Friday 17th October 2014 Dear Parents/Carers, Two weeks ago Emperors had a special delivery, 10 chicken eggs were delivered by the Happy Chick Company. By Friday the 10th of October we had 9 happy chicks. They have brought great excitement to the school and we have all learnt a great deal about the life cycle of a chicken! All the chickens have been allocated new homes and they will leave school today. This afternoon Firetips and KS1 are off to Soft Play City in Welwyn. This is a new soft play centre and we have been invited to try out all their facilities free of charge. The venue hasn’t officially opened yet and we will be the only school there during this taster session. I will be accompanying the children on the trip and I plan to take lots of photographs which I will add to the recent events section of our website. Please remember to take a look. Susan Braceland Terrific Times Tables Give Me Ten Well Done to the children below for earning their next Times Table Certificates: Emperors Emilio Escobar-Fajardo Commodores Hana Hussein Tortoiseshells Manha Hasib Sadiha Ali Cardinals Zita Sikora Murtaza Shah Ruksana Begum Rayhan Jamil Paige Mc Lean Maisha Hossain Monarchs Danny O’Connor Anisah Choudhuri Rebecca Adu-Poku Eve Slater Kai Richards William Lansfield James Durston Mingda Santos Admirals Karys Hardingham Abby Forster Fabiola Brooking-Williams Luke Farenden Haleemah Bint-Sa’d Parent Consultations Thank you to all parents/carers who will be attending parent consultation meetings next week (Monday 20th October and Wednesday 22nd October). I hope you will find these a valuable opportunity to find out how your child is progressing in school. All clubs next week are cancelled apart from Rising Stars which will continue on Tuesday and Wednesday as normal. Music in Bloom For the first time in twelve years, St Albans Cathedral hosted a spectacular Flower Festival entitled ‘Music in Bloom’ and Margaret Wix was lucky enough to be part of this spectacular event. Every class from Skippers up to Monarchs designed and made a seedtray based on a familiar Nursery Rhyme. We received a special thank you letter from the organisers who wanted to thank all the staff and children for their hard work. The money raised at the event will go towards building a better Education and Visitors Centre at the Abbey. Photographs On Wednesday 22nd October Van Cols will be in school taking individual and sibling photographs. Photographs will be printed in time for Christmas. Numicon We have rearranged our Numicon parent workshop which was cancelled last week. The new date is Friday 28th November. The session will take place at 9.30pm after Celebration assembly and will last about an hour. We hope to see many of you there. St Albans Review This week Margaret Wix made the local paper. On Thursday the St Albans Review published an article about our recent HMI visit. It reports on the key findings of the inspection including praise for our rigorous action plan and the effective action which has taken place since our last inspection. Follow the link below: http://www.stalbansreview.co.uk/news/11533976.School_s_acti on_plan_praised_by_inspector/ The following children received a book in assembly this morning for reading 25 times at home since the beginning of term: Firetips Daisy Howard Moonbeams Lexi Pomroy George Robinson Emperors Alfie Long Thasnia Chowdhury Summer Coyle Anissa Elamrouchi Grace Li Holly Godfrey Tortoiseshells Lucile Rouchy Commodores Stanley Francis Admirals Quintella Santiago Kaidan Bray Kacey Westrope Joe Latham Kiara Ryan Thomas Monribot Cardinals Ruksana Begum Rayhan Jamil Zainab Alakhal Monarchs William Lansfield Muhammed Shah Mollie Howard Harvest Festival Our Harvest Festival this year will be on Monday 20th October at 9am. You are welcome and encouraged to attend. This year we are asking people to bring thanksgiving gifts which we will then donate to FEED, the local food bank project run by the Vineyard church. Please feel free to bring any of the following items which will be gratefully appreciated and passed on to someone who really needs them: coffee/tea, sugar, longlife milk, fruit juice/squash, tinned meat/hot dogs/pies/fish/vegetables, rice, pasta/noodles, cooking sauces, tinned puddings/custard, jam/spreads, cereals/cereal bars, biscuits, part baked bread, shower gel, shampoo, deodorant, shaving foam/razors, toilet rolls, washing up liquid/washing powder, nappies sizes: 2, 4+, 5 & 6 plus baby wipes. Please help us to make a difference to families within St Albans. Pantomime Letters have already been sent home about the whole school trip to the pantomime on Thursday 11th December. The school funds the cost of the tickets as we believe this is a valuable and enjoyable experience/reward for the children. The PTA fund the cost of the coaches meaning that this trip is free of charge to the children. You were asked to reply by Monday 20th October or to arrange to see Miss Moles. If you have not replied by Monday, we will assume your child is not attending. They will be marked as absent on Thursday 11th December as the school will be closed for the duration of the pantomime visit. If you have lost your original letter, please send a note to the office. There will be no further reminders. Thank you. PTA Disco Leaflets went home yesterday advertising the PTA Halloween disco and firework display which will take place on Thursday 4th November. Tickets are £4 per child and will be available from the school office from Monday.