Dear all Welcome to our Christmas Newsletter. We have had an exceptionally busy term and I hope you enjoy the wide range of achievements of our children and young people included in this edition. We have also enjoyed seeing many of you at our family learning events and drop-in sessions across the campus and I hope to see you in the New Year at the various events we have on offer. You will find included in this newsletter feedback from our information gathering events and the dates and times of our next family learning sessions. I hope to see you there! Kind regards Miss Stones Head Teacher 3-18 On 29 September we welcomed our parents to join us and help us to build our 3-18 ‘Vision, Aims and Values’. We also spoke with teachers and pupils in the schools and we gathered the ideas of our school community. From this process we have created our 3-18 statement which will inform our 3-18 curriculum rationale. ‘Dornoch Firth Campus is a close family comprising of Dornoch Academy, Dornoch Primary and Nursery school and Bonar Bridge Primary and Nursery school. Our schools are deeply committed to working with everyone involved with the learning of our children and young people and have a very inclusive, nurturing, family school ethos from age 3 to 18. We are always happy to welcome new families who are about to join our community. We want our children to be happy, resilient and flourish in all aspects of their development and learning. We are hard-working schools with a strong focus on the wide range of achievements open to our children and young people. Our young people are guided to work effectively and fulfil their aspirations. We work hand in hand with partners to provide a bespoke education for all young people in order to prepare them for learning, life and work. Our 3-18 curriculum rationale is focused and aspirational. It is built around the four contexts of learning (curriculum areas and subjects; interdisciplinary learning; ethos and life of the school; opportunities for personal achievement). To ensure that we remain a vibrant and progressive campus, we revisit our rationale on an annual basis with our partners and school community. This means that we both build on our past and continue to prepare our pupils for a full and successful life as global citizens in the 21st century.’ On Monday 22 January 2018 at Dornoch Primary School, we would like you to join us and help us build our 3-18 curriculum rationale. There will be tea, coffee and cake, an opportunity to see the work of our children, and time to chat about how we shape the 3-18 curriculum for our campus. Following this event, Mrs Birnie, Mr Ross and Mr Sergeant will liaise with individual parent councils to arrange further information events at your child’s school. The children will showcase their work and we can discuss topics and projects for the future. Further information can be found at https://education.gov.scot/improvement/Documents/frwk17-curriculum-rationale-diagram.pdf. Parents should telephone 0800 564 2272 for updated information using the school PIN: Bonar Bridge Primary (041550); Dornoch Academy (041020); Dornoch Primary (041890). Information will also be available at: http://www.highland.gov.uk/schoolclosures, https://www.facebook.com/highlandcouncil, and https://twitter. com/HighlandCouncil. Guidelines for Parents are available on our website or can be requested from the school. I should like to invite you to join us at our Carol Service in Dornoch Cathedral on Friday 22 December at 10.30 am (secondary pupils), and 1.45 pm (primary pupils). Each service will last approximately 30 minutes. Last term we held a number of family learning events across Dornoch Firth Campus. This is a new way of working in response to parent feedback and the new guidelines in ‘How Good Is Our School? 4’. Further information can be found at https://education.gov.scot/improvement/frwk2hgios. Our initial meetings were a great opportunity to introduce teaching approaches and materials to our parents and to get to know you and your children earlier in their educational journey. The approach will take a few years to embed into our practice and we welcome your feedback on our events. So far we held events in literacy and numeracy, especially focussing on ‘Emerging Literacy’ in Primary 1. Further information can be found at https://bumps2bairns.com/ and https://highlandliteracy.com/emerging-literacy/. Please join us for our next event at 9.00 am on Tuesday 12 December at Bonar Bridge Primary School, or at 9.00 am on Wednesday 13 December at Dornoch Primary School. At this event we will be looking at Benchmarks in Literacy and Numeracy for children in P1-P3. At this workshop we will look at examples of work from our children and look at ways to support progression at home as well as in school. The parents had seen each stage of the lighthouse building and photos of the children making simple circuits. Each child was able to explain some of the key learning points. Our P3s worked as a problem solving group showing their understanding by making a model where they had a light that was lit and turned round at the same time. It was, sadly, too bulky to put into any of our lighthouses! Nursery children were welcomed into the newly built setting at the start of this term. They have settled in very well and have all taken opportunities to explore and familiarise themselves with their new environment. Here are some of the children’s views on their favourite parts of the new nursery: “I like all of it!” (Struan); “The home corner is my favourite bit.” (Molly); “I like my home tray and the drawing table.” (Isla); “The garden, filling the buckets with stones.” (Magnus). Nursery children have been learning about how to keep safe as they walk outside. They attended the road safety assembly with the rest of the school and have enjoyed a visit form the lollipop lady, Terry. Mrs Gallon In September we welcomed our children from Bonar Bridge and Dornoch Primary to join us for a ‘Gaelic Interdisciplinary Learning day’. Young people from all schools worked together on Gaelic song and cookery. A great day was had by all! P4-P7 pupils entered a competition to design a new flag for Sutherland. These pupils were winners and received a booklet on Heraldry. Mrs Allan was very proud of all the entries but a particular ‘well done’ to these pupils who were chosen as winners. We celebrated Halloween in Bonar Bridge Primary by holding a ‘spooky’ themed House Team Challenge, whereby pupils worked in their House Teams to assemble a skeleton from memory using limited materials. Every team worked well together and finished the task in the given time. The winning team was Spinningdale who won 20 Pom Poms for their team. The children also came to school dressed up and took part in some fun Halloween activities in class. I am sure you will agree they all made a huge effort and look fantastic. Bonar Bridge Primary School were lucky to get a visit from Peter Price – a well- known guitarist and singer. He was performing a concert nearby and offered to come in and run a workshop with the pupils. Every pupil got the chance to play the guitar and learn some chords. He even taught them to play chords for some famous songs. The pupils thoroughly enjoyed it and have invited him back again next year. P1-P3 really enjoy doing yoga through stories with Jamie on the smartboard. They always start and finish with the special word, “Namaste”. There is a very quiet relaxation section at the end of each story. After each session, they discuss which moves they found the trickiest and which parts of the body they have exercised. The five-a-side football teams have being doing well, with P6 and P7 teams competing against local primaries. The boys’ team were successful in gaining third place in the last tournament meeting, with the girls’ team winning their section outright. Very well done to all! Benchball has also been marked by success in the annual competition, with the boys’ and girls’ teams taking first place. The basketball competition is ongoing, and the teams are training and playing hard to progress. Thanks are due to all the parents and coaches who have helped out so much. Mr Hepburn P6 and P7 are working very hard to prepare for the Christmas show ‘Troy Story’. All the children are working hard to remember their lines and are learning their song lyrics at the same time. Their dancing skills are coming on really well, and every member of the cast is really engaged and enthusiastic. We are looking forward to the show more than ever! Miss Shelley At the end of October, an inspirational week was spent at Kindrogan Field Studies Centre beginning the journey to Forest School accreditation. Forest School is an empowering and creative approach to learning and development which maximises the benefits of learning in the outdoors. It offers our children the opportunity, over repeated visits, to engage with the rich natural diversity of our wild environments to help build confidence, curiosity, resilience, compassion, care and healthy bodies and minds. Forest School’s positive effects on learners, staff and their wider community are increasingly recognised by HMIe and Learning and Teaching Scotland as an ideal vehicle for delivering our Curriculum for Excellence, closing the attainment gap and putting the learners at the heart of their learning experience.