Newsletter no. 11 (May 10th 2013) - St Paul's C of E (Aided) Primary ...

St Paul’s School News
www.stpaulsschool-dorking.co.uk No. 11, May 10th, (2013)
Music Festival at Dorking Halls
Well done to all the Years 3 and 4 children in the choir who took part in this music festival on
Wednesday evening. Choirs from most local primary schools took part in the evening and sang a
selection of songs from musicals. I know that parents really enjoyed the evening. Thank you to
Miss Stuckey and Mrs Wharmby for rehearsing the children.
Great Behaviour from Year R children
The children in Year R recently went to visit the library with their teachers and some parent
helpers. One of the librarians told a parent that our two classes of children had been the
best behaved of any group of children from a school that had recently visited the library.
Well done Reception children! Well done teachers and parents!
Anti- Bullying Charter Mark
Surrey recently introduced this Charter Mark as an option for Surrey schools to begin to work towards achieving
this, starting with Bronze, then Silver and finally Gold, which could take three years or more to reach. Governors
and staff agreed to incorporate working towards this Award into our School Development Plan for 2012
-13.
This term we therefore began to look at aspects of this Charter, at Bronze level. All staff reviewed in staff
meetings our existing Anti-Bullying Policy, which is taken from a recommended Surrey model policy and adapted
by us to suit our children and school. Governors on our Learning Committee will similarly review the policy at
their June meeting. The Policy is on our web site.
Parent participation wanted
A few years ago a few parents kindly formed a small working group with me to look at this policy and they
wrote a parent guide to anti-bullying. This was an excellent document and again this can be found on the web
site. I wonder if parents from this original group and any other interested parent, would be willing to review
the parent guide and check if this reflects the full policy and meets the needs of parents, If you are interested
in being part of this group, please could you let the office know and we will set up a meeting.
New initiatives
During the staff meeting, we discussed how we monitor very low level incidents of unkindness
by a child to another at playtime. These incidents are not serious enough to be
sent to me, and therefore recorded, but have involved a reprimand from the member of
staff on duty which the class teacher may not always be aware of. We decided that
each class will have a book and all staff have access to sticky labels. If a child is unkind
or hurts another their name is written on the sticky label with a sentence of what they did, to whom and it is
dated. This label is stuck on a white board in the staff room. Each day class teachers will check this board and
take down any labels with their children on and stick it in the book. Teachers will review their book each week
with their class and children in the book can lose a class treat such as Golden Time. I will have books in each
half term to check that the same names are not appearing in the labels as this could be an indication of bullying
behaviour and require further investigation. I explained this system to the children in assembly last week. So
far very few labels have been used, which is great!

Citrine team wins extra play for good behaviour
In September we introduced a new system for recognising good behaviour at lunch time. Children who
are polite, play well or eat up their lunch well can be rewarded with a colour token by staff. This token,
given in the colour of their team, is then put by them in a tube at the back of the hall. At the end of
each term the team with the most tokens in their tube is the winner and they get an extra play. Last
Thursday, Citrine children from all classes had this treat. Well done Citrines!
Partnership Role
For the last few years I have been acting as a Local Leader of Education (LLE) for Surrey, which has
involved supporting headteachers and schools in a coaching role. I am now changing this role and have
become an Associate Adviser in Surrey. This means that I will work in partnership with designated
other schools in advising and supporting them. I will occasionally be out of school for this work but it
should not be more than I was in my previous role. St Paul’s gains from this wider experience that I
have in these roles as I find I always learn new things that can further support our school.
Online Uniform Suppliers
We would like to remind parents that uniform items with our logo can be purchased form the uniform
shop in Dorking (Love Your Logo) or online from School Trends (www.stparent.co.uk) or
Tesco (www.tesco.com/ues).
Changeable Weather
We are certainly seeing all varieties of weather at the moment! Please ensure that your child has
suitable clothing - some Y2 children were very cold today when working outside as they did not
have jumpers or coats. We hope that we will soon be needing sun hats!
School Dinners
Please let the office know by Friday 17th May if your child is changing to or from school dinners
so that the kitchen have sufficient notice.
A small number of families have not yet paid for this half term’s dinners - please do so as soon as
possible!
New Online Payment System - Tucasi scopay
Access letters have been sent out to allow parents to set up a Tucasi account for online payments.
Please contact the office if you did not receive a letter or need a copy. We are pleased that some
parents have started using this system for school dinner payments. Trips for years 1 and 2 will be
added shortly, and we will let parents know when they can pay through Tucasi for these trips.
SATS
A separate letter has gone out to Y6 parents today outlining the timetable for next week. We wish
the children who are taking tests next week all the best - we know how hard you have been working
to prepare for the tests.
Trips
Year 5 are preparing to go on their residential trip to the Isle of Wight next week, led by Miss Morgan.
Years R and 6 have trips on Friday next week, If you have not yet returned your child’s permission
slip and payment, please do so on Monday so that we can finalise arrangements. Thank
you.
Dates
We attach a list of dates until the end of term. Please note that our last Inset closure
will be on Monday 24th June.