Heathfield Primary and Early Years Centre Values Honesty * Integrity * Respect * Equality * Compassion

Heathfield Primary School and Early Years Centre - Newsletter September 2019

Dear Parents/Carers, The term has started positively and pupils are looking smart in their uniforms and have come back to school with a lot of energy and ‘can do’ attitudes.

School Events We have some exciting events happening during and after the school day as follows: TAMFEST – Sunday 27th October The Feel Good Choir and Samba Band are playing at different venues throughout the day and the Heathfield cheerleaders will join them in the procession leaving the Arran Mall and walking down the Main Street. Please come along and join the procession or cheer us on from the crowd. TWOs COMPANY – Saturday 2nd November Mrs Terras’s choir will sing on Saturday 2nd November at the Town Hall during the evening. Tickets will be available from the Gaiety in due course. PRESTWICK LIGHT SWITCH ON – Sunday 24th November Mrs Terras’s choir will sing during this event. We will be looking for parent helpers.

Educational Visits

All Primary 5 and 6 pupils will be going to Ryze on Friday 6th September. The school was awarded free tickets and we decided to run the visit as a reward for the

vast sum they raised for Whitley’s retreat.

Primary 6 are visiting Vikingar in Largs on Monday 9th September as a stimulus for this terms context for learning.

Primary 2 are starting tennis on Friday 6th September.

Parent Council Meetings Wednesday 6th November 7pm Wednesday 19th February 7pm Wednesday 13th May 7pm (There had previously been a meeting on 2nd October but this has been cancelled as the Fundraising Committee are meeting on the same night.)

Sponsored Bounce

We will be holding a Sponsored Bounce on Thursday 19th September. All proceeds will go into the School Fund and will support school trips, clubs and cooking. We are striving to offer a wider range of engaging activities both in and outside school and funds will help enormously in supporting these activities. Sponsor forms are in bags.

School Photographs School Photographs will be taken on the 25th and 26th September (TBC). In response to a parent consultation before the summer we will trial individual/family photographs throughout the school.

Macmillan Coffee Morning Primary 7 pupils are planning and leading the Macmillan Coffee morning on Friday 27th September (more details to follow). Please come along and support, we know you will enjoy a blether and the hospitality of our pupils.

Parking Please note that the carpark is for staff parking only. Could we also remind parents that parking is not allowed on the zigzag lines on Heathfield Road.

Heathfield Primary and Early Years Centre Values Honesty * Integrity * Respect * Equality * Compassion

Playground Development Primary 1 and Primary 2 playground – The Primary 1 and 2 playground is looking tired and desperately in need of some care and attention. We are proposing that the first step is to clear what is currently there and then add some colour and playground markings. We will be booking a skip and are looking for a dedicated and hard working team of parents to come along and help break up what is there so we have a blank canvas to start the project. Every little bit helps and we will provide tea and coffee. Watch this space for more details. Primary 3 – 7 playground – this is a much bigger space and more difficult to make an impact. This year we are hoping to add some benches and start a trim trail. There have been football nets added at lunchtime. The willow dome has been a great success but we need some keen gardners to help maintain it. If you have some free time please contact Allan Ward via the school office.

Facebook We are very proud of our Facebook page and feel that it is a great opportunity to communicate with parents, celebrate success and showcase all the fabulous pupils we have in our school. Thanks to our local community for supporting the page and we cant tell you how much all the positive comments and support mean to us. We are finding it increasingly difficult to run the messenger aspect of the page efficiently so we have decided to stop this function on the page. We will trial this for a period and welcome your feedback.

Inspirational Quotes Owen Kerr Signs has offered schools a free quote to inspire pupils and brighten walls. As we have quite a large amount of blank space in corridors and stairwells we have decided to order a few more quotes for around the school. We asked parents for some suggestions on the Facebook page and were delighted with the response. Pupils are being consulted this week and we are hoping to have the favourite quotes agreed by the end of this week.

Rights Respecting Schools

We are excited to receive information that we won an Education Scotland ‘Food for Thought’ Bid to allow us to buy new cooking equipment for our school. This a great achievement that will allow us to support article 24: Good quality health care, clean water and good food. Throughout the year all classes will be participating in cooking, looking at how this impacts our local and global community, as well as a focus on the recycling of food packaging. This also support our focus on Global Goals 2 : No Hunger, 3 : Good Health & Article 12 : Responsible Consumption.

Staffing Natalie Spence starts her maternity leave on Friday 6th September and during this time Allan Ward will be covering the Principal Teacher post. Erin McGhee (Primary 5) will be covering Natalie’s maternity leave. Gillian Speirs is leaving our EYC to take on a post in East Ayrshire. The post will be interviewed on Friday 6th September. Thanks to Gillian for her commitment to Heathfield EYC.

ASN Parents Forum The dates for this year’s meetings are as follows:

Wednesday 20/11/19 – Parent Forum - 6:30-8pm – Girvan Academy

Wednesday 19/2/19 – Parent Forum - 6:30-8pm - Marr College, Troon

Thursday 7/5/19 – 1-8pm - ASN Information Hub – Ayr Town Hall The forums are open to all parents of children / young people in South Ayrshire - whether or not they have been diagnosed or identified with Additional Support Needs. Best wishes, Gaenor Hardy Headteacher

Heathfield Primary and Early Years Centre Values Honesty * Integrity * Respect * Equality * Compassion

Dates this term……

Sponsored Bounce Thursday 19th September Long weekend Friday 20th September and

Monday 23rd September Teacher Inservice Day Tuesday 24th September Pupils start back Wednesday 25th September School Photographs Wednesday 25th September

Thursday 26th September Macmillan Coffee morning Friday 27th September Parents Evening Thursday 10th October Harvest Service (pupils only) Friday 11th October ***COLLECTION FOR AYRSHIRE FOODBANK*** Close for October break Friday 11th October

Dates next term…… Pupils start back Tuesday 22nd October Halloween Discos Wednesday 30th October Primary 1 and 2 1.45pm – 2.45pm Primary 3 – 5 5.00pm – 6.15pm Primary 6 and 7 6.30pm – 7.45pm Parent Council meeting Wednesday 6th November Dance Competition Friday 15th November Dolphin House Monday 18th November Monday 25th November Monday 2nd December

Lunch time and after school clubs We are excited to share that we have over 24 clubs running this term open to Primary 2-7. We could not offer the amount of experiences for our children without the dedication of our staff,

who give up their own time to support a variety of different sporting and wider life skills activities.

Throughout the year we aim to offer a variety of clubs that will appeal to all our children and will use Pupil Think Tanks to ensure we are offering clubs which appeal to all children in every stage. P1 clubs will start later in the year when they are all settled into Heathfield routines. We are now paperless with most of our club sign ups, in which you will receive a link via

email/text to sign your child into the clubs of interest. Confirmation emails will always be sent before clubs commence to confirm if your child has a space. If you have the time to support any of our after school clubs, please contact that office. We would greatly appreciate your help and

support.