Dear Parents

As a staff we always feel a great sense of pride as we say goodbye to our Primary 7 pupils, however this year feels specialto me as these were the very first P1s that I welcomed in seven years ago when I started as the Headteacher at Dunbar Primary School. Time seems to fly by so fast in our schoolas it really does feel like months and not years since that day. As with all our pupils I look forward to seeing them when I visit Dunbar Grammar School or when we welcome pupils back as volunteers or when they come to visit and amaze us with how tall they have become! Good luck Primary 7! I am amazed and delighted at the wonderful year the pupils, staff and community of Dunbar Primary School have had with such a range of activities and learning going on. Take a look at our school and class blogs on: http://www.edubuzz.org/dunbarprimary/or search for @DunbarPrimary on twitter.

I will be reporting back on our school improvement activities at the start of next term and at the Meet the Teacher evenings; however we are delighted with the impact Dunbar Reads Aloud has had on our pupils and the reading attainment. Congratulations though to you, our parents, the Parent Council and all our fantastic volunteers for all your efforts in supporting the school in all that we do, you make our school a very special place of which we can all be proud. Our aim was to read 20,000 books this session although we didn’t make that grand total I am delighted to tell you that our total was 16,825, I am sure you will agree a fantastic achievement by our pupils!

Au-Revoir

As well as the P7 year group previously mentioned, we say goodbye to Miss Rachael Brown and Miss Hazel Cleland who are departing to teach at other schools.Two long serving members of staff are retiring after many years of outstanding, loyal service to our school; Mrs Anne Knox and Mrs Ruth Crooks are both retiring and will be missed by us all and we wish them all the best for the future. Miss Zoe Winters and Miss Lisa Macdonald are both going to university to train as teachers, we know they will excel in this profession and we wish them good luck when they return to the classroom. Mrs Janette Murray will be greatly missed in nursery. We wish her well as she leaves us to work in the family business.

Welcome to Dunbar Primary School

I sent out the class list for the new session 2015/16last week and the pupils got to meet their new teachers on Monday 22ndJune. We welcome our Newly Qualified Teachers–Mr Jamie Orr in P3B, Miss Samantha Todd in P4B and Miss Erin Armstrong in P5C. We also welcome, as the Class Teacher in Woodlands, Mrs Amber Thomson and in P4b Mrs Kirsty Parkin. We are delighted to welcome back from maternity leave,Mrs Sarah Hughes and Mrs Doreen Sheerin who will be sharing Harbour Nursery and Mrs Marie Howey is also returning to her nursery nurse post.

New Arrival!

We are delighted to inform everyone that Mrs Frances Wilson P2/3 teacher had a baby girl,Lottie, a couple of weeks ago.

Unpaid Lunch/Trip/Camp/York/Nursery Snack Money

We have a large amount of money owing for lunches and trips and I would be very grateful if parents would settle these amounts before the end of term. As a school we can no longer allow parents to build up large amounts of money owed, and we will be contacting parents to ask them to pay these amounts.

New School Uniform

Both campuses will be open for parents to collect orders of school uniform between 9am – 2pm on Tuesday 19th August.

Ready Steady Cook

Congratulations to Karly Conn and Daisy Bisset both from P6b who took part in the final of this cookery competition and produced some delightful dishes and were the runners up against four other schools in the county.

Fundraising Events

Pupils and staff raised £212.78 for the Wear it Wild day for WWF and Mrs Anne Knox has raised £150 for the MS society with sponsors and a baking stall at Lochend Campus.

Congratulations!

Well done to all our P6 and P7 athletes who took part in the East Lothian Athletics Competition at Meadowbank and won! The team was: Freya Ross; Lewis Young; Louie Dalgetty; Iona Goldie; Taylor Wilson; Kirsty Nicolson; Steven Dalgetty; Ben Smith; Marissa Kelly; Zola Lorimer; Amy Morrison; Emily Bird; Dylan Kirkwood; Eve Pitman; Niamh Richards; Evie Welsh; Mikey Wimbledon-Hall; Angus Williams; Abigail Arthur; Lewis Lancaster; Lucy De Los Santos; Taelor Snaith; Finlay Thomson; Jake Douther; Amy Paul; Claudia Wight; Brandon Dean; Callum Richards; Ellie Miller; Joshua Bath.Special mention to Louie Dalgetty (high jump); Niamh Richards (150m); Lewis Lancaster (150m) and Ben Smith (600m) who all broke records at this meeting.Thanks also go to Mrs Lyle, Mr Taylor, Mr Mackenzie and all the parent volunteers who gave their time and effort to ensure the team were ready on the day.

Meet the Teacher Evening

P1-P3 Meet the Teacher will be on Tuesday 1st September at 6.00pm

P4 – P7 Meet the Teacher will be on Wednesday 2ndSeptember at 6.00pm

The meet the teacher evening is a vital event in our school calendar and we would really appreciate it if all parents could attend.The class teachers will have really important information on the year ahead for your son/daughter and how you can support your child both at home and in school. Whichever class your child is in next year,this evening is important in setting out the expectations for the year and we really look forward to seeing you.

Volunteers

A BIG THANK YOU to everyone who volunteered in school over the course of the year. We will be holding a coffee morning in September in the hope of persuading new parents to join us, but also more importantly, to say thanks and keep going please if you are one of our regular volunteers. We are all so very grateful to all the unsung heroes who came and helped us in lots of different ways: supporting reading focus groups, helping on school visits, library volunteers, gardening helpers, healthy snack volunteers, cycle training supporters, read-a-thon organisers and all those who came and spoke to classes and many, many more! Our school is much better for your support and of course we often could not offer the activities to our pupils without your help.

Primary 7 Show “Alice” and Leaving Party

We look forward to seeing all the parents of our P7 pupils at the show on Wednesday 1stJuly at 1.15pm at John Muir Campus. The P7 Leavers Party begins at 6.30pm at Lochend and we hope parents will join us from 8.15pm for a final dance.

End of Term Finishing Arrangements – Friday 3rd July 2015

We are aware that lots of parents have pupils in both P3 and P7 so in order to enable them to see both clapping out ceremonies the P1- P3 pupils will leave very sharp at 11.45am.

We know that parents, younger siblings, grandparents and other parents and pupils will want to come and see P7 leave so we will ensure that the Primary 7 classes do not leave the Lochend building until nearer 12.10 allowing those who wish to come to see them to do so.

  • 11.00 am - P1,P2 and P3 clap out P7 at John Muir Campus after our whole school assembly.
  • 11.45amsharp – P1 and P2 clap out the P3s at John Muir (continuing our new tradition)
  • 12.10 pm (approx) P4–P6 clap out P7 from Lochend (continuing our old tradition) - this will allow parents and younger pupils to attend and join in too!

Parents/Carers are welcome to attend all the ‘Clapping Out’ ceremonies

Coming soon...next session

Mathletics, Childrens University and Grandparents Day, plus lots of other exciting things ahead!

Finally, I hope you all have a lovely summer holiday and fingers crossed for warm, sunny weather. We look forward to welcoming everyone back on Wednesday 19thAugust 2015 at 8.45a.m.

New P1 Pupils Group A 9.00 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.Group B 12 noon – 2.00 p.m.

With best wishes

Mrs Helen Gillanders