As we reach the final week of providing feedback from the parent survey results, we want to extend our thanks for your valuable input. 

What one key thing would you improve at Almond Hill to help with children's learning and progress?

One parent raised a question about whether it was fair to ask for three positive areas alongside one suggestion for improvement. Change is often challenging to implement so we wanted to focus on the most impactful priority and on what was the most important thing for parents. 

Many suggestions for improvement related to increasing staff, provisions and opportunities. As many of you will understand, these factors are largely influenced by budget constraints. 

Key Themes from Feedback: 

Public Speaking & Oracy – We completely agree! Over the next three years, we will be developing our oracy programme to provide more opportunities for public speaking. Look out for the new debating club for the upper school next term. 

Homework – A topic with varying opinions! Some parents have said there is too much homework whereas others have said there is not enough and some requested a more focused monthly project . Homework is always a tricky balance as we recognise that some families can provide substantial support while others may not be able to. Our current approach includes: 

• Weekly homework designed to be accessible, age-appropriate with 2 difficultly levels—without requiring adult support.  

• Some children ask for the ‘challenge’ piece which is an optional extra and if chosen, should be completed on top of the usual, age-related homework. For those children who may need some additional support, they may be given homework that focusses on areas where they need more practise (i.e. spellings). 

• Occasional projects that may require more time, effort, and resources, such as the diversity homework or the recent writing/art project where we saw some incredible Starbirds! 
   

Additional Support & Opportunities – We would love to expand pastoral care, interventions, clubs and extra learning opportunities and we will continue to explore ways to make this possible. 

Thank you again for your continued engagement and support. Your feedback is invaluable as we strive to create the best possible learning environment for all our children. 

On 1st April, we are inviting parents in to take part in a fun, interactive maths lesson with their children. The plan is to meet with Miss Simmons in the hall at drop off (8:45am) for a very short chat about maths at Almond Hill followed by a maths lesson (short, fun activities which use a range of maths skills) from 9.00 -10.00am in your child's classroom. It will be an opportunity for children to experience learning with you and maybe even for you to brush off those maths skills and support your children in the classroom. These types of events have always been very successful and children love having you in the classroom sharing their learning experiences. We look forward to seeing you then! As ever, you will be able to move between classes if you have children across the school.

Our Parents’ Evenings (PTI’s) for the Spring Term will be held on Tuesday 11th and Thursday 13th March. If your child is in 3W, Miss Ward will be available to see parents on Monday 10th and Thursday 13th March. 

Given how the time spent with the class teacher at parents’ evening is finite, families will receive their PTI forms today via email to allow you to digest the information and plan for any questions you may have.  Please bear with us as the system can sometimes take a while and you may not receive them all at the same time. 

Face to Face Appointments 

If your child is in the upper school, please go straight to Acorn House. You will be able to look at your child’s books in the classroom and meetings will be in offices (Year 5 downstairs and Year 6 upstairs). If your child is in the lower school, please go straight to Oak House. You will be able to look at your child’s books in the classroom and meetings will be in offices within Oak House.  There will be a free crèche available in the computing room for all in person PTI meetings on 11th and 13th March, but we are unable to offer this facility for Miss Ward’s appointments on 10th March. We will also be selling preloved uniform alongside the creche. Please come along and replenish your stocks.  The computing room can be accessed from the quadrant. Premier will be running their wraparound care as usual and our external football club for year 5/6 will run as planned. All other clubs held on a Tuesday or Thursday (including reading booster) will not be running. 

Online Appointments 

If you choose an online meeting, please see the below link for a guide on using the system. Please read this carefully as it tells you how to check that your technology will work correctly for the meeting. You will be sent a link for the meeting and you will need to ensure you are prompt to start. The meetings follow back to back so your time cannot be adjusted. The meetings will be timed to 9 minutes and will cut out after this time. There will be a clock on screen as an indicator for both you and the teacher that the meeting is coming to an end. https://support.parentseveningsystem.co.uk/article/801-video-parents-how-to-attend-appointments-over-video-call  

We received a call from a local resident last week who reported that they had noticed an increase in children walking independently to school and is worried that they are not taking enough care when crossing.  He said the children seem not to have an awareness of cars and is worried there will be an accident. Please speak to your child about road safety and the importance of crossing roads safely.  

Thank you to the parents who have been in touch to discuss our new initiative ‘Girls on board’ which like all our pastoral provisions is designed to help children develop personal skills and in this case, a focus on solution finding. As with all our provisions, we will monitor the impact and evaluate success over time. The book ‘When Girls Fall Out’ has been mentioned to me as a good read by a parent and I would agree (as I have read it myself) as it provides more background reading on this topic if you are interested.

https://www.girlsonboard.co.uk/parents/ 

Are we meeting your child’s needs? 
I'm absolutely thrilled that 98% of parents who responded to the survey believe we are meeting their child’s needs. As a school dedicated to serving the local community and by extension, children with a wide range of needs, this feedback makes me incredibly proud. It reaffirms that we are successfully fulfilling our mission.

The current ‘job pairs’ were mentioned in the survey – not in a negative way by any means but I wanted to address it here. For some children, a job pair can be tricky however we believe it builds a really strong teaching team for your child. Teachers are able to utilise their different strengths to enhance the learning experience for the children. Children in any class are often taught by different people (for example Cover Supervisors) and they are very much used to this throughout the school.

We have looked at the comments regarding how we can improve but there were no patterns or trends and comments were very much personal to the individual person or family. If there is anything you feel needs follow up, please contact the relevant staff member so we can discuss this with you.

Details are still being finalised but please be aware the dates for the spring term parents’ evening are as follows:
Tuesday 11^th March and Thursday 13^th March

Parents of 3W please note parents’ evening with Miss Ward will take place on Monday 10^th March and Thursday 13^th March.

I was pleased to hear that the recent pastoral/SEND coffee morning was the best attended so far. This particular day of the week and time was suggested by a parent and staff changed their working patterns to facilitate so this made it particularly worthwhile. Hopefully parents know that when they give us feedback to improve, if we can action it, we will always try though it might not happen immediately.  

We have been overwhelmed with the generosity of our families and staff so far with regards to donations of kit for swimming. We would really appreciate donations of the following:

• Towel x1
• Hats x8
• Swimwear (boys and girls) size 11-12 x2 of each
• Swimwear (boys and girls) size 12-13 x2 of each

If you have any of these at home that are unwanted or no longer fit, please bring them in and give them to your child’s class teacher.

Miss Simmons will be hosting an information meeting for parents of children who will be going to Grafham next year. Here you will have the opportunity to find out more about the trip and ask any questions you may have. Year 5 children are welcome to attend with parents/carers. Thursday 20^th March 6pm via Microsoft Teams.

From outer space and dinosaurs to Messi, Ronaldo and everything in between—our young journalists have been hard at work on the latest edition of the student newspaper, 2 Cool 4 School. You can read it here:

Thank you to all parents who joined the Teams meeting for our first online Parent Forum. We had 21 parents/carers from across the school with each year group represented, this is a welcomed increase on numbers from the year before. It is great to see how invested everyone is in the school and their children's education.  At the meeting we discussed and took opinions on different elements of Almond Hill including: possible future changes to the way parents are kept informed of school events, the idea of being 'phone free', how we can improve transition from Y2 - Y3 and Y6 - Y7 and what parents feel about supporting the school through voluntary contributions towards some occasions. It was lovely to hear your views and even if you did not contribute your ideas this time, knowing there were many parents logged in and listening was great - so thank you. Please look out for the next meeting at the end of the term. Everyone is welcome! It is from the comfort of your own home and very informal - a nice chat about all things Almond Hill. So if you have been thinking about joining and being a voice for the parent community - do it!

We have loved celebrating Safer Internet Day this week.  This year, the celebrations and learning have been based around the theme ‘Too good to be true? Protecting yourself and others from scams online'.

Safer Internet Day is the UK’s biggest celebration of online safety. Each year we cover an online issue or theme that speaks about the things young people are seeing and experiencing online. Created in consultation with young people across the UK, this year Safer Internet Day focused on the issue of scams online and for young people, how to protect themselves and others, as well as what support is available to them. This Safer Internet Day, we assessed the real scale of this issue and allow young people to share their experiences and ideas on how to tackle the problem.  It is coordinated in the UK by the UK Safer Internet Centre, the celebration sees thousands of organisations get involved to promote the safe, responsible and positive use of digital technology for children and young people.  More information can be found on the link below.

Safer Internet Day 2025 - UK Safer Internet Centre

The children have used the information that we have discussed to create pretend scams.  The best will be used on a display in the Computing Suite to educate children (or adults) on the tell-tale signs to watch for in an online scam.

We are pleased to see that everyone who responded felt we handle conflict appropriately and, when necessary, deal with it effectively.  
 
However, if you need to discuss any concerns with the school, please use the following communication channels: 

• General enquiries can be directed to the school office via phone or email. You may also contact your child’s year group using the designated year group email addresses. 
  Year3@almondhill.herts.sch.uk 
  Year4@almondhill.herts.sch.uk 
  Year5@almondhill.herts.sch.uk 
  Year6@almondhill.herts.sch.uk 

• Concerns about your child should first be addressed with their class teacher. Please speak to them to  arrange an appointment after school. 

• Urgent matters should be directed to Miss Simmons, our Deputy Head (admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk). 

• Special Educational Needs or Disabilities (SEND) enquiries should be sent to Mrs. Birchall, our SENCo (iep@almondhill.herts.sch.uk). 

• Mrs. Fordham can be reached via the admin email. Depending on the nature of your enquiry, it may be forwarded to a more appropriate member of staff for a response initially. 

• Child Protection concerns should be directed to our Designated Teacher for Child Protection, Mrs. Fordham. Deputies include Mrs. Birchall, Mrs. Burgess, and Miss Simmons if she is not available.  

We appreciate your cooperation and look forward to continuing to support our students and families. 
 
One parent has referred to trauma informed training which is provided by the Virtual School. This is training that is undertaken by staff annually and we agree it is very good. As a school we employ the Therapeutic Thinking strategy as supported by the Local Authority but are also currently undertaking further training in ‘unconditional positive regard’. This concept complements and supplements the strategies already used to ensure we meet the needs of the pupils in our community. 

I am very pleased to inform parents that Mrs Bond has taken the post of Acting Assistant Head for the rest of this academic year.  Mrs Bond will look after sport for Almond Hill. I am sure you will all join me in congratulating Mrs Bond on her new role.   

Details are still being finalised but please be aware the dates for the spring term parents’ evening are as follows: 
Tuesday 11th March and Thursday 13th March 

Parents of 3W please note parents’ evening with Miss Ward will take place on Monday 10th March and Thursday 13th March. 

A reminder for Year 6 parents: Miss Simmons will be hosting a SATs information meeting online on Monday, February 3rd via Microsoft Teams. We encourage you to attend! For those who may be interested, DSPL2 are hosting a 6/7 Transition: Stevenage Parent/Carer Workshop – details can be found below.  

Microsoft Teams
Join the meeting now 
Meeting ID: 355 580 176 793 
Passcode: gD9Yz2s6 

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/67-transition-stevenage-parentcarer-workshop-tickets-1214803773789?aff=ebemoffollowpublishemail&utm_campaign=following_published_event&ref=eemail&utm_medium=email&utm_source=eventbrite&utm_content=follow_notification  
 

Thank you to the parents who took the time to complete the parent survey last term. I was really pleased to see that the responses were overwhelmingly positive. Over the next few weeks, I will respond to some of the feedback/responses via our newsletter.  

Do you read the weekly newsletter? If not, why? 

I am pleased to see that many of our parents read our weekly newsletter. This is the best place to find answers to many of your questions.  We know that some parents feel there are too many emails from school which is why we tried to reduce the amount of emails we send by adding the majority of necessary information to our newsletter. The admin team are looking into how we can improve the way we communicate with parents. 
 
The layout of the newsletter was mentioned too and this is something we are always happy to consider. The changes to the newsletter came from suggestions in our parent forum and we would welcome any one to join and help to make a difference. Please email Miss Simmons if you are interested in joining. The newsletter will be raised at one of their upcoming meetings. 

Do you look at the school's website? If yes, what do you find useful? If you answered no, please explain why. 

Again, I am pleased parents find our website useful and are looking at it to find the information they need and those who do not use our website tell us this is because the newsletter provides the necessary information they may be looking for.  The most popular areas of the school website are the term dates, calendar, staff details, newsletters, curriculum information, house points, school uniform details and photo galleries. 

What would you like to see on the website? 

Many of the suggestions made here are for things that are already on the website but this is really useful as we can highlight these areas for you here.  

A list of which Illness children should be staying at home with - https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/page/?title=Attendance+%28including+absence+request+forms%29&pid=225 an NHS guide to when not to send your child to school can be found following the link above. 
 
Contact details for the Governors, admin, head and year groups - The school governors, admin and headteacher are all contactable via admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk - all contact details can be found here https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/page/?title=Contact+Us&pid=13  

Photos of staff next to their names - https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/page/?title=Staff&pid=33  

More information on the SEND side of things in school and what help is available and more on mental health for young children – We have a dedicated area for both SEND and mental wellbeing.  

https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/page/?title=Special+Educational+Needs+and+Disabilities&pid=50  

https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/news/?pid=22&nid=25  

Thank you for completing the survey about ways to improve congestion around the school. We asked if parents of children in Year 5 and 6 were interested in a ‘walking bus’ at the end of the school day and this wasn’t a particularly popular suggestion. Most people preferred the idea of a later finish for Years 5 and 6 so we will trial this after half term.

I wanted to address this survey as we did have some submissions however due to there being a very small number of responses, I will not be addressing feedback on our newsletter as this may impact people’s anonymity. However, if you or your child have a disability, please don’t hesitate to contact the school if there is ever anything that we can do to support you for example with access to the school.  

We had a very limited response to the survey but I thank the parents who did take the time to provide their feedback. All swimming certificates were given to children before Christmas and I am delighted to tell you that many children achieved their 25-metre swim. Almost all children achieved a distance certificate and everyone who participated gained in confidence. We have secured some funding via County Councillor Ellie Plater under the Locality Budget Scheme. A big thank you to Mrs Burgess for her hard work on this so no child misses out. We will continue to provide updates and the portal remains open for payments until 31st March 2025. We will never chase people for money personally but would appeal to those who are able to, to make payment, if their child took part in swimming lessons in the pop up pool. We will never exclude anyone from anything on the basis of cost but will have to limit our extra curricular plans going forward if we incur a huge deficit. Being taught to swim 25metres is part of the national curriculum so needs to be prioritised.  

Mrs Choudhury has noted a lot of wasted food from children eating school dinners. Please can I ask parents to speak to children about the importance of eating their lunchtime meal. If you are ordering a school dinner, we would suggest ordering alongside your child so they are choosing what they will eat. Not only is it a waste of parents’ money if you are paying for food and it is going in the bin but it is also not healthy for children not to eat all day.  Mrs Fordham has spoken to children about this in assembly too.  

We are always really keen to support ex Almond Hill pupils in any way we can and as such I am asking for your help to complete a survey to support one of our former pupils with her university dissertation. The aim of the survey is to better understand the reasons why children are absent from school and the factors that influence absenteeism. Having a better understanding of this can help inform new interventions to tackle absenteeism. 

Calling all parents and caregivers!   
Do you have a child in Years 1–6? Help us understand school attendance challenges by taking part in a short research survey.  
 
Your views can make a difference, whether your child has faced difficulties attending school or not. Plus, there's a chance to win a £5 Amazon voucher!  
 
Learn more and take part here: https://tinyurl.com/5n787usk  
 
Thank you for helping us make schools better for everyone! 

Our Christmas dinners and class parties were the highlight of the week this week. With music playing in the beautifully decorated dining room. Sue, our cook and her team provided a lovely meal for staff and children to enjoy. A big thank you to our kitchen staff who served the children with smiles and festive cheer! 

A huge thank you to FOAH for another hugely popular present room.  The wonderful team of volunteers have worked really hard to provide an excellent choice of affordable gifts – something to look forward to on Christmas Day! Our FOAH elves have told us they sold 870 gifts! A big thank you to everyone who came along and purchased a gift!  

On Tuesday evening, we held our 'Mince Pies and Carols sing along evening.' Despite the chilly weather, lots of parents and children turned up to get in the Christmas mood with some fantastic singing- along with fabulous dance moves and superb percussion work! Thank you to everyone who came to join in the fun. We'll see you again next year!

I am sorry to inform you all that Mrs Small will be leaving Almond Hill at the end of this term. She has had to prioritise family circumstances and decided to move on from Almond Hill into the educational training setting as of January. She would like to thank every child, staff member and parent she has come into contact with for helping her settle into Almond Hill life. 

I would like to thank Mrs Small for her contributions not only as a class teacher but as one our school leaders. Her dedication to sport and celebration has been truly appreciated by staff and pupils.  

I am pleased to be able to tell you that we have been successful in securing an experienced, qualified teacher, Mrs Barhey, who will be joining us in January '25 for two terms. She has worked in two Hertfordshire schools for over 20 years across all year groups from year 1 to year 5. She will be working alongside our very experienced year 5 team to ensure a smooth transition for the children.  

On Wednesday, we had our end of term Rock Steady performance for parents. Mrs Cleaves went along to watch. "Wow! What a fantastic performance! It was like being at a proper rock concert. Well done to all the children who took part and a special thank you to Olivia, our Rock Steady Band leader." 

A big well done to all the parties who took part in the school election. I am pleased to announce our winners! This year’s elected school government are THE COLD CAPYBARAS. Please see below for a reminder of their manifesto.  

Finley, the Prime Minister has already met with Mrs Fordham to discuss commencement of their pledges.  

I am pleased to say that four children in Year 4 achieved their 25m swim. This is particularly impressive when you consider Year 4 were only added on at the end of the lesson period. The instructors tell us that although not formally assessed due to the limited time, the other children who had lessons from Year 4 really gained in confidence and water skills and will be in a good position to gain their 25m next year so well done!  

As you know, we have been looking into ways we can improve the congestion around the school at pick up times. We have been liaising with a variety of professionals as well as yourselves and Letchmore to see what we can do to ease the problems this causes.  We have been considering the idea of a ‘walking bus’ for children in Year 5 and 6 which would consist of a member of staff walking children (who have been given permission) down to Letchmore Park where they would meet parents. We would like to know if you would consider using this if it was given as an option – this would be for children in Year 5 and 6 only as the member of staff would not be able to wait with children at the park.

Another consideration is to change the collection time. We would be interested to hear from Year 5 and 6 parents if you would (honestly!) delay coming to school if we were to let Year 5 and 6 children leave 5 minutes later at 3.20pm. The time it takes to collect is actually quite short so it would make quite a difference to the number of cars on the road but only if parents would genuinely come later if this was an option.  

We have also written to Local councillors, Stevenage Borough Council and Herts County Council and are starting to receive responses which we will share with you in January.  

A big thank you to everyone who completed the parent feedback survey. We will take some time to go through the responses and will feedback via the newsletter over the coming weeks. 

In October, we communicated that we had changed the way we would like parents to report absences. Previously, we asked parents to phone the school office on the day or to email.  

Now, you can report on the day absence in the following ways:  
by phone (01438 233660 option 1)   
by completing the form on our website  
by submitting on to the Arbor Parent Portal (How to Guide)  

Please do not use the year group emails for this or admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk. The year group emails are not regularly monitored and there are so many emails coming into admin and with only one person managing this box,  they may be missed. You will still be contacted by the office team to check absence if you have emailed one of these as it may not have been passed on and we have a duty to check children’s attendance.  

We also reinstated the online form for requests for time off in term time. If you are requesting time off in term time for holidays, a religious festival or other events, please submit the form on our website. You will also find a form here to inform us of medical appointments.  Please be advised that the government does not consider holidays to be an exceptional circumstance. These are highly unlikely to be authorised and may incur a fine.  

Changes to collection – on the day  
As previously requested, please do not email these changes in. As you can imagine, the school email address gets lots of email daily and it is monitored by one person. This means that some requests/emails may not be seen straight away so it is important that if there is a change to collection, you call the school office. These changes need to be called through by 2.45pm to ensure they are delivered to your child’s class teacher in time for the end of the school day. We cannot guarantee messages will get through to the class teacher before the end of the day otherwise. 

Year Group Emails 
The year group email addresses are a way to communicate with the class teachers for non-urgent queries. They should not be used to report absence or for anything that requires an immediate response as they are not regularly monitored. 

The most important thing is that parents get involved. We would love approximately three parents per year group and with so many new families joining, we wanted to remind you of this opportunity. 

Our next meeting will take place in January. Please complete the form below if you are interested in joining one of our meetings or would like to find out more. This is a really exciting opportunity to further develop the home school partnership. 

I am disappointed to report we received several complaints last week from local residents in regard to the way parents are parking when dropping or collecting their children. I completely understand how difficult it is to park around the school and can see that this causes problems for parents. When our school increased in size, the drop off facility was put in but with such few spaces this hasn’t helped as much as we would have liked. On the flip side however our neighbours should be able to access their houses and driveways without obstruction. Some residents have sent photos of the obstructive and/or dangerous parking and I must inform parents that my advice to these people is to report to the police and/or local council.  

As a school team, we have talked on many occasions about ways we can improve the parking situation both for our parents and our neighbours but we are struggling with a solution. We have invited traffic wardens to the school at our busiest times, met with a local councillor and contacted the local police but we are now asking for your help. Do you have any suggestions on how we can help ease the congestion outside school? Please leave your comments below. We understand many people are frustrated and the reasons why so please only complete the form if you are able to provide suggestions.

Parent Survey  
As you know, we are always looking at ways to improve our school and your feedback is invaluable in helping us to do this. Please can you take the time to complete the survey below to give your feedback on different aspects of school life. There is a section for you to add your child's name if you would like a response from school. Please only use this if you are hoping to hear from me, as previously, some people got phone calls who weren't expecting them.

https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/survey/?pid=166&form=70  

As mentioned on a recent newsletter, the admin team have been discussing communication methods and how we can reach more parents. Currently, we use email, phone, our newsletter, Facebook and our website.  We have decided to trial using Seesaw’s announcement function to send reminders of upcoming events/deadlines. You hopefully saw the first announcement which was sent on Wednesday this week regarding Christmas card designs. We were able to see how quickly this was being viewed by parents and think this will be a good way to communicate.  

If you do not have access to Seesaw, please enter your details below and we will connect you with your child’s journal. 

Please be reminded, THE DEADLINE FOR FREE DELIVERY TO SCHOOL IS: WEDNESDAY 20TH NOVEMBER 2024. Any orders placed after the set deadline will be subject to postage & packaging charges with delivery direct to your home address. For any issues regarding Online Ordering Access Codes, please contact the office. 

Year 5 are going to be leading a community action project very soon! This will be a reverse advent calendar. This involves giving items (rather than receiving them) to those who need them during the run up to Christmas. Year 5 will explain a lot more next week but we wanted to give parents as much notice as possible! If you are able to, please start to collect and bring items in to your child's classroom that you would like to donate to Foodshed- a local Stevenage food bank. These items must last until Christmas so no fresh produce please and watch this space for more information next week too! 

Please see a summary of our most up to date school improvement plan.

You can download a copy to view here

Objectives 2023-24 based on school self- evaluation: July 2023 Yr3-6 assessment outcomes, evaluation of school improvement actions 22/23, consultation with staff and governors, feedback from pupils and parents, May 2021 Ofsted, Attendance data 2022-2023 and external visits

2024-2025 Summary of Objectives

Objectives 2024-25 based on school self- evaluation: July 2024 Yr3-6 assessment outcomes, evaluation of school improvement actions 23/24, consultation with staff and governors, feedback from pupils and parents, May 2021 Ofsted, Attendance data 2023-2024 and external visits.

At the end of the school day, we often have parents come into the building through external doors. Please do not do this. We have lots more clubs after school than we have before which means there are more children still here at the end of the school day. Any visitors to our school must be signed in at the office to ensure we know who is here in the event of an emergency and to safeguard all the children in our care. If you need to come in to school for any reason (other than Premier), please come to our main reception.  This is particularly important if you are coming in to collect a child late. The office staff make a note of all children who are waiting at reception to be collected and they must be signed out by the office team before leaving. The school office is open from 8.15am until 4.30pm every day. 

It has been reported by adults and children that some children are going to Almonds Lane cemetery before and after school and not always behaving respectfully. Please can families discuss with their children to ensure this is not the case. I would suggest that visiting the cemetery at primary school age is something that should be done in the company of an adult to ensure everyone's feelings and well being are taken into account. 

In response to the letter sent this morning, we have had some queries that we wanted to address in our newsletter so all parents received the same information. 

Lots of the queries have been around payments. We do not expect (or need) parents to pay for 20 swimming lessons now. All we ask in the first instance is that parents who gave consent for their child to have lessons in the pop up pool pay for their child's initial lesson which is £4.50. Children will be assessed during this lesson. This may mean this is the only lesson your child has meaning no more payments will be required. Other children will be asked to complete lessons which will cost £4.50 each but parents will be informed about this. The number of lessons any child has will be dependent on their swimming ability with a maximum of 20 being offered. These will take place every day for 4 weeks in the month of November. In order to ensure that parents are not put under any undue financial pressure (especially in the run up to Christmas), the payment request will remain open until near the end of the spring term. 

Lessons at Stevenage Swimming Centre will continue whilst we trial the pop up pool. Slots are hard to get (especially afternoon slots) so we don't want to give ours up until we know that the pop up pool will be successful. Children who currently go down to the Stevenage pool can do both if they want to. Where children have started their lessons already and started making progress, it is important they get the chance to complete the course.

Hopefully this answers any queries. We will answer any further questions after half term.

I would like to say a huge thank you to the staff and parent volunteers who facilitated the Halloween disco on Tuesday.  It was a really well put together event by FOAH and ran seamlessly from a delivery point of view with well over 200 children enjoying themselves immensely. I am especially indebted to staff who gave up their evening on Tuesday who are also going to Grafham on Friday and into half term. It was also lovely to see a slightly expanded group of parent volunteers able to help at this event. 

However, I am sad to say that we have had a handful of parents who have been particularly hard on the office team this week due to the Halloween disco. I understand it can be difficult if your child misses out on events taking place in school which is why we aim to give plenty of notice and reminders through our weekly newsletter. As mentioned before, we have a duty to ensure the children within our care are safe and therefore need time to ensure risk assessments are completed and distributed to the relevant staff in good time before the event. This includes our parent volunteers who kindly give up their time to host these events. When food is being served, we must ensure dietary requirements are met and all staff supervising are aware of any needs. This is a big task for over 200 children and some medical needs require specifically trained members of staff to supervise which must be planned for in advance. 

We are also not able to accommodate the swapping of tickets. There are over 200 children who attend the discos who need to be registered and we need to know who is going to be here.  

Please don’t put staff in a difficult position by calling/emailing and asking them to ‘bend the rules’ to fit your child in. No-one likes saying no. We don’t say no to be awkward. We have deadlines in place for safety reasons and it is never about the money.  

This year, 70% of the school community attended the disco which is the same number as last year.  

The disco has been on our website calendar since the end of September and has been mentioned on our newsletter for the past 4 weeks as well as a reminder being added to Facebook. That being said, the admin team will take some time to discuss communication methods (we currently have our website/newsletter, email and Facebook as communication tools) to see if any improvements can be made and welcome any positive suggestions from parents. 

Thank you to the Year 4 parents who have already completed the collection arrangements form for the cinema trip. If you haven’t already done so please do ASAP. Please note, if a form is not completed by Friday 25th October, your children will be expected to walk back to school after the film.  

https://forms.office.com/e/SpYXKX6ueW

The definition of disability is a broad one.  ‘A person has a disability if he or she has a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on his or her ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities’ (Equality Act 2010). The Equality Act 2010 replaced previous discrimination law and provides a single piece of legislation covering all types of discrimination that are lawful.   

We would like all parents who feel they and/or their child fits the definition outlined above to complete the disability equality questionnaire. The data collected will be used when writing our school’s accessibility plan and disability and equality policies. In most cases, we know if a child in our school as a disability but it is not the case for our parents and it would be useful to know how we can better support our school community as a whole. You do not have to provide identifying details about yourself or your child but there is the option to do so at the end should you wish to be involved in any future focus groups etc.   

https://forms.office.com/e/htcdMFtbak  

 Please find attached the E-consent letter for your child’s Flu vaccination for this coming winter. Please note that you can consent for either the Flu nasal spray, OR the non-gelatine IM Flu vaccine. Please make sure you complete the form online as soon as you can. The portal will close 48 hours ahead of the Flu session. Vaccination UK East Anglia Immunisation (schoolvaccination.uk) Flu can be very unpleasant for children and can sometimes cause serious problems, such as pneumonia. Children can catch and spread flu easily. Vaccinating them also helps protect others who are at higher risk of getting seriously ill from flu, such as babies and older people. The School Immunisation team will be coming into the school on Thursday 14th November to deliver the vaccine. Please be aware that children can NOT receive this vaccination with their GP unless they are clinically vulnerable. 

Flu Consent Form

Flu Leaflet

Please can I remind parents in Years 5 and 6 to complete the form below as soon as possible regarding swimming ability and consent for the pop-up pool. The deadline for submitting the form is Friday 18th October. It is a huge administrative task allocating the swimming lessons and we need to be able to do this before half term so we can let families know who needs to bring kit in for the first day after half term. 

Thank you to the school staff who have donated kit. We would still benefit from swimming costumes and trunks in a range of sizes if parents can please have a look at home for these. I want to remove barriers where I can and I think kit is something we can certainly support with. Please bring donations to the office – thank you. 

The timetable below gives you an idea of what will happen over the next few months. 

Thank you to the Year 4 parents who have already completed the collection arrangements form for the cinema trip. If you haven’t already done so please do ASAP. Please note, if a form is not completed, your children will be expected to walk back to school after the film.  

https://forms.office.com/e/SpYXKX6ueW 

Our photographers will be in school on Tuesday 22nd October to take individual photos of the children. The photos taken of Year 6 will be used in the yearbook so please do your best to be here on the day. Almond Hill siblings will also have their photos taken on this day.  

Don’t forget to sign up! So far, our cashpot is on £204.37 and continues to rise! A big thank you to everyone who has shopped at Asda and selected Almond Hill as their school! Please spread the word to your friends and family. 

This is also available to download at the bottom of the page.

Moving on 2025 leaflet Information for parents with children in year 6 at primary/junior school. Further information about moving to secondary school in September 2025 will be available at www.hertfordshire.gov.uk/admissions 

The timetable below gives you an idea of what will happen over the next few months. 

I am pleased to be able to tell you all children will be going on a school trip to the cinema in November! The trips will take place during the school day and at no charge to parents. On the day of their trip, children will come to school as normal to be registered and then walk down the Leisure Park to watch the film before walking back to school around lunch time except for Year 4 who will be watching their film in the afternoon so can be either collected from the cinema or from school upon our return (please note, this may be later than usual). We must know beforehand if you are collecting from the cinema and will ask you to complete a form nearer the time. Please note, if your child has not been given consent to watch PG films, we may be in contact to discuss this with you. 

Year 4 - Kung Fu Panda 4 - 13th November 1:00 - 2:40  
Year 3 - Garfield - 27th November - 10:00 - 11:45 
Year 5 - Asterix and the secret of the magic potion - 19th November 10:00 - 11:40 
Year 6 - Despicable me 4 - 28th November 10:00 - 11:45 

As a school with high expectations for behaviour and learning where hard work is greatly valued, we believe taking advantage of occasional opportunities like trips to the cinema where there is no cost involved. We are also aware that for some children, trips to the cinema happen very rarely or not at all.  A huge thank you to Miss Simmons who has organised this FREE enrichment event for the children.  

For anyone who was unable to attend the Grafham meeting in the Summer term, you can find useful information in the PowerPoint below.  

During October, we will be inviting Year 3 parents to have lunch with their children. As I am sure you will remember, this is a lovely opportunity for both parents and children but it does rely on help from the wider school to make it run smoothly. The lunches will take place on:  

Wednesday 9th October – 3L (Mrs Lyons) 

Wednesday 16th October – 3W (Mrs. Ward) 

Wednesday 23rd October – 3B (Miss Bonfield and Mrs Geer) 

An email has been sent to Year 3 today with more information.  

The menu will remain the same for the rest of the school but we will need your help in preordering your child’s meals for this day to help our cook prepare for the increase on orders on these days. You can do this today. As always, pre orders must be in by 8.55am on the day your child will be taking the meal or a cheese sandwich will be offered. 

A message from School Gateway

To make our payment options easier to understand within the School Gateway app, we’ve updated the name of Bank Transfer to One-click payments.

Some of your parents may already be using this functionality, so please let them know that in order to see these changes they'll need to download the latest version of the School Gateway app from their App/Play store. Once they've updated the app, they'll be able to look out for our new One-click payments button which has replaced the Bank Transfer button at checkout. 

It's likely that there are parents at your school who aren't taking advantage of this functionality yet. One-click payments is designed to save parents time at checkout, so recommending it to them can help them get the best out of School Gateway.

We’ve created some handy guidance to make sure it’s as simple as possible to set up, so please feel free to share this with your parents.  

We wanted to make our new parents aware (and remind parents) of Operation Encompass which is a system in place between schools and the Police to support families. Operation Encompass is the notification to schools, prior to the start of the next school day, of incidents where and when a child or young person has experienced or been exposed to any domestic abuse.

Operation Encompass allows the Police to liaise with a trained member of school staff (DSL) so they can use the information that has been shared in confidence whilst also ensuring that the school is able to make provision for possible difficulties experienced by children, or their families, who have experienced a domestic abuse incident. We are keen to offer the best support possible to all our pupils and we believe this will be extremely beneficial for all those involved.

Moving on 2025 leaflet Information for parents with children in year 6 at primary/junior school. Further information about moving to secondary school in September 2025 will be available at www.hertfordshire.gov.uk/admissions

The timetable below gives you an idea of what will happen over the next few months.

There are over 300 children arriving and leaving our school every day. We welcome children riding bikes/scooting to school if they are wearing a safety helmet. In the interests of the safety of all our children, we expect you to observe the parking restrictions when dropping off or collecting your child in a car. Please can you make your child aware that the raised area outside of the school is not a pedestrian crossing. At the end of the day the school gate area is very busy.

At the beginning of the day, most parents with children in Years 4, 5 and 6 do not park. They drop their children off and let them walk to class. However for children in year 3, it is more likely they will want to park and take their children to the classroom door. This can cause difficulties if all the available spaces are already filled. Please be mindful of this issue. There is a 10 minute window for children to be dropped off and the car park tends to be quieter in the latter half of those 10 minutes e.g 8.50-8.55am.

If you park in the ‘drop off’ zone at the end of the day it must be in one of the marked bays. You may not park on the access roadway around these spaces. Adults who park in one of the allocated parking spaces at the end of the day need to get out of their cars and walk to collect their child. The ‘drop off’ area is for vehicle entrance/exit only NOT for pedestrian use. I am sure like me; you wish to keep our children as safe as possible. I hope the guidelines are clear enough for all parents/carers to follow. If you have any queries or concerns about the use of the drop off, please contact me.

If you are driving to school, please park safely and in line with restrictions. Please also show respect to our neighbours in adjacent roads so their access is not restricted by inconsiderate parking.

Wow! We are really pleased families were so eager to sign up to clubs this term. In the past, we have had clubs that we have not managed to fill and even though we have increased our offer this term, many of the clubs were full on the day they opened! If you are not able to sign up for club on the Arbor Portal, it is most likely because it is full. Please ensure you have access to the portal (particularly for new parents) as without this, your children may miss out on events and clubs.

We will be offering Year 3 parents a couple of 1-hour sessions to talk about our behaviour policy, Therapeutic Thinking. Please complete the short poll below to help us plan this to suit the majority of parents.

What is therapeutic thinking?
Therapeutic Thinking is a behaviour management approach which focuses on all behaviour being a form of communication. The basis is that we need to 'analyse' children's behaviour for what they are not saying and put into place support for them in order that they can thrive and develop not only academically but socially & emotionally too. The ethos is that we teach children to read, do maths, swim and we also need to 'teach' them what positive behaviour looks like. It has to be explicitly taught so we can't just bribe with extrinsic rewards as we want children to be able to make good choices for themselves (intrinsic) even when we are not there. 

When children feel negative, it is harder to make good choices. It's like when we're tired, hungry, stressed we are not the best versions of ourselves. So in order for some children to be able to make better choices we need to help them feel better about themselves by giving them more positive, pro-social experiences.

The theory is underpinned by ACES (adverse childhood experiences), attachment and being ‘trauma aware’ and how all these things can impact on children. Research shows for it to work, it has to be a whole school approach and needs to be embedded in policy. Consistency is key so children get the same experiences from all staff which makes them feel safe and secure at school. 

Everyone makes mistakes and when children get it wrong we focus on repair, reflect, restore strategies such as reflection & restorative conversations to help them make a better choice next time.

Children in Year 3 have now been added to Seesaw. Please follow the link in the invite to join your child’s journal. If you haven’t received an invitation to join, we do not have consent for your child.

We’d like to welcome back existing parents and introduce ourselves to those who have joined us this year. We are Friends of Almond Hill (FOAH for short), the PTA responsible for raising funds and running events so your children have the best experiences and some nice extras at school.

Last year we ran a Halloween Disco, Movie Night, and Present Rooms for Christmas (sorry to mention the C word!), Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. We had enough funds to purchase additional equipment for the outside gym and provided year books and leavers hoodies for those leaving the school. We are always looking for people to help us as little or as much as you can – after all, more hands make light work.

If you have any “spare” time, useful skills, or matched funding by your employer and would like to get involved and make some new friends, please email us at foah@almondhill.herts.sch.uk, our first on-line meeting (via Teams) is on Monday 16^th September at 6pm. Joining details can be found here if you’d like to say hello and find out more. There are formal roles available (we are a registered charity) and ad-hoc opportunities based on the specific activities we are running. Alternatively we’d be really grateful if you could support the fund raising activities we are running throughout the year if you can.

These sessions are a chance for parents to come and meet with other parents and Mrs Birchall our SENCo and Mrs Burgess our Pastoral Lead to talk about all things SEND and pastoral. 

Tuesday 24th Sep 8:30-9:15am
Thursday 21st Nov 2:30-3:15pm

We want any parent who feels these sessions may benefit them to have the chance to attend so welcome feedback about the time/dates that these are planned.