Glashieburn News January 2018

Glashieburn News

Session 2017/2018 Edition 3

Happy New Year to all our families, and welcome back to a new term at Glashieburn!

What a busy term we had in the run up to Christmas! Well done to all our boys and girls in P1-3 for a fantastic Nativity performance of ‘Hey Ewe’, and to our P4-7 pupils who worked incredibly hard to put on a terrific performance of ‘Santa’s on Strike’.

Our whole school topic of ‘Trip in a Time machine’ was a great success, with our Victorian Day rounding of our ‘Old School Values’ spotlight week.

This term’s whole school topic is entitled ‘Entertainers and Performers’. Our teachers and children have lots of exciting things planned. Keep your eyes peeled for your class Learning Leaflet and any updates on the Interactive Learning Diaries!

Dates for your diary: 

Monday 12th February-Holiday

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Tuesday 13th February– Inset Day

Contact Us

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Wednesday 14th February- Inset Day

Glashieburn School

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Friday 23rd March 9am- Showcase Assembly for P1/2C,

Jesmond Drive Bridge of Don Aberdeen AB22 8UR

P3/4W and P6/7S 

Friday 23rd March– Reports home

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Thursday 29th March– Term finishes for Easter Holidays

Tel: 01224 704476 Email: Glashieburn@aberdeen city.gov.uk

Further information available at http://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk

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Glashieburn News

STAFFING UPDATE 

Huge congratulations to Mrs Rachel Cruickshank who had her baby during the Christmas Break. Ethan Cruickshank arrived on 3rd January, and both him and mum are doing very well. The staff are hoping for some cuddles very soon! In the Nursery we have appointed a Senior Early Years Practitioner to cover Mrs Cruickshank’s maternity post. Miss Amanda Forbes will be starting with us on Monday 22nd January, and I’m sure all our parents and children will give her a warm welcome.

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Mrs Claire Stephen will be finishing with us at Glashieburn on 12th March, ready to start her maternity leave. I’m sure you will join us in wishing her all the best.

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Sadly Mrs Jessica Conroy will be leaving Glashieburn at the end of January to return to Glasgow due to her husband’s work commitments. She will be greatly missed by the children and staff, however we wish her all the best with her continued teaching career. We will keep the class updated of any appointments made from our upcoming interviews.

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Mrs McKenzie and Mrs McDonald will be picking up cover for our teachers so we ask that you’re patient with us if we are not always available. Thanks.

STUDENTS We have teaching students at Glashieburn this term. These ladies are observed and guided by the class teacher, however as part of their course they are required to lead the planning, teaching and assessment for a number of days. If you have any questions about this, please get in touch with us.

P4W: Ruth Morrison P6R: Sydney Henley P7B: Sharonjit Kaur

INTERACTIVE LEARNING DIARIES Hopefully you have signed up to your child’s Interactive Learning Diary this will give you a lovely insight into what you child and their class has been up to while they are at school. We have encountered some technical difficulties as we have begun but please bear with us in this first year.

From this term parents should be able to upload and add comments to their child’s diary. Once these are approved by the teacher they will appear on your child’s diary feed. This is a great way of adding praise, positive feedback or asking a question, however any concerns should continue be raised through a call to your child’s teacher, the diary is not the place for a discussion. This also gives parents the ability to upload any of your child’s achievements out of school which link to their skills tracker or to nominate themselves for a whole school jigsaw piece.

If you have any questions about how to sign up for the Interactive Diary, please get in contact with the school. If your log in password was provided more than 30 days ago, you will have to request a new one from the office as it will have expired.

SCHOOL COUNCILS

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Eco: Our P5 and P1M classes are working collaboratively towards gaining our Eco Flag, and have been making good progress towards this. The boys and girls have even braved the winter weather to take part in some litter picks. The Eco Council are hoping to work alongside our Health Council later this term to promote healthy snack choices at playtime.

Pupil: Our Pupil Council members have been busy completing a questionnaire and discussion linked to school improvement. They have decided that the first improvement to be made is the choice for indoor playtimes. They plan to create Rainy Day Boxes for each area. The members presented their idea to the PTA and made a request for a donation to buy storage boxes and some of the items to go in these. They have also asked any Glashieburn families for donations after any Christmas clear outs. These donations should be put into school by Friday 19th January.

Glashie for Ghana: The children in this council work with Mrs McKenzie and have a link with GE Oil on Broadfold Road, and a school in Ghana. The boys and girls recently visited GE Oil to take part in a video link up with some of the school pupils from Ghana. They now all have pen friends and recently wrote a letter to them, introducing themselves and a day in their life. At Christmas time the council collected items for shoeboxes which were decorated and sent over to Ghana as gifts for some of the children, and they have also have also collected games and book no longer used at Glashieburn and sent those over to the School. Very busy indeed!

Charities: P3M ,who are our Local Charities Council, recently promoted a food drive to add to Instant Neighbour's food back. It was a great success, thanks to all who donated. The children really enjoyed hearing about what Instant Neighbour does in the community, and thought that helping to load the van was great fun!

P4W are our National and International charities Council, and have been completing research around these types of charities; how they differ from local charities, what kind of help they need and how we might be able to help at Glashieburn.

Fairtrade: Our Fairtrade Council is made up of children from P7B and P1/2C. This last term they were working hard to achieve the ‘Fairaware’ award for Glashieburn. The children have one more survey to complete and fingers crossed the award should then be ours! They will be looking to achieve the ‘Fairactive’ Award by Summer. Look out for details about a Fairtrade café idea!

Health: Our Health Council is our P3/4W class and they have been finding out about how to keep active at lunchtimes and have been busy devising ideas for lunchtime activities. If you have any ideas, let them know!

Sports Council: This council works closely with Steven Campbell from Active Schools. They have planning how to raise the profile of sport at Glasieburn and get everyone active.

Rights Respecting Schools: P6R make up the Rights Respecting Schools Council, and have done a fantastic job of earning our Bronze award. The children completed pupil, teacher and adult surveys, collated the results and created a spreadsheet with their findings.

They have also had to keeps minutes of every meeting to submit as part of the Bronze award. Next up is working towards the Silver award– good luck P6R! Glashie Safety Officers: P2W are responsible for making sure our school is safe. They completed some work with Rachel from Sustrans around cycle and road safety, and have thought about safety around their classroom, and have made improvements. Recently they found out about handwashing and created some fantastic posters for the toilets in their class area.

Digital Leaders: The P6/7 class have been finding out about Internet safety and have created posters to help keep other children informed of how to stay safe while online. The class have also created a trailer for their Term 1 and 2 video about what’s been happening at Glashieburn. This should be released very soon!

House and Vice-House Captains: These 8 children work with Miss Robertson, and have focused on ways to encourage children to earn house points. They have been planning and organising the Term Treat, and are now looking to plan an inter-house competition by running a ‘dance battle’!

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Glashieburn News

COFFEE AFTERNOONS This term sees the start of our Parent Coffee catch up afternoons.

P1 and P2: Friday 26th January 2-3pm P3 and P4: Friday 16th February 2-3pm P5, P6 and P7: Friday 9th March 2-3pm These catch up times are designed to allow parents a chance to meet up and chat, it’s an opportunity for parents to support parents, and fosters a community link. It may even be just 5 minutes peace with a coffee and a biscuit before pick up!

Our aim would be for parents to offer suggestions as to how these times could be utilised in terms offering information and guidance, perhaps from outside agencies. We would also like to hear of any other ideas you may have for these coffee catch ups and how often you would like to have them.

CELEBRATION ASSEMBLY DATES The celebration Assembly dates are as follows…

-Friday 26th January -Friday 9th February -Friday 23rd February -Friday 9th March These assemblies are for the children to nominate themselves for a whole school puzzle piece, it could be for an achievement your child is really proud of or a skill they have mastered more than once from their skills tracker found in their homework jotters.

Remember that you can also upload any certificates or pictures of achievements to your child’s Interactive Learning Diary.

MRS MCDONALD’S MISSIONS A huge well done to all those who completed the first mission, I hope you have remembered to colour a window on your rocket. All the poppies are available to view in our Parent’s area beside the back hall.

A new mission will be set at the beginning of February so keep your eyes peeled for more information coming home!

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PTA A huge thank you to our newly formed PTA, the members have done a fantastic job of organising and running some great events since taking up their roles. I think the Santa’s Grotto proved to be the most popular with our younger children, and the movie night was a great hit with our older boys and girls. We look forward to the Family Ceilidh Night on the 26th January and the Valentines Discos in February!

Committee Roles: CHAIR: Donna Crowe (Jamie P4) VICE-CHAIR: Nicola Massie (Cameron P3 and Catherine P1) SECRETARY: Isla Taylor (Archie P3 and Hollie-Ann P1) TREASURER: Anne Haggart (Iona P3 and Heather P1) Class Reps Nursery: Angie Taylor (Ethan) Jo Davidson (Jamie) P1: Gordon Kessack (Cameron), Duncan Milne (Ailsa), Dawn MacKenzie (Owen) and Elaine Brown (Georgia) P2: Kelly Easton (Holly) and Keely Urquhart (Esme) and Lauren Dale (Ava) P3: Lynne Murray (Finlay) and Sonja Kirk (Finlay) P4: Carol Glodek (Holly), Emma Combe (Lucas) P5: Kelly Bonnar (Emily) P6: Lorraine Drage (Daniel) and Stacey Corbett (Grant) P7: Karen Gill (Rose), Fiona Campbell (Brodie) Claire Swanson (Aidan ) We are still looking for 1 or 2 class reps for P5. Reps can rotate their attendance at meetings.

Thanks to those who have volunteered, please get in touch if you can help.

If you are interested in coming along to a meeting, keep an eye on the Glashieburn PTA Facebook page for the next date .

REMINDERS  Please ensure that all children have a pair of indoor shoes. During winter months mud and other debris is brought into school on the soles of children’s shoes which can mean that this mess is also then taken on to carpeted areas. Some indoors may be sent home as they are beginning to get too small or not fastening, which is unsafe.  All children should have a gym kit which consists of a change of tshirt and shorts. Girls and boys with long hair should tie this back for gym.  Children should not wear jewellery to school– stud earrings only  Please refrain from allowing children to bring toys into school  f you think you may be eligible for Free School meals, leaflets and forms are available from the office at all times. You can also collect forms for clothing grants at the office.  Don’t forget about our uniform swap in the cloakroom at the front of the school. This is very handy for those children who have taken a growth spurt recently.

PARKING After a complaint from a local resident, could we ask our families to be considerate when parking for drop off and pick up. We appreciate the lack of parking in the and around the school, however we do need to allow for residents coming to and from work, and accessing their own drive-ways.

Thank you