There have been lots of strange sights in school today. This is because the theme for ‘Children in Need’ is do your thing and we allowed the children to ‘do their thing’ with their hair and they certainly did that. It is all for a good cause though and with the donations brought in today we managed to raise £174.35. Thank you to everyone who kindly donated.

As I predicted last week it has certainly been a busy week in school. On Tuesday it was ‘Odd Socks Day’ which is all part of anti-bullying week. The theme this year has been ‘Change starts with us’ meaning that for bullying to end, changes have to be implemented by individuals and not by waiting for somebody else to put something in place. The classes have each written a verse for a whole school poem about why bullying is bad and when we have put it together we will put copies on our website for parents to read. I have also emphasised to the children that they must carry the principals of non-bullying beyond the school gate. I receive too many comments about children making unkind comments about other school children outside of school, especially online and it needs to stop. Parents should also be checking what their children are posting online to make sure that the children know they will not get away with this form of unacceptable behaviour.

We have had some success in school this week which is always good to write about. Some pupils from Years 3 and 4 took part in an indoor athletics tournament this week and won!! They were really happy and excited about it as were the rest of the school when we did the presentation in assembly. As always we had a lot of supportive parents who went to watch their children take part and I have to say that when they were telling me about the event, I think they may have enjoyed it more than the children. I would like to congratulate all of the children on their wonderful performance and I would like to thank Mr Mills for preparing them so well for the event.

It is a themed week in school next week and we think it is a very important one. It is called ‘Just Talk’ and it is all about how children should cope with their mental health, especially anxiety, whether or not they are experiencing it themselves or they know somebody who is. We will be discussing how people feel when they are suffering with anxiety and depression and we will be discussing strategies of how to cope with it. The week is called ‘Just Talk’ because it has been proven that if people could just share and discuss their worries then the amount of people suffering from mental health problems would be greatly reduced. As the amount of children suffering from anxiety and mental health problems has greatly increased in recent times I am sure that you will agree with us that this is a very worthwhile topic for us to cover in school.

As well as covering ‘Just Talk’ during the week we have a Mufti Day next Friday for the PTA Christmas Café event on December 6^th. For being allowed to wear their own clothes for the day, we want the children to bring in an item that could be put in a Christmas hamper such as mince pies, chocolates, bottles of wine, biscuits etc. I know that you have all been very generous in the past so I am sure that you all will be again. We also have the Year 4 Assembly to look forward to next Friday so it is certainly going to be an action -packed day.

I hope you all have a fabulous weekend. The weather is not going to be the best but I am sure you will still be able to enjoy yourselves. I am going to the O2 to watch the tennis so the weather is certainly not going to affect me.