governing body and also follows national guidelines. You can take a look at our policy here for further information and clarification. If you are ever unsure, please contact the school office in the first instance who will happily support and advise.
I would like to thank you for your support in ensuring your child is able to attend school as much as possible.
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 young person 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.
January Attendance Figures
Whole School Attendance: 97%
- Class 1: 97.7%
- Class 2: 96.6%
Well done! We have managed to match our whole school attendance target of 97% for the month. Keep up the good work in school!
Miss Talbot's Reminders
- To ensure the smooth running of the school's finance, please can we ask that lunch payments are kept on top of weekly. Please feel free to see me in the office if you are having any issues with payments.
- Strictly Pennine Dance Show tickets have now been allocated and you will find your ticket/s payment is now loaded onto Parentpay.
- A reminder that clubs next half term will be gymnastics on a Wednesday from 3:15pm to 4:15pm and Fair & Funky on a Thursday from 3:15pm to 4:15pm.
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!
Outdoor Learning
The children have enjoyed their first half term of Forest School sessions of the Spring Term with Miss Wood! We would like to make parents aware of the dates for next half term:
- Class 1 - 23rd February and 16th March
- Class 2 - 2nd March and 30th March
Please ensure that your child comes to school on these days with the relevant and appropriate clothing and footwear for the weather as Miss Wood will take the children outside where possible!
Children's Mental Health Week
At Holme we take mental health very seriously. This week is Children's Mental Health Week and the theme for this year is Let's Connect. The Care Crew will be hosting an assembly on Friday before our final Celebration Assembly of this half term to tell the community more about it. We hope you can join us on Friday 10th February at 2:40pm to learn more. Please feel free to look at Place2Be's website for further information around children's mental health and how we can support it as a community.
As we will be celebrating World Book Day on Thursday 2nd March, we would like to give the children the opportunity to bring their favourite book into school and also dress as a character from a book. We know that this is not every child's cup of tea, so please feel free to send your child in dress differently clothes if they wish not to dress as a character.
Amazon Wishlist
We are in the process of creating an Amazon Wishlist. As a small school we do value donations and support with resources for our children. Please take a look at our list and see if there is anything you would like to purchase for the school. There is no obligation, and if you would like to be anonymous, we're also fine with that! We guarantee that everything on the list will support with the children's education directly in school.
Here is the link if you'd like to have a nosey. We will start adding items after half term. Please feel free to check regularly as we will be adding items at regular intervals: https://amzn.eu/4YvautA
Friends of Holme School Update
Dear All,
A quick update following the FOHS meeting last week and what’s coming up!
Last year we raised a handsome £760.56 and hope to do even better in 2023! So many thanks for all your support.
We are very excited to be introducing some new events this year – so keep an eye out. We are hoping to hold:
• An art gallery exhibition where you can view and buy your own child’s artistic creations!
• A fashion show in the Autumn Term
• A movie night
• A bonfire and firework night
We will also be running some of our longstanding events. The School Run is booked for Saturday 24th June. Please make a note of the date as we will need helpers on the day and cake bakers in the run up. It is always a good earner and we really appreciate your support.
Please remember to use easyfundraising every time you shop online. Over 7,000 brands will donate to us (Friends of Holme School), including all the big names like eBay, John Lewis & Partners, Argos, ASOS, Expedia, M&S, Just Eat, Udeitch and many more! This means you can raise FREE donations for us no matter what you’re buying. If you haven’t signed up to support us yet, it’s easy and completely FREE. These donations really help us, so it would be great if you could take a moment to get started!
You can find our easyfundraising page here:
We will be bringing back our pop up recycling centre in collaboration with The Firefighter’s Charity. More information is to follow but if you are having a clear out put unwanted clothes to one side, we can take it off your hands!
The greeting cards have been a hit, these are still available so let us know if you need to restock. They are available at the Friday assemblies if you would like to buy some.
Thank you for supporting us at Friday assemblies and thank you to the Holme Brew Ladies for serving us with a cheery welcome and a hot cuppa!
The money we have raised has meant that the children went to the panto at Christmas free of charge and we are currently paying for the dance lessons, getting the whole school ready for the Strictly Pennine dance show on Wednesday 1st March. We have also helped with workshops in school, and helped kitting out the library. Our very smart Year 6’s have been proudly sporting their Year 6 hoodies, again funded by FOHS. Without your help none of these extras would be possible so many, many thanks to you all.
Look out for more dates and events to follow and remember all are welcome to come to our meetings (the next one tbc!).
Thank you!
FOHS
Holme Village Winter Feast
Dates for the Diary
As always, if you wish to speak to us about your child, please do not hesitate to talk to Miss Wood in Class 1 and Mrs Guest or Mrs Haley in Class 2 in the first instance. We will endeavour to help in any way we can.
Safeguarding
Holme Junior & Infant School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and expects all staff, volunteers and parents to share this commitment.
We have safeguarding policies and procedures in place that contribute to our safeguarding commitment, including our child protection and safeguarding policy which can be viewed in the policies section of our school website. Our safeguarding policies and procedures seek to ensure that every child, regardless of their age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, or sexual orientation, has a right to equal protection from harm.
Sometimes we may need to share information and work in partnership with other agencies when there are concerns about a child’s welfare. We will ensure that our concerns about a pupil are discussed with the child’s parents/carers first, unless we have reason to believe that such a move would be contrary to the child’s welfare.
We actively support the Government’s Prevent Agenda: to challenge ideology that supports terrorism and those who promote it, protect vulnerable individuals from being drawn into terrorism, and raise awareness of radicalisation risk.
Our Acting Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) is Mr D Bond (Interim Headteacher).
Our Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead (DDSL) is Miss B Wood (Acting Assistant Headteacher).
Our Safeguarding Governor is Mrs M Thomas.
If you have any safeguarding concerns at all, please do not hesitate to get in touch with either Mr Bond or Miss Wood.