Headteacher's Blog
Head Teacher's Blog October 2024
It is a pleasure to welcome back staff and students for this new 2024/2025 academic year. It has been lovely to see children across the school settle well into the school life, engage in their learning, and continue to form new friendships. Parents/carers attended ‘Meet the Teacher’ day on Wednesday 25th September. For nursery and reception, “Meet the Teacher” day took place on Thursday 16th September. During the meeting, staff passed on relevant information regarding school rules, year group expectations and the curriculum overview. Class handbooks were then emailed to all parents/carers and have been uploaded to the school website. We will be holding additional parent-teacher meetings later in the school year when parents will have the opportunity to discuss their child’s progress and attainment with the class teachers.
On Tuesday 24th September, Year 6 enjoyed a brilliant interactive poetry workshop with popular author and poet Michael DeSouza. We were also thrilled to welcome writer, Banji Alexander, to our school on Wednesday 02nd October who came to talk to us about his life as an author. He shared with us his new book called Lockdown Looms - Reggie's Birthday Party. During a special assembly, Banji spoke to our pupils about his writing, inspiration and read them extract from his latest book. During his book signing, the pupils had the fantastic opportunity to engage directly with the author.
Every year, during the Autumn Term, we hold elections for our school council. Candidates from Years 2-6 make speeches outlining why they would make a good school councillor. Then one boy and one girl from each class is democratically elected to represent the pupils in that class. The school councillors’ election took place on Monday 07th October in the presence of a team from Brent Electoral Services. On Monday 14th October, we had the honour to receive a visit from Mayor of Brent, Cllr Tariq Dar, who announced the results of the election during a special Head Teacher’s Assembly. During the assembly, the Junior Travel Ambassadors, Red Hats and Play Leaders were also announced. Following the assembly, the new school council joined the Mayor for a morning tea in the library.
During the week commencing 14th October, we celebrated Black History. This year’s theme is “Reclaiming Narratives” and pupils from across all year groups learnt about stories of true black heroes, their contributions to society and their achievements. Our pupils had lot of fun creating colourful, carnival style masks; which they proudly wore during an African dance Worksop led by the class teachers on Friday 14th October.
This half term was packed with lots of interesting workshops and educational trips. On Tuesday 17th September, we received a visit from Met Police Community Officers (PCSO) on behalf of Brent Safer Transport Team who delivered a workshop to our Year 6 pupils about the importance of traveling safely and responsibly on public transport.
Our year 4 pupils have commenced the Brain Buddies Emotional Regulation course, which runs over 10 weeks. The course focuses on understanding, identifying and developing strategies to regulate emotions through self-care, self-calming, and thinking strategies such as problem solving. Our Year 5 and 6 pupils had a refresher session to remind them of the strategies that they have previously learnt. Our Year 4 pupils visited the Science museum on Thursday 03 October to gain insight about the digestive system and our Year 6 pupils visited Hampton Court Palace to learn about Henry VIII along with deepening their knowledge of the Monarchy.