Whitehouse Weekly Bulletin 300

Friday 28th February 2025

A Message from Miss Siddall

It has been great to welcome the children back to school after the half-term break. We hope you all had a good break.  At Whitehouse, trips and visits are an integral part of our curriculum at Whitehouse Community Primary School and this term year one will enjoy a Great Fire of London workshop, year three are going on a visit to Colchester Castle and having a Roman day in school, year five will visit the local Co-Op and year six are going to Walton-On-The-Naze to study coastal erosion and search for fossils. For any visit, it is important the office receives permission slips and notification of lunches in advance so please help us by returning permissions promptly. Thank you for your support.

Attendance for the week before half term:

Class with the best attendance:  Owls (98.97%)

Assemblies

The theme of our assemblies for next week will be based on resolving friendship issues.  (UNRC: Article 12 – I have the right to an opinion and for it to be listened to and taken seriously).  Why not discuss this with your child, it is a skill which will useful throughout their lives!

Road Safety

We love to see our children walking, cycling or using their scooters to come to and from school.  It is a great way to enjoy the world around them and get a little bit of exercise.  However, can we please ask parents/carers to take a little time to speak with their children about how to use the roads safely.  There is lots of advice online, about what and how to speak to your child on this matter, here is just one link which you may find useful:

https://www.rospa.com/policy/road-safety/active-travel-hub/parents-and-carers.

Recycling

Unfortunately, our pen recycling program has been discontinued and we are no longer able to accept pens for recycling at Whitehouse. This may be disappointing, but we’re actively seeking alternative schemes to make recycling more accessible and effective. In the meantime, we remain committed to sustainability and continue to recycle glue sticks, provided that the middle part is removed. The Eco- Committee is open to hearing any suggestions or ideas from the community on what other items they’d like to see recycled, as we strive to create a more environmentally-friendly approach moving forward. Please let your class teacher know your ideas so they can pass it on to Miss Tempest or Miss Jaspal. 

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 is 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.

EYFS:

Key Stage 1:

Lower Key Stage 2:

Upper Key Stage 2:

World Book Day

Preparations are almost complete for this year’s World Book Day at Whitehouse, which takes place next Thursday, 6^th March 2025. Teachers have been sharing information with the children, including this year’s specially produced World book Day books.   You can view these at the following link:  https://www.worldbookday.com/books-and-tokens/books/.  

The Department of Education’s Reading Framework recognises the importance of reading for pleasure and the impact this has on a child’s future including academic success, improved wellbeing and a reduction in the impact of social disadvantage.  The main aim of World Book Day is to encourage children to begin a lifelong love of reading, so they produce a special selection of books which are available for just £1.00 and book tokens are provided for each child to cover the cost of one of these books.

Building on the success of last year’s event and to ensure all of our children are able to use their book token, we will once again be holding a ‘pop up shop’ in school on World Book Day.  The children will be able to choose one of the World Book Day books to take home.

As always, we would like to invite each child to come to school dressed as their favourite book character.  We are aware that with the cost of living crisis, this can be difficult for families, so please do not feel you have to go out and buy a costume.  Instead, why not have some fun making a very simple costume with your child using items you have at home?  The World Book Day website has lots of ideas.  Go to the following link and click on Explore Now.

https://www.worldbookday.com/resource/world-book-day-2025-low-cost-dressing-up-pack/

Important note re Year 6 World Day

As the children in Ocelots and Chameleons will be on a school trip on World Book Day, it has been decided that the whole of Year 6 will collect their World Book day book and have the option to come to school dressed as a book character on Friday 7^th March.  Year 6 pupils who are in school on the Thursday, may also come dressed as book character that day as well if they would like to.

Scholastic Book Fairs

Also, during World Book Day, we will have our Book Fair open for viewing only and the children will have the opportunity to have a look around.  They will have the opportunity to select books that they would like to see in our school libraries and the most popular choices will be prioritised for purchase with any commission we receive at our Scholastic Book Fairs.

The Book Fairs will take place on Thursday 6^th March 2025 and on Monday 10^th March 2025 from 3.00pm to 4.00pm in the Marlow Road Hall.  Please do come along with your children if you would like to buy a book.  For each purchase made, the school raises money to buy books for our library.  Children will be given a mini-flyer with full details of the Book Fairs which they can bring along to the Fair to enter into our free prize draw with a chance of winning a free book.

We are very excited to celebrate World Book Day and run our Book Fairs and hope to see you all there!  Thank you for your continued support.

Accelerated Reader

Many congratulations to the following children who all recently received certificates for their reading.   A big well done to you all.

Special Menus

We are pleased to let you know we have a couple of special menus next week to help us celebrate Pancake Day and World book Day.  Please see menus below. 

As usual there is no charge for children in Year 2 and under and for any child who is eligible for free school meals, for all other children the cost is £2.52.  Pick and mix and jacket potato options will also be available.

Job Vacancy

Please note we currently have a vacancy for a Midday Supervisor. We have placed all the information and an application form on our website at the following link:  https://www.whcps.org/vacancies/.  If you would be interested in applying for the position, please note the closing date is 9.00am on Monday 17^th March 2025. If you would like a paper copy of the application form, please ask at the office.

Attendance: Duck Race Winners

Well done to the winners of our Duck Races the week before half term:

Choir Singing

This is for all our children in Year 3-6 who love to sing!  Why not go along to the Ipswich Minster for an evening of singing in the choir.  The children even have the chance to wear a cassock, and there will be pancakes served afterwards.  Details if your child is interested are on the poster below.

Celebrating our Children

This week we were thrilled to hear about three of our children and all about their activities and successes.  On Sunday 23rd February, Seth, Maddie and Jason (all in Year 5) represented the 11th Ipswich Monday Cub Group by taking part in the Wolsey District Cub Bowling Competition!  This took place at Tenpin in Martlesham.  They had a wonderful time and Seth was awarded a certificate for being the highest scorer in the group!  Well done to all of you!  If you would like us to celebrate the wonderful things your children are doing outside of school, please do drop us an email to parents@whcps.org to tell us all about it.

Dates for the Diary

Monday 3^rd March 2025 – Family Breakfast – 8.00am

Monday 3^rd March 2025 – After School Clubs Start

Wednesday 5^th March 2025 – Y6 Walton Trip (Tigers and Toucans)

Thursday 6^th March 2025 – World Book Day

Thursday 6^th March 2025 – Y6 Walton Trip (Chameleons and Ocelots)

Monday 10^th March 2025 – Family Breakfast – 8.00am

Monday 13^th March 2025 – Helping Hands Hub

Tuesday 18^th March 2025 – Year 3 Colchester Castle Trip

Thursday 20^th March 2025 – Parents Evening – 3.30pm to 5.30pm

Friday 21^st March 2025 – Comic Relief – Non-Uniform Day (for small donation)

Monday 24^th March 2025 – Year 3 Roman Day

Tuesday 25^th March 2025 – Parents Evening – 3.30pm to 6.30pm

Wednesday 2^nd April 2025 – Whole School SMSC Day

Monday 7^th April 2025 to Monday 21^st April 2025 – Easter Holiday

Tuesday 22^nd April 2025 – PD Day (School closed to children)

Monday 5^th May 2025 – Bank Holiday (School Closed)

Friday 23^rd May 2025 – PD Day (School closed to children)

Monday 26^th May to Friday 30^th May – Half Term Holiday

Monday 23^rd Tuesday 24^th June 2025 – Year 6 Residential (Danbury)

Tuesday 22^nd July 2025 – Last day of the Summer Term

Wednesday 23^rd July 2025 – First day of the Summer Holiday

Monday 1^st September 2025 – PD Day (School closed to children)

Tuesday 2^nd September 2025 – PD Day (School closed to children)

Wednesday 3^rd September 2025 – First day of term for the children