Head Master: Robert MacDonald, M.Ed., B.A.
Telephone: (01242) 522086
Email: hm@richardpate.co.uk.
5th November 2009
Dear Parents,
I do hope you have all enjoyed a restful half term break and it has been lovely to see the children return in such high spirits. Our curriculum focus on Maths has been a great success this term featuring a number of activities which hopefully have had the children sharing their experiences at home. We started Maths Week with a visit from ‘Bubblz the Clown’ who entertained the whole school in an assembly and then visited the Prep classrooms throughout the day. Bubblz was also on hand when we released over 350 helium balloons with an identifying tag for every child and adult at the Richard Pate School. Torrential rains that night has had some impact on our returns but we have heard back from a number of people from as close as Southern Road and as far away as Fulham football club. We hope Liverpool FC weren’t visiting at the time. Other stops on the way have included Shurdington, Oxford, Middlesex and Hertfordshire. We will announce the winner of the furthest travelling balloon later in the term. The Juniors also enjoyed a visit from the Puzzle Challenge Company where they worked together in groups to find solutions to various tasks. The week continued with the Headmaster’s Challenge where Year 2s and 6s joined me in running, cycling and roller blading round the school. The children will now create various ways of presenting the data that was collected. The week culminated with our Year 5s visiting the Prep Department to play maths games with their younger counterparts. We will continue our study of Maths this term and encourage you all to visit the Gallery section of the website at www.richardpate.co.uk to see first hand evidence of our exploits.
Operation Christmas Child : We hope that everyone received their Operation Christmas Child pamphlet before half term. We are hoping to fill a large number of shoe boxes with Christmas surprises for less fortunate children around the world and it is heart warming to see the number of boxes growing outside of the main Reception area. We would love to have all boxes in by Wednesday 11th November so they can be shipped off as soon as possible. If they are later than that then they will need to be taken to central collection points. Thank you for your support of this worthwhile initiative.
Photographs : The deadline for photograph orders is also next Wednesday. We have had a few glitches with one or two of the photographs so if you have not received a proof copy please let Mrs Minett know.
Scholastic Book Fair : We are holding a Scholastic Book Fair which begins on Thursday 19th November and runs for one week. This is an excellent opportunity to purchase good quality books for your children and also provides our school with valuable resources. We encourage everyone to come along and support this important fair.
Book Tokens : Miss Wright has enrolled us in the Nestle book token programme which is an excellent way for us to add to our school library. We would be very grateful if you could collect the Nestle tokens from the back of selected cereal packs (participating cereals are on display in the library). There is already a collection box in the entrance to the school where you can drop those tokens off. The promotion will continue until March so please start collecting.
Gardening Club : We are also very excited about a Gardening Club we would like to start in the Juniors in the new year. Mrs. Hodgin, one of our parents, will be working alongside members of staff here at school to create some dedicated areas for the children to plant various greenery. Once again we would like you to help us with this initiative as Morrisons has introduced a “Grow Your Own” scheme. You can collect tokens when you shop at Morrisons which can be dropped into a collection box in the entrance way and we can convert these tokens into gardening supplies.
Uniform : I wanted to remind all parents of Junior children that the boys and girls should have returned in winter uniform after half term. We allow them to choose up until half term but now with the colder weather it is time for all children to dress appropriately. We also ask Junior parents to practise the art of tying shoelaces and ties over the half term. Children should also come to school with a proper school coat in preparation for winter. We hope you have taken the opportunity of half term to check your child’s kit to see that it is still properly named and that everything fits. The PE department was very keen to ask that children in the Juniors come with a mouth guard and proper black jogger bottoms for the second half of term as well. The only exceptions are Year 3 boys for whom mouth guards are optional for tag rugby. We also remind Year 3 parents that their children should now arrive in school uniform to start the day on Friday.
Swine Flu : We continue to watch the developments related to the H1N1 virus with interest and have reason to believe we may have seen the first cases amongst our Richard Pate family. The advice we continue to receive is that any child exhibiting flu like symptoms should be kept away from school for 7 days to ensure they are no longer capable of spreading the virus. We have been told that siblings of those children do not have to be kept away from the school if they are not exhibiting symptoms themselves. By exercising common sense I am sure we will keep cases to a minimum.
Absentees : It has come to my attention that some of you have had difficulty in getting through to our phone system out of hours. We are looking in to these difficulties but as a helpful addition we now have the facility for you to let us know if your child will be absent through a dedicated e-mail address. If you send an e-mail to absent@richardpate.co.uk with details including your child’s name, class, date of absence and a brief reason why they will not be in school the message will go directly to the office team. You can still use the phone system to tell us of an absence but this alternative may prove very helpful to some of you. As always we expect any requests for absence which do not involve illness to be sent to me for consideration.
Website photos : In our on-going effort to ensure your children’s safety we are changing the username and password for our Gallery of photos on the website. As parents you can click on any of the photos you see in the Gallery and it will ask for username and password. By supplying these you can then download a high resolution quality version of the photo. We like to change this number periodically so only our current parents have access to the photos. The username and password can be found in the printed version of this newsletter.
Upcoming Dates : The second half of this term promises to be every bit as busy as the first half and I wanted to draw your attention to some important dates in prospect. On Monday 9th November we will be hosting the PTA AGM and my Headmaster’s Annual Report. This is an opportunity to learn more about the important business of the PTA and to hear how the school continues to move forward. We will be hosting a reception in the Forum from 7.15pm and the meeting begins in the hall at 8.00pm. It would be lovely to see as many of you as possible at this event.
On the penultimate night of term, Tuesday 15th December, we will be staging our Carol Service for all Junior children and their parents commencing at 7.00pm. We will once again hold the service in Cheltenham College Chapel and expect all Junior children to be in attendance. Please note this important date in your diaries as it is a highlight of our musical calendar.
Christmas Fayre : Due to an unfortunate clash of dates we have had to reschedule our Christmas Fayre for Saturday 28th November from 2 – 4pm. The PTA is sending out a letter in the coming days with details of what to expect and how you can help. We hope that as many of you as possible can join us for this exciting event. I will also be sending out a request from Ian McKinlay, our President of the PTA, asking for donations for the raffle and a possible silent auction. I know these are challenging times but if you were able to make a donation it would be greatly appreciated. That request will come in an e-mail before the end of the week so please watch out for it.
Pate’s Puffins : Our dedicated group of hockey mothers continue to meet every morning on the astro to enjoy some fun and exercise as part of the Pate’s Puffins. We are always keen to welcome new members and if you have an interest in joining please come along in your hockey kit on any Monday. If you are a little shy please drop me an e-mail and I will make an introduction to Roy Smith who coordinates the activity for us. The Puffins also take part in the occasional match if you are interested in the competitive element of the game.
We look forward to another exciting half term and hope you can join us for the many activities on offer in the coming weeks.
Yours sincerely,
R. MacDonald
Headmaster