Friday 10th July 2020
www.st-johnscofe.hants.sch.uk 01256 324121
St John’s Newsletter
Learning, Loving and Laughing Together
Transition arrangements… I hope the year 3/4 children enjoyed their class calls with their new teachers today.
The year 1 and 2 children will have this opportunity next Friday, 17th July. The calls will be at the following
times with a link being posted in their current year group classroom.
Aruba - 9.30am
Greece—10.30am
Dominica - 2.00pm
Where a child is joining Dominica, Mrs Wynn will host the call as Miss Dellar (who will be present) does not yet have an
account on our system.
Remember to look out for the link to your teacher’s welcome video. These will be sent out on Monday.
All receiving teachers have now spoken with your child’s current class teacher and this week the children are being set some
transition tasks as part of their learning. More details can be found in Mrs Tunnicliffe’s entry on the final page.
Year 5/6 children in September— these year groups will also find out their morning groups for September next week. Again a
link to the teachers’ welcome video will be emailed and we are currently working on finding an opportunity for the children to
talk to their morning class teacher.
Nearly there… The end of term is fast approaching with 7 days of teaching remaining. I want to say a big thank you
to all parents for their continued support and efforts to keep the children engaged and motivated. We know it has
been a challenge to maintain the children’s enthusiasm and to create a learning environment in living rooms,
dining rooms and on kitchen tables but the level of engagement in the St John’s virtual classroom has been
consistently higher than the national average and this is a huge credit to parents and carers. As I have said before,
I am with you all the way - as I write, I have just dealt with my own child who has loudly claimed he can’t think of
anything to write just as my husband started a conference call!
If your child has found it a challenge to complete work at home, please don’t worry about it over the summer. Let
us get all children back to school in September, settle them in and then we will begin to assess where they are,
what they can remember and we will tailor work to meet their needs so we can begin to fill those gaps. For some
children this will be a quick process, for others it will take slightly longer. However, research into learning shows
that at the bottom of the hierarchical of need is the requirement to feel safe and secure. Without this, the child
will not learn effectively. Therefore, our focus in September will be on getting the children used to their new
classes, surroundings, routines and safe measures. Please give my teachers the time to settle your child. Some will
bounce back to school and just accept that things have to be done differently, others may find it temporarily
challenging and some may need additional support for a few weeks. Over the holidays, talk to your child about
returning to school, highlighting the positives about seeing their friends and learning at school rather than home,
and talk through their anxieties and concerns.
The government guidelines were published last week. Using the information we have been provided with and
what we have learnt this term, we now have a draft plan. We had a virtual staff meeting this afternoon to go over
the draft plan to check it works and nothing has been missed. We will then need to check a few operational
requirements and risk assess everything. At this point we will publish to you but this may not be before the end of
the term. However, even when I do this, please bear in mind there will be a huge possibility that things will change
again before the beginning of September if the virus infection rate begins to climb again or Basingstoke is put into
a local lockdown. Let’s all pray and hope this won’t be the case!!
New
Classes
Friday 10th July 2020
www.st-johnscofe.hants.sch.uk 01256 324121
Diary Dates
21/07/20 Last day of term - please note all children
MUST be collected by an adult.
22/07/20 INSET Day (5)
INSET Days 2019/2020
Wednesday 22nd July 2020 (5)
INSET Days 2020/2021
Thursday 3rd September 2020 (1)
Friday 4th September 2020 (2)
Dinner Menu
If your child is currently in school, please see below the dinner menu for the rest of this Summer term. Please note, there is
a slight chance the menu will change if the kitchen have supply issues.
Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday
Meat Sausage Roll Ham Sandwich/Wrap Tuna Wrap Hot Dog Fish Fingers
Veg Veggie Sausage Puff Cheese Sandwich/Wrap Pizzini/Pizza Veggie Hot Dog Quorn Nuggets
End of Year Gifts...
We’ve had several questions from parents about how they could
give an end-of-year gift to the adults in their child’s class, given
the various restrictions in place. Nothing is ever expected, but
the staff are always grateful for your kindness and generosity.
We’ve discussed this as a staff, and given the circumstances, we
would rather not have gifts brought into school for
various reasons: some staff are not in school, anything would
need to be quarantined and cleaned, and the weather may melt
things!
If you would like to give something, we have created a digital
wishlist of books on Amazon for the school library. If you
purchase a book and leave a message we will create a special
print with the message to stick inside the front of the book to
mark who gifted the book. The link to the list can be found
below:
www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/28E52G0TXQ5IG?
ref_=wl_share
A road safety newsletter was
emailed out earlier in the
week to the year 6 pupils. If
you didn’t receive it and
would like a copy, please
contact the school office.
The road safety experts are
very concerned that many
year 6 pupils will be
unprepared to make their
first ‘independent journeys’ to and from their secondary
school. In usual times, there are many opportunities for
the children to practise but obviously this year, this
hasn’t been possible for many.
Cleaner Required
We are looking for a cleaner from September—7.50 hours per week, 4.00pm—5.30pm each day.
If you are interested, please contact the school office at: [email protected].
Year 6 athletics and leavers video
Well done to all year 6 pupils who returned to take part in the virtual athletics event. Hayley sent me some pictures of some
of the children and it was so lovely to see happy faces of children who had clearly enjoyed doing the activities. Thank you to
Hayley for organising this.
Next week, the year 6 staff will be posting the leavers video in the year 6 Google stream. I haven’t had the opportunity to
view it myself yet but make sure you don’t miss it. We might not have been able to do our usual events but we are trying
hard to find ways to mark the year 6s time with us.
Friday 10th July 2020
www.st-johnscofe.hants.sch.uk 01256 324121
Child Title Response?
Year R Transition Meeting
Year 2 Transition Meeting
LETTER ALERT!
Digital Learning Update! Well done to everyone who has been submitting work over the past couple of weeks. We have seen some fantastic creativity including zoo maps, zoo keeper talks and some amazing story books. Next week is our last full week of term. Usually in school, children would have the opportunity to write a letter to their teacher ready for September. We would still love for children to be able to write to their September teacher so the English tasks will help children to complete this letter. The final, best copy of the letter will be submitted on Wednesday or Thursday and the receiving teacher will read the letter and return the work. Please try to upload or e-mail in a copy of your final letter if you can, rather than just marking it as done. As far as possible, we would encourage you and your child to complete this task as it forms an important part of the transition process. For children who are in school, this task will be completed within school time. Year 6 As secondary transition is slightly different, Year 6 work will be reflecting on road safety and how to keep safe when walking or cycling. This work goes alongside the road safety letter sent earlier this week. We would encourage parents/carers to discuss the learning from our road safety tasks with your child. Mrs Tunnicliffe