Merrylee Primary School s1

Merrylee Primary School Newsletter 7 February 2010

Dear Parent / Carer

Extra in service day for developing a curriculum for excellence As you may know the government has allocated another in-service day for schools to allow teachers more time for the planning of the development of a curriculum for excellence. Glasgow City Council has decided that Glasgow schools will be closed on Wednesday 2 nd June for this purpose.

Official opening of Merrylee Primary School and Limetree Nursery The official opening of the school will take place on Monday 8th March at 10am. This is an event which must follow specific guidelines from the council. In the afternoon of that day we plan to have a celebration with the children. It will almost be exactly one year since we moved in on the 10th of March 2009. Quite unbelievable.

School catering service I am pleased to report that our catering service is back to normal with Monday 1 st March starting week one. Thank you for the many contacts re the catering manager’s initiative to encourage the children to make healthy choices for lunch. The children have been really motivated by it. They have been eating more fruit and vegetables and also taking more time over lunch. I am very grateful to Anne Marie and her staff who always offer an excellence service to our children. The children are encouraged to eat their lunch in a caring manner and always offered alternatives if they don’t like their original choice. Our catering staff have just been recognised for offering exceptional service by their director who spent the day with us last Thursday. Well done to all. I would also like to point out that he also recognised the caring contribution made by our Facility officers (janitors), day cleaner and crossing patrollers. Thank you to them also.

P5 is the first winner of the healthy eating challenge with 98% making healthy choices. Well done to them all. The class will enjoy extra play time this week.

Staff news I am delighted to report that Miss Leiper will be working with P7/6 until Mrs Gray returns from maternity leave in June. She has established a great working relationship with the class and the pupils are very happy that she has been allowed to stay.

A big thank you to the Parents’ association A huge thank you to the PA as we have just had a projector and large screen installed in the school hall. This is a fabulous addition to our IT resources. Many thanks for the funds to meet the bill of £1800.

Dog mess in the lane I see that we still have the problem of dog mess in the lane although perhaps slightly better than before. The community team are still actively monitoring the situation. My advice would be to make personal complaints to various official bodies. P7 pupils have sent letters of complaint, we have put up more notices and I have been challenging anyone I see who does not pick up after their dog. As a dog lover, I am keen to tackle the irresponsible owners. 1 Dogs around the school exits and entrances Once again I have received complaints about the increased number of dogs at the various exits/ entrances from school. If you bring your dog to meet your child, may I respectfully request that you do not wait where the majority of children need to pass. We have a number of pupils who are afraid of dogs and the presence of the dogs upsets them.

Parent Council The Parent Council has successfully negotiated finance with the council local area committee for funding for an adaptation at the side of the school. It has been agreed that the fence will be moved backwards to provide a safe waiting area for parents at the end of the lane. I am very grateful to them for their persistence to seek improved access for our pupils and also to the area committee, Bailie McNally, DRS Glasgow and the education department. All parties will meet on Monday evening with Cathcart Community Council to discuss the matter further. We are very fortunate that so many bodies who are willing and interested to support initiatives and requests from the school.

P5-7 Scottish Opera Our P5-7 pupils spent some time working with artists from Scottish opera. The resulting performance was excellent. The children learned so much from the experience and the performance was certainly enjoyed by all of us privileged to be able to watch it.

P2/1 To People’s Palace The class thoroughly enjoyed their trip and saw many old toys, shops and household things which unfortunately I could remember my mum having!

P2/1 has also enjoyed shopping expeditions to Sainsbury’s on public transport! Thank you for your support with this exercise which brought their learning about shops, the use of money and shopping lists into context. The children went in small groups on the bus with their own shopping lists, bought some shopping, paid for it and made their way back to school. Well done to them all.

P1a To Kelvingrove Park P1a had a fabulous visit to Kelvingrove Park where they saw lots of examples of local wildlife. They delighted in watching the squirrels dash all over the place.

P5, P6/5 & P7 Science workshops with Shell education These were very disappointing experiences as the teacher who led the workshops was far from inspiring. The tasks and experiments were well thought out so the day should have been very successful. Following very honest evaluations, Shell is sending the manager of the education unit to deliver another day of workshops free of charge. I have been assured that we will be much happier with the experience next time.

P1b To Kelvingrove museum The class visited a special set in the museum based on ‘The Princess’ storyline which is their current major class study. The children thoroughly enjoyed their workshop.

To Celtic Connections concerts Several classes attended events at this year’s Celtic Connection Festival. All were thoroughly enjoyed and offered the classes various musical appreciation experiences. 2 P5 To Science Centre To enhance their study of space, P5 visited the Science Centre, Imax and the Planetarium. How best to learn about space! The children have turned their class into a mini space exhibition with an impressive array of rockets, controls, planets etc.

P3/2 & P3 To Dynamic Earth The classes made it through the challenges of our weather to Edinburgh to one of the most interactive and informative museums for children in the country. They saw and handled fossils and participated in a workshop to increase their knowledge and understanding of the time of the dinosaurs.

Pupils to an animation workshop at the BBC Pupils attended an animation workshop at the BBC where they worked with other pupils from across the city to produce a short animated film. They were amazed at how long it took to produce a small 3 minute film.

P7 pupils to Cineworld As part of the Glasgow film festival. P7 pupils went to Cineworld to watch the ‘Journey of the turtle’. The theme fitted in well to their study of conservation. Pupils enjoyed it but reported that it was a bit too long.

African visitors Last week we welcomed 4 educationalists from Africa to the school. They visited 4 classes to observe an enterprising approach to learning and teaching and were most impressed. It was great to hear of the different challenges they face in their own countries in relation to education. It certainly made us realise how lucky we are and how much we take our facilities for granted.

SW Cross Country finals at Netherpollok Congratulations to our finalists from the local event who competed at Netherpollok. All took part and did very well. Our P6 pupils won the trophy for the best P6 team with Katie Rice and Adam Baird the champions in the P6 age group. Well done to all.

So many activities this month! We have had so many outings and activities this month that I cannot report on them all! Hopefully you have heard of them from your child. Senior pupils competed in hurling, Gaelic football and football tournaments; classes had reading visits to the library; classes went to the library in preparation for the ‘Aye Write’ festival; many lunch time and after school clubs have begun. Thank you to everyone for their contribution and participation.

Lost property The mountain of lost property is rising again. Can I please remind you to label all of your child’s clothes etc? Mrs Macrae will now take responsibility for managing the lost property. No mean feat! I am grateful to her for agreeing to do this. All property will be gathered and will be open for you to come and reclaim any items every Friday from 2.30 until 2.55pm at the community entrance. She will keep the property until the last Friday of every month, after which we will pass it to the local charity shop. I hope this meets with your approval. I know you will realise that we cannot hold goods indefinitely. We already have 2 black bags full since Christmas.

3 Plea re missing items A boy in P4 has lost his school fleece. It is navy with school badge and has a quilted lining. The boy had his name on it. If your child has brought the wrong fleece, or any other item, home by mistake, please return it to school.

Healthy snacks Please try to ensure that your child brings only a healthy snack to school. The Health Committee continue to be proactive in encouraging fruit eating in class and regularly run campaigns to encourage healthy snacks and packed lunches. We do however realise that this is a matter for parental choice and they thank those who do for your continued support.

Free meal entitlement Glasgow City Council would like to encourage all parents/carers who think they may be entitled to apply for free school meals. The council is concerned that many families are not accessing this service. Forms are available from the school office, from education headquarters in Wheatley House, Cochrane Street or on line on the Glasgow website. Please do not worry that your child may feel different if not paying for lunch. We have a very discreet way of dealing with this in school so no child is aware. Please feel free to come and chat to me about this if you have any concerns.

Collecting tokens Please continue to support the school by sending in token given out in supermarkets etc. We are currently collecting Sainsbury’s, Nestles & Tesco tokens. Thank you.

Dates for your diary Wed 3rd Mar Selected P3-5 pupils Hillpark badminton challenge Fri 5th Mar P7/6 To David Livingstone Centre Mon 8th Mar Official opening of the school Tues 9th Mar P5 To Tiso Outdoor experience P6/5 To Aye Write festival Wed 10th Mar Language group To workshop Fri 12th Mar P6/5 To Eco day at the Science Centre P5 To Aye Write festival P7/6 To Aye Write festival Mon 15th Mar Whole school Yamaha demo Tues 16th Mar P7 Swimming starts School photos start today Mon 22nd Mar School book fair starts Tues 23rd Mar Parents evening Thurs 25th Mar Parents afternoon Mon 29th Mar P5 Working with PACE with OLA Wed 31st Mar 10am Easter Service Cathcart Trinity Church Thurs 1st April 2.30pm School closes for Spring Holiday Mon 19th April9am School resumes More trips for this months still to be confirmed! More dates will follow.

Liz Mahindru Head Teacher 4