Crookston Castle Primary May Newsletter
Comic Relief Red Nose Day:
Thank you to both our Pupil Council for organising events and again to you for your donations to support this worthwhile cause. We raised a total of £516.24 and are awaiting our certificate.
School Photographs:
On Tuesday 2nd May group photographs will be taken for every class. Individual portraits will be taken for all P1 children. Many of you have said that next session you would like to have individual portraits and family groups taken so we will arrange that with Tempest for the new school year.
School Site Vandalism:
This has been an increasing problem for our shared site over the course of the year. Crookston Early Years Centre has sustained the most damage. CCTV has helped protect our school to a certain extent. Our minibus has had a window broken again and once more our bins have been set on fire. I believe that it costs £85 to replace a bin. The eco committee have written to Patrick Harvie MSP to get free replacement blue recycling bins and we aim to try for free rubbish bins for the playground too. Councillor Watson has arranged for an evening/night patrol to the grounds for the foreseeable future, which may be reviewed closer to the summer break.
Health Week:
Miss Beaton and colleagues are organising Health Week Activities in the week of Monday 22nd to Thursday 25th May. All children will get a variety of activities each day which will be sport, health or wellbeing related. We are grateful for the support of many local groups and organisations in supporting us with making this a fun active learning week for all. Weather permitting, we are holding sports day for P1 to P6 on the Thursday and would like to invite you up to our pitch to watch your child compete in team games, timings as follows: P1 and P2: 9.15-10.30 P3 and P4: 11.00-12.15 P5 and P6: 1.15- 2.45 We had planned for P7s to take part as well but Rosshall Academy have just given this as a P7 transition visit day so we will host a separate P7 sports event near the end of term in June. Our Parent Council are donating the proceeds from recent raffles towards buying fruit etc for the children to make smoothies and towards other Health Week costs. Wear sportsgear fundraiser on Thursday 25th, suggested donation £1.
Crookston Castle House System:
As part of our positive behaviour policy we have introduced a House System in our school. This has been proven to work well in other schools. The children voted for their favourite Scottish Castles and so our six Houses are: Balmoral, Blair, Edinburgh, Glamis, Inveraryand Stirling. All children and staff have been allocated a House. Siblings have been given the same House too. The Houses will have regular afternoon meetings where children can join in activities or take on challenges based around their castle. Children are also able to earn House Points that go towards weekly, midterm and end of term treats. Points are being given to children who demonstrate our school values of Respect, Responsibility, Communication, Equality and Being Valued. Our thanks go to Mr Welch for running the Houses. We hope that the children enjoy working together towards team goals and that they enjoy the rewards they can earn.
Nursery to P1 transition days: Mrs Mathers will make usual arrangements for the transition programme from Nursery into next year’s P1 classes. She has arranged transition visits for the afternoons of Thursday 1st and 8th of June. All families will receive a note of this shortly. P7 to Rosshall Academy transition days: These will be Wednesday 24th and Thursday 25th May. On the first day teachers will accompany the children to secondary from our school. On the second dayall children should make their own way to Rosshall. On both days the children should come home independently with your arrangements from the school.
Kindles Update:
So far this year we have raised just under £1800 towards funding kindles. We have spent £1760 and now have 3 class sets of kindles (16 per class, children work in pairs). We have purchased 150 books at a total additional cost of£47 and protective covers at £64 Children are very positive about working with the kindles and by the end of this term all children from P5 to P7 (8 classes) will have had the opportunity to use them. Our final fundraiser will be on Thursday 25th May when children can wear their sports gear all day, suggested donation £1.
Communication Issues:
Because of a very large legacy bill for previous year’s photocopying and in line with eco school recommendations, we try to keep both our photocopying and notes home to a minimum. We put newsletters on the website and send home brief notes when necessary. We also use texts and send tweets. For this to work we have to have current mobile numbers so please let the office staff know when you change a contact number. Despite two notes home and it being in our March newsletter, several parents were not aware of Rookie Rockstars being in the school. I would urge you to keep checking schoolbags for letters and we will text you when we add a new newsletter or duplicate letter home to our website. As some people are having difficulty accessing our website on their mobile phones, Mr Ramsay is currently developing an APP for you to download which should make it easier to access electronic information.This should be ready in the new term. The newsletter is also displayed on outdoor noticeboards and is available also from the school office. You can follow us on twitter @crookstoncastleor access the website at
Planning for next session:
We have already had enquiries about teachers and classes for next session, 2017-18. This session I have listened to various concerns from parents about classes and I will endeavour to take these on board in final decisions. I now can confirm that we will retain 19 classes next year: 3 P1s, 3 P2s, 3 P3s, 2 P4s, P5/4, 2 P5s, 2 P6s, P7/6 and 2 P7s. I will be consulting teachers about how best to form these classes but I need to ensure that there is a reasonable balance of reading groups within each class to make the learning environment feasible. We will also take into account social groups and any additional supports some children may require. There will inevitably be some movement within classes but we will endeavour to keep this to a minimum. As soon as this is sorted we will let you know which class and teacher your child will have in August. Before the end of term the children will also get to meet their new teacher and see where their classrooms and lining up stations are.
Yours sincerely, Hilda Carrick Head Teacher