Dear Parents and Carers,

• The City of Edinburgh Council would like your views on future school session dates for 2022/23 and beyond. If you would like to complete the survey, please do so at: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/schsd2022
• Leonardo in P6A recently won an on-line Chess Tournament. He has received his trophy and his national and international ranking for chess. It is a great achievement – well done Leonardo!
• Skye in P7C wrote the most beautiful poem in traditional Scots language with her Gran called The Keep, it will be posted on our website for you all to enjoy, thank you Skye!
• The Rights Respecters have created a whole school health and wellbeing challenge which has been designed by the children. The challenge is to raise awareness of and promote Article 24 (health) and Article 28 (education). The children have from the Monday 15^th March – Monday 29^th March to complete the challenge. More details will be shared by the class teacher.
• Reporting Pupil Absence: if you leave a message on the school answerphone to inform us your child is absent, please always give the reason. We have to enter a specific code for absences depending on the reason. If it is Covid19 related, we shall phone you back for further information and to offer our help.
• Autism Week is the 29 March to 4 April 2021. For more information, please see https://www.autism.org.uk/get-involved/raise-money/world-autism-awareness-week/waaw-schools utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=paid&utm_campaign=saaw&utm_content=parents&fbclid=IwAR3WFln59nHpJ3MIYtJLUYDSkvS2WnToNJxT4y2xkK647xfhhU82LRcBxqQ

• Equalities: Sharing the Learning:
  • Just before lockdown P4 classes covered the ‘Heroes and Heroines’ topic which was brilliant for exploring diversity and equality. The children learned about famous figures who overcame obstacles in their lives to achieve great things. The teachers used the story of Rosa Parks to explore racism, Marie Curie’s story to explore gender inequality, Frida Kahlo to explore disability and others including Gandhi, Captain Tom, Greta Thunberg, Harriet Tubman, Harvey Milk etc. They even talked about animals such as Wojtek the bear to discuss animal cruelty. Everyone really enjoyed the topic and took a lot from it. There were also positive responses from parents! Will definitely be using the topic again! Well done P4 Team.
  • P6 Science topic was focussed on researching scientists and inventors…..criteria included being encouraged to consider gender.
  • Please continue to sharing suggestions, we are very pleased to build our knowledge and skills in all our learning.
• Parent Consultations: an email will be posted to you on Friday 12 March, sharing details of how and when to book your appointment for the parent consultations on Monday 16 – Thursday 29 April. If you have any problems booking, please contact the school office.
• Red Nose Day is on Friday 19^th March.  Teachers will encourage awareness of how Comic Relief ties in with the Sustainable Development Goals and will discuss global issues, such clean water and sanitation, responsible consumption and production and quality education with the children. If you want to join in, there are lots of great, free resources on the website https://www.comicrelief.com/rednoseday/schools/freedownloads/
• Show Racism the Red Card Assembly: All children are invited to enter the associated competition, I look forward to seeing some great designs, it has been a while since we won this!
• Children 1^st are offering free courses and a free helpline to all parents of 3-6 year olds, further information on their website or phone 08000 282233.
• P1-P7: Dropping off and Collecting Children from School from 15 March 2021: The Travel Team at The City of Edinburgh Council are finalising plans to update the signs and locations of signs to show time restrictions for the street closures during school drop off and collection times.
• Discussions are in place to change the street closure to the end of Montpelier/ Viewforth Place and not at the top of Bruntsfield Avenue/ Bruntsfield Place. This will help parents as they wait for their children and also help our neighbours by giving them greater access to their homes. Updates will be shared as soon as they come to me.
• Please do all you can to walk to school. If you cannot, please park in a safe place and avoid driving to the school gates. The Police Team will continue check on progress and help keep our children safe.
• Our staggered start and finish times have been updated, now all the children are returning school to help reduce the risk of spreading Covid19 and are detailed below and on our website.
• Spaces for People: The City of Edinburgh Council have asked we share this information with you.
  • Many of you will have seen some of the temporary ‘Spaces for People’ measures at schools and around the city. Further information is available at www.edinburgh.gov.uk/spacesforpeople
  • We are now considering whether to keep in place some of the temporary measures in place for a longer trial period so we can test them out when pedestrians and traffic begins to get back to normal. We want to do this as many of the temporary measures are likely to help us achieve the Council’s long-term objectives to improve how we travel, making it easier for people to get about, and to help us meet the city’s net carbon-free targets.
  • We’re keen to hear what people think about this and are seeking views from residents, businesses and key city organisations. Please fill in our online questionnaire. More information on www.edinburgh.gov.uk/streetschemes

Please keep yourselves, the children and the community safe by continuing to follow all the FACTs. If we can help in any way, please contact us via admin@bruntsfield.edin.sch.uk. If you wish to talk to someone, we shall arrange a time to phone you.

We all look forward to seeing all the children from P1-P7 on Monday 15 March.
Have a good weekend when it arrives.

Kind regards,

Carol Kyle