Well it has been a long but fantastic half term and it is great to see just how well children have settled into their new classes and how they have progressed in their learning. This term we have seen pirates and rockets, trenches and banana growers and a whole variety of other aspects to hook children into learning. Last week I had the pleasure of spending a week with the Y6 pupils at Thornbridge Outdoor Activity Centre, taking part in activities such as climbing, caving and mountain biking. It was wonderful to see the children mature and change over such a short period of time.

Thank you to those parents who attended the KS1 and KS2 SATs meeting, we do hope you found them useful and that they will help you to support your children during this academic year.

On Monday we had a visit from South Yorkshire Police to share information about bonfire and firework safety, to ensure that all our children keep safe in the coming weeks and yesterday Y5/6 pupils took part in a refugee project to try and find out what it is like for those people who have had to leave their own countries due to civil war.

The “stars of the week” for the final week of the half term have been selected for amazing independent writing, for contributing fantastic ideas to lessons, for always working and trying hard and brilliant work in numeracy, well done to you all and enjoy ‘Dining with the Stars!’

Attendance this term has continued to be positive and I do really appreciate your support in keeping your children’s attendance high and resisting the temptation to take cheaper term time holidays, attendance for the final week of term is 94.6% and for the year so far 96.7%. The second week after half term is assessment week so as ever I urge you to ensure your child attends that week as children always tend to do better on assessments when they are doing them with their peers.

As ever thank you for your continued support of Hoyland Common Primary School and if there is anything you wish to discuss about your child’s education please do not hesitate to contact me or one of the HCPS team.