Key Dates
Monday 19th November
Year 6 trip to the Imperial War Museum (Oak & Elder)
Thursday 22nd November
Year 6 trip to the Imperial War Museum (Willow)
Thursday 22nd November
Elder class parent assembly, 9.00 am
Thursday 22nd November
PSA Committee meeting, 7.30 pm in the Small Hall
Thursday 29th November
Rowan class parent assembly, 9.00 am
Thursday 29th November
FernSpeak heats
Friday 30th November
Year 2 cake sale
Saturday 1st & Sunday 2nd December
Christmas trees on sale
Monday 3rd December
Year 6 trip to the Synagogue
Wednesday 5th December
Year 6 trip to the Synagogue
Thursday 6th December
Elm class parent assembly, 9.00 am
Thursday 6th December
Year 2 trip to Cornerstone (Clover)
Thursday 6th December
FernSpeak Finals (parents of children taking part are invited to attend)
Friday 7th December
PSA Tombola Collection - Mufti day
Friday 7th December
Year 2 trip to Cornerstone (Heather & Bracken)
Friday 7th December
Year 1 cake sale
Saturday 8th & Sunday 9th December
Christmas trees on sale
Reminders
Absent or late for school?
If you child is ill or absent from school for any other reason, or if they are going to be late, please let the school office know by 9.00 am at the latest. The easiest way of doing this is by emailing office@fernhill.rbksch.org or calling us on 020 8247 0300. Please leave a message on the answerphone if no one answers your call – staff are there, but busy, and your message will be picked up!
Entry system in school reception
If your child is late to school or leaves earlier than the end of the school day, please remember to sign them in or out using the new entry system in school reception. All visitors to the school must also sign in and out, including parent helpers.
PSA Curchods sponsorship forms
Thank you to those Fern Hill families who have signed up to have a Curchods sponsorship board outside their home to promote our tree sale dates. At the moment, we are well down on numbers compared to last year so we really do urge you to sign up for this. Each board raises £10 for the school so it's a great fundraising opportunity. The more boards that go up, the more money we can raise for our school. Please note that these are NOT "for sale" signs - they advertise our tree sales. Curchods will arrange for them to be put up the week of 26th November and taken down the week of 17th December. If you haven't signed up yet, please email the PSA at fernhillpsa@gmail.com with your name, address, contact telephone number and email as soon as possible. Thank you very much for your support.
PSA Committee meeting
Please come along to our next PSA Committee meeting on Thursday 22nd November in the Small Hall from 7.30pm. We really welcome new faces and fresh ideas so if you've never been to a PSA meeting, why not make this your first time?! We look forward to seeing you there.
Attachments
Year group newsletters
Children in Need
Thank you so much to all the children who bought a pin badge or wristband for our Children in Need appeal today. Everyone looked very spotty indeed coming to school this morning! A big thank you too for all your generous donations to our special Children In Need cake sale this afternoon. We'll let you know as soon as possible how much money we have raised for this wonderful charity.
Term Dates
The term dates and INSET days for the 2019-2020 academic year are now available on the school website here. Please note that the autumn half term break will include the last Friday before the half term week and the Monday and Tuesday following the half term week which will help to break up an extremely long autumn term, benefiting both children and teachers. There will still be an INSET day at the start of the autumn term in 2019 and the start of the spring term in 2020.
This week has been Anti Bullying Week, the annual awareness week organised by the Anti Bullying Alliance. The children have focused on the theme of ‘Choose Respect’, watching a video on it in class and singing along to the ‘Unique’ song, promoted by the Anti Bullying Alliance. Year 6 watched a thought-provoking video about cyber-bullying; we’ll be revisiting this topic with the whole school during the spring term. Monday saw a fantastic variety of socks in school for Odd Socks Day and on Tuesday, the children celebrated World Kindness Day, the perfect fit to an anti-bullying message. We have also relaunched 'Friendly Ferns', a lunchtime club in the Meadow Room, run by the children themselves for any child who needs a quiet place to go to or a group of friendly faces to be with.
Fern Hill is working towards the UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools Award!
We are very proud to announce that we have joined many other schools across the country taking part in the UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools Award accreditation. Our whole school community - children, parents, staff and governors – will be involved in this exciting opportunity.
The programme supports schools to embed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC or CRC) in their practice to improve well-being and help all children to realise their potential. The award is based on principles of equality, dignity, respect, non-discrimination and participation. The initiative started in 2006 and schools involved in the Award have reported a positive impact on relationships and well-being, leading to better learning and behaviour, improved academic standards and less bullying.
You can find out more on our News page here.
Sports News
November started off with a sporting bang - fixtures and events almost immediately we came back. Starting with the Year 3 boys, they played in a series of friendly matches at Kew AFC. Demonstrating great teamwork, the boys put in some strong results, winning their matches comfortably. Their final match saw them generously allowing the other team to play one more player than them (to ensure all players got game time) and they were rewarded for their sportsmanship with a good win. Well played to all the boys who took part.
Last week was the Year 5 and 6 Kingston Borough Cross-Country races at Kingston Grammar School playing fields. Despite the overnight heavy rain, and the damp and miserable weather on the day, the squad of 23 applied themselves to the job in hand, and ran some great times. Overall, Year 6 boys came in the top 5, helped by Finn coming in 4th in his race. Year 6 girls came in the top 10, with Skye defending her title from last year and securing the fastest time in the Year 6 girls race. The Year 5 boys and girls found it a little tougher and were hit by illness on the day, but all put in great efforts in their respective races. Well done to all of the runners, and a big thank you to the parents who generously helped out with the transport.
As ever, thank you too to the staff who gave up their time to take the children to these events.
More to come later in the term, with the Year 6 boys hoping for a place in the Borough Finals, and the Year 6 girls who, having got through to their Borough finals, are competing for a place at the London Youth Games next Spring. Good luck to all of them; watch this space for the results over the next couple of weeks.
- Mrs Lawn, Year 6 class teacher and PE Lead
TEAM POINTS
The overall winner this week is HAMPTON
-
Kingston
288
-
Coombe
284
-
Richmond
311
-
Hampton
341
PSA News and Events
Fireworks Night
We're delighted to say that our PSA Fireworks Night raised a grand total of £1,276.00. Thank you so much to all the families who came along, as well as to all the parents and staff who gave up their time to help run the event.
Christmas Trees on sale during December
Please remember that Christmas trees will be on sale outside school from 9.00am to 3.00pm during the following weekends in December:
- 1st & 2nd
- 8th & 9th
- 15th & 16th
This is an excellent opportunity to buy high-quality Christmas trees and also support our school. The trees are sold by a former Fern Hill parent who will generously donate 25% of the money raised from the tree sales straight to Fern Hill. Please do come along, buy a tree and support our school!
Christmas Fair - Friday 14th December
Planning for this year's Christmas Fair is well underway and we're looking forward to lots of festive fun! We're holding a tombola collection and mufti day on Friday 7th December so please put aside any bottles of wine or spirits, toys, games, toiletries or other items that you can donate. Thank you very much.
We are currently approaching local businesses to ask for donations for our Christmas Fair Raffle. If you run your own business (or know someone else who does) and would be happy to support Fern Hill by donating a hamper gift or a voucher please email the PSA on fernhillpsa@gmail.com
Weekly Attendance
Well done to Year 1 and Year 2 who have the best year group attendance for this week.
It's a joint award this week with the the Attendance Cup going to Bracken and Sycamore classes for the best attendance with 99.67%.
| Year | Attendance % | Star Year ★ |
|---|---|---|
| Reception | 96.1% | |
| Year 1 | 98.9% | WELL DONE! |
| Year 2 | 98.9% | WELL DONE! |
| Year 3 | 97.8% | |
| Year 4 | 97.1% | |
| Year 5 | 98.8% | |
| Year 6 | 96.2% |
Inspiration 