January 2017, Issue 2

From the Editor’s desk…

Inside this Issue: 2 ………………………………………………….. Fundraising and Charities 3 …………………………………………………. Art Exhibition 4,5 ………………………………………………. Cardross Christmas 6 ………………………………………………….. School Development Work 8 ………………………………………………….. Digital Leaders

Cardross Primary Newsletter

Christmas at Cardross - it’s always fun!

We had a great time

celebrating the festive

season.

Read more

inside...

Our school Twitter feed is a great way to get short, very regular updates of news and information from the school. Follow this link https://twitter.com @CardrossPrimary, or use a QR reader for the printed code to take you directly there.

We also continually update the Google calendar on our

website. This can be synced with your phone to keep you

informed.

Happy New Year! We hope you enjoyed your festive break and welcome everyone back into this new year. We aim to make 2017 as successful as we possible can, for every one of our pupils and families; encouraging all to seize our school motto and #Go For It!

Having surveyed all of our pupils, we are confident that the vast majority of our families have access

to an Apple device to view the interactive features of these newsletters so we will continue with this format for the time being - hopefully bringing you more insight into all what’s going on in our busy school. For those unable to use Apple to view the interactive features, we have also published all the information within this document format. Both of the formats can be accessed via our school website.

We hope you enjoy reading our news.

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Grant bids Unfortunately the two grant fund bids submitted by the school last term were unsuccessful. Thank you to all who supported us as we tried to gain enough votes in the Aviva Community Fund to develop our garden and outdoor space. Despite a huge number of votes being cast in our favour, other projects gathered more and we didn’t make the Final stage.

Another bid we made was to the Public Sector Digital Xtra Fund. Unfortunately our iPads do not support the newly launched Apple developments in coding and programming. We are very proud of the lead we take in digital technology and had hoped to be able to supplement these resources with newer devices to allow us to do this. As you know budget constraints are immense at present and these costly improvements can only be made with additional funding.

We will continue to explore funding streams and keep you posted in this area. Many thanks to Mr Bob Seaward for the time he spent working with us in preparation for these bids.

Our kind hearted pupils and

families gave very generously

over the festive period. £270

was raised for Children in

Need through our Service

offering, Nativity donations

and Jumper day. We’re also

grateful to Mr Mark Rooney

for transporting all our food

items to the Foodbank from

our class Reverse Advent

Calendars.

We were very pleased to

support the Rotary ‘Purple

for Polio’ project. Infants

worked alongside local

Rotarians to plant crocus

bulbs in our grounds. When

we see them sprout in the

Spring the purple will remind

us all of the

enormous task being

undertaken by Rotary

International to eradicate this

disease, worldwide.

Fundraising and Charities

Cardross Primary Newsletter 2

3

Winter Festival

A group of singers joined with

others from local cluster

schools to form a massed

choir, performing at

Helensburgh’s Winter Festival.

It was a rousing programme of

songs and the venue was

packed! It was a great way to

start the festive season - and

to make new friends.

The School Hall was transformed into a professional Art Gallery in

November and we were delighted to welcome so many visitors to

view and purchase our masterpieces. Every pupil in the school

worked on their exhibit which Images Art then framed and hung for

all to enjoy.

The quality of artwork produced was exceptional, and although

each class had worked on the same theme, individual expression

and detail shone through each piece.

The Exhibition attracted a steady steam of visitors throughout the

whole evening who took their time admiring the pieces.

Pupils took great delight in seeing their artwork displayed in this

context and were justifiably proud of their achievements.

Most of the exhibits were purchased by families and the school

made a profit of £195. This money will go to pay for further art and

craft materials for the children to use to further develop their talent

and skill. Thank you to everyone who supported us in this venture.

Pupil Council Council members have been selected from each class and have been working hard already!

Each class have been allocated a date to host a charity Bake sale. The charity can be chosen by each individual class and the goods provided by each class are sold at tuck time on the given dates. Parents will be notified if there is any leftover baking which will be sold at 2.30pm Primary 5 held theirs in November and raised a whopping £200 for Cash 4 Kids.

They hope to visit Clyde 1 this term to hear more about how their money will help.

The Pupil Council also organised an enjoyable Christmas Movie afternoon. Pupils chose to go to the film of their choice after eating Christmas lunch.

Art Exhibition

Cardross Primary Newsletter January 2017, Issue 2

We had a very busy festive season here at school with many events to prepare for and take part in. Our Infants

in P1-3 presented a fantastic Nativity - “It’s a Baby!” Actors in P1 looked as cute as buttons as they delivered

well-rehearsed lines and stage movements. Singers and the band in P2 provided plenty of energy and

percussive accompaniment to the catchy music throughout; and readers and choir in P3 spoke and sang

confidently and clearly, pulling this familiar story together for their audiences. The children gave three

performances this year - two in school and one at Ardardan. Each time the houses were full and the audiences

very appreciative.

A magical moment was taking the Nativity, “on the road” to Ardardan. The children adapted very well to

performing in a different setting and we are really grateful to The Montys and the Ardardan team for allowing

the use of their space and the work they did in hosting us. It made for a very special evening.

We were busy at two local Tree Festivals over the Christmas period. At our own Festival in Cardross we displayed a tree decorated with bright orange Christingles. This German custom was the theme for our school service and our crafted Christingles brightened up the branches of our tree.

The Senior Choir were also invited to perform at the Helensburgh Tree Festival in the URC. They presented a

lovely programme of seasonal songs and solos and we were very proud of them. Thanks to all who came along

and supported us at that event. It was great to have such an appreciative and sizable audience.

Cardross Christmas

Cardross Primary Newsletter 5

Infants were also treated to a Christmas Storytelling session from our local Susan Wilson. As usual, Susan and

Onion thrilled the children with tales and adventures. It’s always a delight to welcome Susan to school. She

brings literacy to life and fires imagination and creativity in our pupils.

Thanks to the CPSA, all of our pupils enjoyed a Christmas treat. Primaries 1-5 travelled to the Kings Theatre in Glasgow to a performance of the pantomime, Cinderella. The seats were fantastic and everyone thoroughly enjoyed the show - and the ice cream!

Primary 6 and 7 put on their ‘glad rags’ and danced the night away at their Ceilidh. CPSA funding provided a

live Band and we are very grateful to the Helensburgh and Lomond Fiddlers for providing our music. They also

enjoyed a delicious light supper to sustain them and give them energy for some very fast moving dances.

We have received many kind comments about our Christmas Service this year. The children really enjoyed the

Christingle focus and made a very good job of explaining all about it in the Church. Our catchy songs rang

throughout the building as the children sang with such enthusiasm.

Community Coffee Morning As is our custom, we warmly invited community members to a Christmas morning of refreshments and entertainment. Every child was involved from serving and chatting to entertaining with a Nativity performance and Christmas songs.

Here are P7 preparing a ‘sweet treat’ for our visitors.

School Development Work Staff worked with other cluster schools on the November Inservice day, moderating work undertaken by our pupils in Reading. This gave teachers the chance to share practice and standards at each class and Level as we assess the progress being made by our pupils. Within Curriculum for Excellence it is vital that these standards are shared and understood by professionals as we make judgements about attainment of pupils. Parents should be reassured that the evidence we presented was at the appropriate level and standard and that our pupils continue to achieve and attain well within national benchmarks.

Staff continue to work on other areas of the curriculum as continue to drive standards. At present, we are ensuring that all we teach and offer across cross-curr icular topics meet the requirements of each curricular area within CfE and that our tracking of pupils across these areas is robust and provides detail of learning and achievement for individuals.

We have also made improvements to our tracking and assessment within Maths. As many will be aware, this has been a focus area for us over the past two years. We have seen improvements in attainment across the board as a result of the work undertaken and we hope this will be a continuing trend with these new developments this session.

A further opportunity exists for parents to learn more about our Maths curriculum when we will hold a STEM Workshop Evening on Thursday 9th February, 6.30-8.30pm

We do hope as many as possible will be able to come along and take part in a variety of workshops. We have also invited Amy Sinclair from Active Learning in Maths to take part in the evening. Further detail will be sent out in a letter very soon.

Class Assemblies Last term we enjoyed hearing from Primaries 5, 3 and 7 as they shared some of their learning experiences.

Here we see P5 at their ‘Superhealth’ Assembly competing in a ‘cook-off’ as they taught us all how to make a yummy vegetable kebab. Their Assembly was packed full of ways they had learned to be healthy in body and mind.

At Primary 7’s Assembly, we heard all about their Ardroy adventures. As well as sharing the activities and the fun they had on their residential week in Lochgoilhead, they also told us how they had learned to work better as a team and to support and encourage each other. Many faced new challenges and shared their sense of achievement with us all.

P3’s theme was Light and Dark. They dramatised the story of “Rama and Sita” and shared how they had linked the themes to Feelings and emotions. They also shared some amazing pieces of writing and even danced for us!

Cardross Primary Newsletter 6

Active Lifestyles: Cross Country A large group of our athletes rose to the challenge of the first Schools Meet of the cross country season recently at Maryhill Park.

They all did tremendously well, with some notable mentions. Andrew and Cameron in P7 came in 1st and 4th place respectively in the P7 boys race - in a large field of runners.

Our P6 girls also earned 2nd placed team after results were finalised. Fantastic results from our school - we really do #Go For It in a big way!

Cardross Primary Newsletter 7

Congratulations – winners all round! We were all delighted to learn

that Cameron had won MSP

Jackie Baillie’s annual Christmas

Card design competition for

Primary 7 pupils across her

constituency. We were really

proud of Cameron as he received

his prize from Jackie and saw his

card in print.

Super Sumdog!

A number of our pupils were

rewarded with success in the

recent Argyll and Bute Sumdog

competition.

We also had two lucky

competition winners in the

Winter Festival Penguin design.

Ethan and Hannah

designed penguins that were

chosen to form part of a town

trail during the Festival.

They were delighted to receive

their prizes!

Cardross Primary Newsletter 8

CPSA News The CPSA’s Movie Night was very well attended and enjoyed by the children.

The next event for the Committee is the Burns Celebration being held on Friday 27th January in the School Hall between 1.30-2.45pm. This gives all of our pupils the opportunity to perform the work they have worked so hard to learn in our Burns season and it’s always a great afternoon of entertainment. If you haven’t already got your tickets, use the order form provided in the Burns letter and get them from the Office, priced £3. (This includes some themed refreshment!)

Hold the Dates! Our Senior Show is being prepared and we’re very excited to be bringing Disney’s “The Lion King” to you (by arrangement with Music Theatre International - Europe)

Performances are as follows - please get the dates in your diary and order your tickets as soon as they are available. Our shows sell out fast!

Tuesday 28th March - 7pm

Wednesday 29th March - 7pm

Thursday 30th March - 1.15pm

Burns Competitions - Poetry: 23rd January, Song: 24th January

Burns Celebration - 27th January : 1.30-2.45pm

Digital Leaders A group of 10 senior pupils from

Primaries 6 and 7 recently

travelled to a full day of training in

Inveraray to become our school’s

Digital Leaders. There they joined

up with pupils from across the

whole Authority and were taken

through their paces in aspects

designed to support others in

school in integrating technology

into learning and teaching. With

the pace of change so fast in this

area, it’s great to have skilled

children who can assist and

support staff and peers. Well

done to our team and we look

forward to working alongside

you as we further develop our

use of technologies.

Clubs Some opportunities exist, this term, for Clubs in the senior school. Letters with details and sign up will be sent home.

SU : Mon lunchtimes Coding: Wed 3-4pm Netball: Thurs 3-4pm

Cardross Primary School Office: 01389 841433

HT: Mrs Elspeth Davis