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St James Primary School

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St James E-News 

2nd December 2022

Welcome to the St James Primary School's E-News, a weekly roundup of the latest news and events at our school

Latest Headteachers Blog

Dear Parents, 

It has been another busy week in school this week. 

We were visited by a consultant from the Schools Alliance for Excellence on Tuesday who looked at the work we are doing with the children and toured our school.  I am delighted to say that she was impressed overall with our school.  She felt that she saw lots of excellent work with strong teaching and learning, and was was especially impressed with the quality of the children's writing.
 

Thank you to all the PTA parents who decorated the school for us this week and have made it look very festive, helping us all to get into the Christmas spirit.

We are pleased to welcome a new member of our office staff this week.  Mrs Georgie Anderson will work in the office part-time as a result of the extra admin from the nursery combined with a review of the current staff working patterns and responsibilities.  She will be working on Mondays, Thursday mornings and Fridays.

Lastly, we have a large amount of sickness in school currently with a variety of bugs.  Please help us to minimise the spread of these illnesses by only sending your child to school if they are well. If your child has a stomach bug, please ensure that they do not return to school until 48 hours (2 days) after the last episode of either sickness or diarrhoea as they will still be infectious eg, if a child is sick at 11am on Tuesday, they can return to school at 11am on Thursday. 

Best wishes for a lovely weekend,

Valerie Elliott

School Notices 

  •  Lost Property - over the past 5 weeks the office has accumulated a vast amount of unnamed school uniform, water bottles plus 2 coats, items of underwear and gloves.  All of this will be on display in The Gazebo on KS1 playground from Monday.  Please check to see if any of your child's items are there.  Any unclaimed items will be disposed of at the end of term.  Please ensure that every item that your child brings in to school is clearly named so that lost items can be returned to their owner as soon as possible.  Please see below for one suggested option for naming your child's items.  Stamptastic
  • New Look PTA Christmas Fair Thursday 15th December  3.15 - 5pm. This year's  Christmas Fair will be held straight after school. Collect your children as usual and then come in through the office to join the fun! Due to rising prices and the impact of inflation affecting so many of us, we are changing the focus of this year's Christmas Fair. It will no longer be about raising a lot of money for the PTA, and will instead be held as a fun event for St James Primary pupils.  As many of the stalls as possible will be free of charge. There will still be some of the favourites that we will charge for, including the Bottle Tombola and Pick a Present, so that we can recoup some of our costs for the event.  We will need volunteers - please sign up here!  We are pleased to say we have already had 17 members of the St James Primary staff  putting their names down to help.
  • Additional Financial Support for Families - We are aware that some families may be experiencing additional financial challenges at the moment.  If you are in this situation, we may be able to help you access some financial support.  You can email our Home School Link Worker Helen Owen - hslw@st-james-elstead.surrey.sch.uk with regards to this.  Parents can also check to see if their children have become entitled to Free School Meals, this not only means that school meals are free for qualifying children in KS2 (Years 3-6), it can also provide additional funding for the school to support those children until they move to Secondary School.  Please speak to the school office, in confidence, if you think you may qualify, regardless of which year your child is in. FSM claim forms can be found here.
  • All-Age Christmas Carol Service 6pm Friday 16th December - all our families are invited to join a Carol Service at St James' Church Elstead
  • Drop in sessions with our Home School Link Worker, Helen Owen - The role of the Home School Link Worker (HSLW) is to support families with a range of issues at home or at school. 1:1 sessions are available on Wednesdays. To book an  appointment, email Helen on hslw@st-james-elstead.surrey.sch.uk or ring the school office to request a call back.

Letters This Week 

The following classes have had letters uploaded to the Parent Portal this week.  Note: You will need to login to view this area.

  • Puffins
  • Robins
  • Kestrels
  • Whole school  

PTA News

Please click on the link below to find out about activities planned for this term.

View the latest PTA News  

News Blogs

Blog of the Week: Click on the picture below to learn all about Kestrels' Reading Spine

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Dates For Your Diary

 View the school calendar for the latest information

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School Meals

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Safeguarding Information

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School Policy on Granting Leave of Absence

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