We’ve been back a little over a week and already it has been a busy start to the summer term. We were delighted to welcome some former pupils from Leith Academy along to one of our whole school assemblies to share the work they are doing in preparation for their Silver Award. This term will be an important one for Leith Primary as we make our final preparations for our Gold Award assessment in June. Children’s Rights underpins all we do at Leith from our welcoming and inclusive ethos to our commitment to play-based learning, supporting pupils’ talents and hobbies, reducing the financial cost of the school day to parents and nurturing of pupil leadership. At our Tuesday assembly this week, we discussed the importance of dignity. Everyone should have their dignity preserved, even those who may have lost the respect of their peers by being unkind. The right to privacy (#16) links closely to our approach of PIP and RIP – Praise in Public, Reprimand in Private: Pupils may not always know what happens next after they report when someone has not followed our school rules – Be Ready, Be Respectful, Be Safe. This does not mean that nothing has happened but that the adults have dealt with the situation in private to maintain the person’s dignity.
Farewell Ms Kennedy!
Goodbye and good luck to our wonderful school administrator, Alex Kennedy, who will be leaving us on Friday (26th) after nearly two years at Leith Primary. Ms Kennedy has been a key member of our school staff during her time here and the smiley, welcoming face for many at the start of each school day. Ms Kennedy will be taking her experience of school administration to a larger school in the private sector and we wish her the very best of luck in her career.
Whilst we undertake the recruitment for Ms Kennedy’s replacement, please note that our office will be manned only at key points during the day. It is therefore very important that all pupils arrive at school at the start of the day 8.50am. The telephone voicemail, text system and admin email inbox will be checked regularly throughout the day so please leave us a message if you need to get in touch about something important. Repeated phoning and hanging up leaves multiple blank voice messages on our system meaning it might take longer to get back to you so please do leaved a brief message so we can get back to you as soon as possible.
Mrs Beattie, our school Business Manager will be working additional hours to support with new enrolments and ParentPay issues.
Thank you for your understanding during this transitional time.
Junior Award Scheme for Schools – JASS # Article 29 #Article31 #Article 15
We are very excited to be offering all pupils between P3 and P7 the opportunity to have their Wider Achievements recognised in a more formal and progressive way through the introduction of the Junior Award Scheme for Schools. This has been made possible by the generous donation from KPE4, who support the school with reducing and removing costs to parents for clubs and residential trips. If your child attends a club or group, they can get accreditation for the time they spent at a sports club or drama group, dance group, Scouts, Brownies, Youth Club, madrassa, etc. Along with activities planned in school, this will lead to JASS certification. JASS is an excellent precursor to the Duke of Edinburgh Award that many children get the opportunity to do at secondary school. Please look out for the log sheet that children can take to their club for initialling by the group leader, as evidence of attendance. Good Luck!
School Library Reopens #Article17 #Article29
We are delighted that our school library is now back open for all pupils to use. This is thanks to the dedication of our parent council, LPPC, who have audited the books and supplemented them with amazing new ones. LPPC were supported by staff from our local Leith bookshop, Argonaut Books on Leith Walk, who advised on the best selection of new titles that would appeal to our young people. Mr Stuart and Mrs Kinnell have also been working with the National Literacy Trust to establish the best way to encourage pupils to read more for pleasure. Mr Stuart has also established our Junior Librarian group which consists of pupils from all year groups who support their class with maintaining the library and sharing the views of their classmates on which books are most popular.
As many thousands of pounds have been invested in purchasing new books, we would really appreciate parents and carers support in helping pupils to take care of the books when they go home. We were really keen that our pupils get the opportunity to take books home to read in the evenings and at weekends. However, we would like all the books to come back in one piece so that other children can enjoy them. Pupils will be able to exchange their book each week if they would like to select a new one. Se regret that a new book cannot be taken home unless the previous one has been checked back in.
Another big welcome and thank you to our Senior Librarians, who are a small team of parent volunteers who will support classes each week in exploring the new book collection and keeping the library in good order.
Thank you to everyone involved and we hope everyone enjoys our fabulous new books.
Support for Children’s Mental Health #Article23 #Article5
Tennis Coaching This Summer #Article31 #Article24
Family Fun Day #Article 18 #Article 31
Low Traffic Neighbourhoods – Your Views #Article13 #Article 12
We are currently looking at setting up some more research with parents now the low traffic neighbourhood measures have been implemented. We’re interested in finding parents of P6 and P7 children who are interested in taking part in a small focus group on Thursday 9th May at 6pm. The research will be asking parents what they think of the low traffic neighbourhood measures and whether they feel they’ve affected safety of walking to school etc. Groups will be run online using Zoom, will last up to around 90 minutes and parents would receive £40 as a thank you for taking part. Please get in touch with Rachel Young if you are interested in attending this session: rachel.young@progressivepartnership.co.uk
Well Done to Our Recent Leithers of the Week #Article29 #Article31
| Lori | Primary 1/2 | For trying exceptionally hard in maths these past couple of weeks. Well done Lori! |
| Finlay | Primary 1/2 | For trying very hard in numeracy this week. Finlay has been very confident when ordering numbers from smallest to biggest. |
| Jed | Primary 1a | Jed was a fantastic role model on our school trip to the museum yesterday! He followed our silent, sensible and safe rules. Very well done, Jed! |
| Danya | Primary 1a | Danya has been working hard to stay focused and has done a fantastic job of following our carpet rules. Well done, Danya! |
| Aryan | Primary 1b | Aryan has been working really hard on his writing, forming new letters and practising his name. |
| Alice | Primary 1b | Alice has been working really hard on her reading and writing. She can now write full words independently and is very enthusiastic when showing her knowledge of sounds in phonics. |
| Manvir | Primary 2 | Manvir has been demonstrating his brilliant addition skills in our Big Maths activities. He has been challenging himself to improve the speed and accuracy of his addition within 20 and has done an amazing job! Well done Manvir! |
| Ryan | Primary 2 | Ryan has been putting a big effort into phonics this week! He used what he knew about the sound ‘gl’ to come up with some more complex words. Well done Ryan, keep up the good work! |
| Freya | Primary 3 | It has been so lovely to watch you work so hard in Maths this week. You have created some amazing arrays for our Array City and I am so enjoying watching you challenge yourself. Keep it up! |
| Napiu | Primary 3 | You have been working so hard in all aspects of your literacy. You challenge yourself to write more every lesson and it has been so lovely to hear you growing into such a confident reader. I hope you keep being proud of yourself for all of your hard work. |
| Bhodi | Primary 3 | You have been working so hard in your Maths lately, you always come to your group ready to learn and with a super positive attitude. You have worked so hard in counting the number of jumps to find missing addends and I am so proud of you. |
| Ellie | Primary 3/4 | For being an effective contributor to group work in Maths and showing a positive attitude to her work. |
| Kasey | Primary 3/4 | Kasey has been an effective contributor to the class this week, especially during a maths lesson looking at measuring mass. |
| Riyaa | Primary 3/4 | For making super progress in her numeracy learning. |
| Austin | Primary 4 | Great technique and teamwork in Volleyball this week. Well done! |
| Aaron | Primary 4 | Aaron worked hard in Writing this week, focusing on his Literacy target. Well done! |
| Belle | Primary 4 | For supporting others during French this week. Thankyou! |
| Jamie | Primary 5a | Jamie for asking interesting questions and for using technology to support his learning. |
| Aleks | Primary 5a | Aleks has been working on his perseverance and aiming to achieve his best. Well done |
| Anjali | Primary 5a | Anjali listens very well to others and to feedback. She is always aiming to improve her work and achieve her best. |
| Alfie | Primary 5b | Alfie is a responsible and respectful member of our class always ready to learn and is great asset in paired, group and class activities. Well done Alfie! |
| Cooper | Primary 5b | Cooper has been very supportive when his friends have been dealing with big emotions. |
| Scarlett | Primary 6 | Scarlett has been really applying herself in her maths and reading this week. She has also been a fantastic supportive learning partner. |
| Alexa | Primary 6 | Alexa was brilliant in athletics this week, taking part in the activities and doing her best in her sprinting. Well done Alexa! |
| Chloe | Primary 6/7 | Chloe has been continuing to grow in confidence within Numeracy and has worked hard to build up her solid understanding of improper fractions and mixed number fractions. Great start to the term Chloe! |
| Wegdan | Primary 7 | For always showing respect by listening to instructions and using her eye contact and body language. Wegdan is hardworking and completes tasks with full concentration. Well done! |
Believe. Persevere. Achieve. 