Dear Parents and Carers,

• Good news! Whilst our swimming pool is out of use, we are able to use the pool at  Sciennes Primary School. Mrs Fiona McKay has been appointed as swimming teacher and P4 children will start on Thursday 18 September. The class teachers will let you know the dates and details for each group. If you are able to help walk the children to Sciennes and back, please let your class teacher know.
• Ms Helen Drummond will replace Ms Diane Ferguson as our EAL (English as an Additional Language) teacher this year. The City often move support service teachers around to try to match them to Clusters. Our Cluster Schools are Boroughmuir High School, South Morningside and Buckstone Primary Schools. Ms Drummond will start on Thursday 12 September. If your child is going to receive support with English, your class teacher will let you know. You are invited to meet Ms Drummond at Parent Consultation Meetings. For new parents arriving, it is often helpful to have an enhanced enrolment for families new to the country and we try to match new families with Buddy families to help them settle in.
• P1 photos for all the City Schools will be on sale in the 25 and 26 September edition of the Evening News.
• Scaffolding is going up at the front of the school to paint the outside of the windows. This section will not impact on the lines. When the scaffolding is ready to be moved to the next section, we shall reorganise lines to ensure the children are lining up in the best place possible and the will practice lining up with their class teachers before they go home to help.

You asked about:

• Support for Probationer Teachers: Probationer teachers have completed their teaching qualification and have their first year supported in school by a team of staff. Each probationer has stage partners who work with them to plan learning and teaching together across the year group. Each probationer has a DHT as a mentor and they meet weekly to talk about learning and teaching. Visits to their classes to observe and advise on best practice are arranged by the mentor. Each probationer will also visit other classes and schools to shadow experienced teachers. Additional courses and meetings are arranged by the CEC to allow all the probationers in the City to work together on professional reading and additional courses.
• Swimming Teachers: recruitment for a swimming teacher, following Mrs Hunter’s retirement is now completed. Ms Fiona McKay has been appointed.  Swimming teachers are not employed by the school, but directly by the CEC Sports Team. Swimming time is allocated to each school.
• Assemblies: We have one Assembly per week, each Friday. Details of the topics covered are posted on our website. Themes are based around Rights Respecting Schools, Building Resilience and Celebrations. There is a lot of pupil participation in Sharing Assemblies, where the children share their learning with the school. Community Teams, House Captains, Pupil Council also present their updates at Assembly and Bruntsfield Star Certificates are presented at the end.
• Book Festival: We invite Authors into school to talk about their novels, careers and inspiration for writing all year round, not just in Festival time. Many authors come in following the Book Festival as recommendations come to us. Teachers are always welcome to take their classes to events in the Festival. To do this we need returns for contact forms from parents and carers along with the annual permission slip returns. If you still have the annual data check to return please complete and return the documents to the class teachers as soon as possible.

As always, if I can help in any way, please just ask.

Kind regards,

Carol Kyle