Whitehouse Weekly Bulletin

Friday 9th February 2024

A Message from Miss Siddall

This term, we have been delighted to see so many children engaging really well with their reading.  Where we use the AR system in KS2, we have seen 69% of LKS2 and 85% of UKS2 on track for green or purple in the reading minutes box on their reports.  Well done – we are very proud of all of you.  Reading at home really is important.  Last year, 74% of children who regularly read at home passed their Y6 reading paper compared to only 46% of those who didn’t read at home regularly.  A big thanks to all parents and carers who have supported their child in reading at home – this is hugely appreciated.

Attendance for the previous week:

Class with the best attendance: Lions (98.6%)

Absence through Illness

We are noticing that a high proportion of absence has been due to coughs, colds and temperatures.  We understand and appreciate that children can become ill quickly and that it is not always easy to decide whether to send them into school or keep them at home, so to help with this decision, have a look at these bubbles as a reference guide.

Awards

As you may be aware, the children are encouraged to follow ‘The Whitehouse Way’ in school to help them in their learning and in becoming good citizens. Our ‘Wonderful Week’ awards this year will be given as a recognition that the children have worked very hard in one of these areas:  Courage, Perseverance, Reflection or Responsibility.  This will be shown in the colour coded lists below.  We are so proud of our children at Whitehouse and their wonderful achievements.  Well done to you all.

Key Stage 1:

Lower Key Stage 2:

Upper Key Stage 2:

Readers’ Cup

Well done to the following classes who won the Readers’ Cup last week:

Assemblies

The theme of our assemblies for next week will be: International Day of Women and Girls (UNRC Link: Article 2: I have the right to protection against discrimination. This means that nobody can treat me badly because of my colour, sex or religion, if I speak another language, have a disability or if I am rich or poor).  Resources related to this assembly will soon be available on our website.  To access them, simply go to Learning and click on our Enquiry Based Assemblies.

Free School Meal Vouchers

We are pleased to confirm that Suffolk County Council will again be providing vouchers to parents/carers of any child who is eligible for free school meals, to help with food costs over the February half term holiday and the Easter holiday.  Please note on this occasion a voucher of £45.00 will be provided for each eligible child but this will cover both holidays; you will not receive another voucher at Easter.

As usual the voucher will be sent by email from noresponse@vouchers.sodexoengage.com and will be with you by Thursday 15^th February 2024. You will need to go online and redeem the voucher by Friday 12^th April 2024 and then the voucher can be valid for your chosen supermarket for 12 months. If you do not receive the voucher, please email freeschoolmeals@suffolk.gov.uk and they will be able to assist.  Please do not contact the school office as we will be unable to help.

Blue Peter Badge

Many congratulations to Mahira in Year 3 for successfully completing her Blue Peter Book Badge.  Wear your badge with pride!

World Book Day

Preparations are well under way for this year’s World Book Day which takes place on Thursday 7^th March 2024. The aim of World Book Day is to encourage and promote ‘Reading for Pleasure’ and each year they work with a range of publishers to produce a number of special £1.00 World Book Day books which can be exchanged for the £1.00 tokens that are handed out in school.  This year, we plan to hand out the £1.00 tokens to the children on Friday 1^st March 2024 to allow everyone the opportunity to obtain a copy of one of this year’s special edition books prior to World Book Day.  More details will follow after February half term, so watch this space!

As in previous World Book Days, we would like to give our children the opportunity to celebrate this special day by coming dressed as one of their favourite characters from a book they have enjoyed.  We hope that the children will see each other’s costumes as a chance to talk with their friends about the books they like and perhaps encourage a few of them to read them too.  In addition, World Book Day have worked closely with the 2024 £1 book publishers to produce a number of dressing up templates and ideas to create homemade costumes which could be a perfect activity to complete with your child over half term. The templates available include ‘Make your own colourful Elmer mask’, ‘Make your own Charlie McGrew Horse’, and Make your own MARV-ELLOUS Superhero mask’ as well as costume ideas linked to ‘InvestiGATORS’, and ‘Greg the Sausage Roll Lunchbox Superhero’ and others.  It would be lovely to see some of our children dressed as one of these characters.

Competition Time

To help us raise awareness and promote this year's World Book Day in school, we are running a competition for children to design their own World Book Day bunting. We would like to see a wide range of ideas and artwork from the children so we have deliberately kept the entry requirements simple - the only rule is that the bunting must feature the date of this year's World Book Day (Thursday 7th March 2024) prominently within the design. The closing date for entries is Thursday 15th February 2024 and competition entry forms are available from the KS2 Library. The winning entrants from each year group will have their bunting displayed in school and receive a much sought after 'Non-Uniform Voucher'. Good luck everyone!

Beat the Street

As a school we pride ourselves on our inclusive PE provision which provides our pupils with many opportunities to increase their levels of activities beyond the school day. We are therefore, extremely excited to offer all of our pupils, parents/carers and teachers the opportunity to take part in ‘Beat the Street’.

What is Beat the Street?

Between Wednesday 14th February 2024 and Wednesday 27th March 2024, Ipswich is being transformed into a giant game! Beat the Street is a free and fun game which gets pupils, along with their parent/carers and teachers out and about in the local area, increasing activity levels, whilst also having lots of fun and keeping healthy.

How does it work?

This week, game materials including game cards, game instructions (leaflets) and a game map will be provided to all pupils, parents/carers and teachers.  A number of game card readers called ‘Beat Boxes’ will be positioned around Ipswich, including one outside our school. Players use their contactless game cards to hover over the Beat Boxes to score points as they travel around from Beat Box to Beat Box. These points will contribute to individual and school leader boards which can be viewed by visiting www.beatthestreet.me once the game commences. Top school teams will be in with a chance to win hundreds of pounds worth of sports and book vouchers.  As well as prizes, players can also complete fun in-game challenges to win awards.

For more information about Beat the Street visit www.beatthestreet.me or watch the short Beat the Street YouTube video https://youtu.be/WMS6rQPIt0o.

We hope you will all have lots of fun taking part in the Beat the Street game, collecting as many points as possible! We would also love for you share photos with us of our pupils taking part in Beat the Street. Therefore, please feel free to send photos to us at parents@whcps.org.

Siblings Collecting Children

If you have children in years R – 4 who are collected by siblings in year 5 or 6, please could you help us by jotting a note (either a letter or a note in their journal) to give written permission for this.  If you have already given us written permission, many thanks for your help.  We do not need a second note from you.

Y5/6 Girls Football

It has been a long time since the girl’s football team took part in the School Games football event at the beginning of the year. However, on Monday the girls football team were finally back in action in their IPSSA Cup match. As this was the first time that the team had played together in an actual 7v7 match, and for some of our girls the first ever football match they had taken part in, the team were very excited and also a little nervous ahead of kick off. The girls faced extremely tough opposition in Dale Hall Community Primary School. With a number of confident and experienced footballers within the Dale hall side, the girls knew it was going to be a tough match. 

Despite the high pressing attacking football and the large spells of possession shown by Dale Hall throughout the game, the girls continued to work extremely hard to try to close down their opponents. Despite the eventual score line, Mr Jordan was incredibly proud of the perseverance and hard work shown by each and every one of the girls throughout the entire match. The team kept playing and trying their best right up to the final whistle!  A special mention goes to Kezia, who was chosen by the rest of the team as our ‘Player of the Match’. 

Online Safety

Do you know the age limits on some of the popular apps used by children?  See the information below:

Dates for the Diary

Monday 5^th February 2024 – Family Breakfast – 8.00am

Tuesday 6^th February – Year 5 Parent/ Carer Reading Session – 9:00am

Monday 12^th February 2024 – Family Breakfast – 8.00am

Monday 12^th February 2024 – Last week of Spring after-school clubs

Friday 16^th February 2024 – SMSC Whole School Day – Online Safety

Monday 19^th February 2024 to Friday 23^rd February 2024 – Half Term Holiday

Monday 4^th March – Year 6 Walton-on-the-Naze trip

Thursday 7^th March 2024 – World Book Day

Friday 8^th March 2024 – Reports sent home

Monday 11^th March 2024 – Scholastic Book Fair

Tuesday 12^th March 2024 – Scholastic Book Fair

Tuesday 12^th March 2024 – Parents Evening

Friday 15^th March 2024 – Comic Relief

Wednesday 20^th March 2024 – Parents Evening

Friday 29^th March 2024 to Thursday 11^th April 2024 – Easter Holiday

Friday 12^th April 2024 – PD Day (Children not in school)

Monday 6^th May 2024 – May Day Bank Holiday

Monday 13^th May 2024 to Thursday 16^th May 2024 – Year 6 SATs Week

Monday 27^th May 2024 to Friday 31^st May 2024 – Half Term Holiday

Monday 3^rd June 2024 – PD Day (Children not in school)

Wednesday 5^th June 2024 – Nursery and Reception Sports Day

Thursday 6^th June 2024 – Years 1, 2 and 3 Sports Day

Friday 7^th June 2024 – Years 4, 5, and 6 Sports Day

Monday 24^th June 2024 to Tuesday 25^th June 2024 – Year 6 Residential Trip at Mersea

Wednesday 26^th June 2024 – School Transition Afternoon

Thursday 27^th June 2024 – School Transition Morning