Week 25

Dear Parent/ Carer,

Welcome back to the Summer Term at Fairlawn, Haseltine and Kilmorie.

The two terms before it passed with lightning speed.  This is indicative of the pace with which a school year seems to pass... and that is why we have to be prepared a term to a term and a half in advance of events and of key points throughout the year.  We are into our recruitment rounds in all three schools for September and are already well into our planning for September and beyond.  Recruitment gives us the opportunity for renewal and growth.  We are looking to appoint colleagues who are energy positive, who will add value for us, who have a growth mindset, who are committed to their own professional development and are committed to our children and communities.  Our new year's budgets bring us opportunities to continue to build on the enhancements that we have made in all three schools and to maintain that very important forward momentum... that firm sense of purpose that is essential to any successful organisation.

I hope that you are seeing, and will continue to see, those enhancements that are happening in our schools and that you will see the continuing benefits for your children.

All three schools held a Training Day for staff on Monday.  I spent time  at all three schools and was delighted to see the enthusiasm and energy with which our respective staff returned for the Summer Term.  In news from our schools this week:

Fairlawn

We warmly welcomed Hania Ryans as our Head of School for the Summer Term.  Hania is on secondment to us from Downderry Primary and already made a great impression at the school.  Hania is getting to know children, staff, parents and systems and will bring great capacity for us.  We have had a very enthusiastic responce to our adverts for teachers and leaders at Fairlawn and have had many visitors this week looking around and finding more out about the school.  On Wednesday, KS2 enjoyed a fun music singing Assembly.  Meanwhile, on Wednesday and Thursday our Year 4 classes visited Igham Mote,  a medieval moated manor house in Kent, as part of their Tudor topic.  The children had an interesting and fun learning experience during which they dressed as Tudors, toured the premises, and took part in a House Detectives workshop.  On Friday, our Year 2 classes visited the Horniman Museum as part of their Rainforest topic.  Later in the day on Friday, our KS1 children had their sharing assembly during which their outstanding and inspirational work from the week was celebrated.  Our KS2 children also held their new sharing assembly.

 

Haseltine

The signage in the local area celebrating Haseltine as an outstanding school is now almost complete.  Visitors to Sainsbury's can be in no doubt as to just how good Haseltine is and, by the time they have circled the roundabout and entered the Car Park, they will have read most of the inspection report.  We made a brilliant start to the week with teachers working together to look at how we can plan learning that is even more exciting, engaging and practical for our children.  We have met a lot of fantastic teachers this week who have been looking around the school in response to our advert for teaching posts for September.  There is a real excitement amongst teachers about the prospect of working at Haseltine.  The children came in on Tuesday to find explorers, people going to the beach and a gorilla to start their topics this term- they were very excited and have already produced the most exciting learning.  Our affirmations for this term are Respect, Politeness and Manners. We welcomed a range of visitors to our school on Wednesday.  All commented on how lovely the children's manners were in the Dining Room.  We held our Outstanding Party on Friday.  This was a super.... well-deserved... and memorable day for our school.  Thank you to everyone who was part of the event.

 

Kilmorie 

We held a welcome back Assembly for the whole school on Tuesday and introduced our Assembly theme for the week; Relationships.  On Wednesday, Year 4 had a World War II workshop in school. On Friday, children were presented with certificates for 100% attendance and those who nearly achieved 100% percent were given a pen.  Year 6 had a safety and citizenship talk from TfL.