Middle School Newsletter

PLEASE HELP US!

We would really appreciate our parental community promoting reading the newsletter in any message groups and to other parents you see! We have approximately 60% readership currently, so are looking to increase this to as close to 100% as we can. We understand that there are a lot of communications from school, however, please help us spread the word that readying the newsletter each Monday is the most important item to read!
Thank you!

Key Dates

Monday 9th December:  Extended: Last day to order iPads (Year 7 & 8)
See below for more information - no other purchases can be made after today!
Wednesday 11th December:  Year 7 Science Trip - Centre of the Cell (Himalayas)
Thursday 12th December:  Year 6 - 8 Festival of Light Concert 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Friday 13th December: All other Year 7 Students to Pantomime (Every Child a Theatre Goer) (Middle School Choir children visiting in January)
Friday 13th December:  Christmas Jumper Day & Christmas Dinner £1.00 Donation
Tuesday 17th December:  Reception - Year 6 Flu Vaccine (More Information below)
Tuesday 17th December:  Year 7 Science Trip - Centre of the Cell (Himalayas)
Wednesday 18th December:  Exhibition of Beautiful Work 4:30pm - 6:30pm (School finishes at 1:00pm)
Thursday 19th December:  Attendance Award Trip - Winning coaching group for Autumn visiting Zap Space / Attendance Award Trip - Individuals with 100% Punctuality and Attendance (More Information to Follow)
Thursday 19th December:  Year 9 - 13 Festival of Light Concert 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Friday 20th December:  Just One Tree Free Dress Day - £1.00 Donation
Friday 20th December:  School finishes at 1:00pm
Monday 23rd December - Monday 6th January: Christmas Holidays 
Monday 6th January:  School closed for INSET Day
Tuesday 7th January:  School resumes for students
Date TBC January:  Y8 Tower of London Trip / Y7 Middle School choir Pantomime Trip

Middle School Attendance Winners

Year 5 - Machu Picchu 98% OVERALL WINNER
Year 6 - Kosciuszko 97.9%
Year 7 - Ben Nevis 96.2%
Year 8 - Olympus 95.3%

Thank you for your continued support regarding attendance.
Keep trying hard to beat our target of 97% or above!

Year 7 iPads - Information on ordering

Please click this link for the letter sent out regarding 1:1 devices. The portal is currently open for orders and key dates for the iPad roll out are as follows: 

 PORTAL CLOSING TODAY - NO ORDERS CAN BE ACCEPTED AFTER TODAY!

Device collection dates - 09/01/19 & 10/01/19 (3:15pm - 4:00pm and 5:15pm - 6:00pm) 

If you missed our parents' information session last term, the slides presented are available by clicking here. This will give you information about Acceptable Use, how we ensure students' safety online and how the iPads are used to enrich the curriculum. Information on the pricing and how to order is available here. 

Exhibition Update

Coming up on Wednesday 18th December we have our Exhibition of Beautiful Work. To align with secondary and to allow teachers working on multiple projects to set up, we close at 1:00pm on this day. We do understand, however, that this can put pressure on some families, especially with two 1:00pm finishes in a week. 

If you have younger children in the primary and need to collect at 3:00pm, we will provide supervision for your Year 5 or 6 child from 1:00 - 3:00pm. Similarly, if you would like to collect your primary aged child at the earlier time of 1:00pm, we can also arrange this. 

If you would like to register your child to be supervised from 1:00pm - 3:00pm on the 18th December, please click here to do so. If you have any further questions regarding this, please speak to your child's coach. 

A reminder that the school closes for the Christmas break at 1:00pm on Friday 20th December 2019.

Collection after Clubs

Please note that parents collecting students after clubs are dismissed, must wait outside the main reception office on the left hand side for their children. The reception area must be kept free and clear for a safe dismissal, so waiting inside is not possible. Thank you for your support and understanding in this matter.

Please see Middle School After School Clubs Timetable below:

Christmas Jumper Day 2019

This Friday is Christmas Jumper Day! Please remind your child to wear their full uniform with their Christmas Jumper over the top! Donations of £1 will be collected on the day for the Save the Children Charity. 

Coaching Group - Secret Santa

The Student Voice Representatives are organising Secret Santas for each coaching group. On Friday 20th December (the last day of term), all coaching groups will participate in their own gift exchanges. The limit for each gift is £3. Coaching groups will decide if they will have a 'lucky dip' or presents or if they will choose names and buy a gift specifically for a random person in their group. Please remind your child to bring their gift to school by Friday 20th to participate!

- Student Voice Representatives

Election Buzz

This week the Year 7s had a special assembly with Mr Hyman about the upcoming General Election. All of the staff were very impressed with how knowledge a lot of the students were about the different parties and their representatives. 

Festival of Light - Behind the Scenes

Thank you to everyone who came along to the first two in the epic Festival of Light Concert series! The Reception - Year 2 and Year 3 - Year 5 events happened this Thursday. There was a buzz around school all week in the build up, with rehearsals going on throughout the week. Here is Year 5 having a final check in with Mr Bush before their performance, and Ms Hansen doing some behind-the-scenes 1:1 practice with Mr Hyman, right before the staff choir took the stage! 

We're very excited for the next two concerts coming up: Years 6 - 8 on Thursday 12th and Year 9 - 12 on Thursday 17th December. We look forward to seeing everyone there!

Y8 Drama Performances Evening

On Tuesday 17th December, the Year 8 Project Groups will be performing their play 'The Journey' focused on the issues of immigration and refugees. The group have been working on the show over the term with Mr Thompson and Mr Brokenbrow, including all the multimedia aspects. The posters below were designed by Yahya. 

As well as this, Ms Hansen's project group will be performing 'East End Tales' which they have been learning over the term. Please come along to support the groups! Well look forward to seeing you there. 

Just One Tree - Non-Uniform Day

On Friday 20th December, students are invited to wear non-uniform for the day to help raise money for the Just One Tree organisation. For each £1 donation, a tree will be planted, helping to combat Climate Change and make the world better for all of us! Click the image below to learn more about the charity and its mission. We've only got one planet - we'd better take care of it!

Kooth Free Online Counselling

A reminder that Kooth Online Counselling is available and promoted at School 21 to all of our young people. It is a portal through which free, anonymous counselling is offered by trained professionals. Click here to visit the website to learn more about and to access this offer. 

Year 6 Girls Footballers dominate!

Last week a number of the Year 6 girls went to play in a inter-school football tournament. They played brilliantly and won the match - even though they were competing against Year 7 teams! They are through to the final, which they will be playing this week on December 11th. Good luck, everyone! We are so proud of the team and also want to say a big thank you to Mr Rahman for organising the event. 

Green Star Blitz and more Red Star Winners!

Congratulations to this weeks' additions to the Green Star winners list: 

Year 5: Abdullah, Keon, Xavier and Thierry
Year 6: Ava-Grace, Lia, Musa, Raisa, Sunnier and Tamiyah
Year 7: Adil, Elly, Gracie, Iliana, Joel N, Julia and Isaiah
Year 8: Akarni, Asif, Efosa, Kwabene, Marcia and Mellina

Congratulations to Ryan V, Arjun, Daisy, Nabeeha, Kevin, Lili'Mai and Povilas who have all reached their Red Star milestone this week!

Student Safety Workshop

Thank you to all the parents who came along to the Student Safety Workshop recently.  You can access the slides which were shared in the session by clicking here. The Safe Haven Logo (above) is especially important to share with your child. This sticker is displayed in shop windows to show that the shop is a safe place for young people to go if they are feeling worried or unsafe. There are 24 shops in Westfield Stratford City that are displaying these. 

Your feedback was very helpful - the issue of the time between dismissal and early evening (3:15pm - 6:00pm) was raised by a number of parents as an issue of particular concern. Currently, we contact and work with families individually if we have a specific concern about their child, however parents need to make arrangements to ensure their child is travelling home or being collected safely. We do look forward to working with parents to develop initiatives that could support our students at this time. 

Regularly communicating and checking in with your child about their social media / internet use greatly supports the school in keeping students safe online. We deal with a very high number of issues which happen outside of school, but then are brought into school and impact learning negatively. We greatly appreciate your support in this matter. 

Millionaire Readers

Congratulations to Aaishah in Year 7 and Nebil in Year 8 for becoming the newest Millionaire Readers this week.

Also to Rafee in Year 8 and Akshaya in Year 6 for hitting the 2 million word milestone! 

If you are unsure of how to access this, please speak to your coach / class teacher or see Ms Druce! 

Reading regularly makes a huge impact on your child's success in their education. Encouraging 20 minutes a night of reading gives a massive advantage to a child and exposes them to a staggering 1.8 million words per year! Get reading everyone! 

Dear Parents/Carers,

 Thank you to those who have registered with the Easy Fundraising platform, the donations have already started to come in!

 For those who haven’t, this platform allows us to turn everyday online shopping into donations for the school which can then be spent on equipment and facilities. If you haven’t registered yet and are happy to help (at no cost to you!), we ask that you do two things:

 1. Sign up to Easy Fundraising and register School 21 as your cause of choice here: https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/invite/GO6EW2/. (We get a £5 donation for every person that signs up via that link!).

2. Install the donation reminder on your computer: https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/donation-reminder/. This is a totally unobtrusive button that sits on your internet bar, and pops up with a subtle reminder every time you shop with a retailer that donates to us.

 Finally, please share with any family and friends.

 All at School 21

Flu Vaccine Information

The flu vaccine will be happening at School on Tuesday 17th December in the afternoon for students in Reception to Year 6. 

Thank you for your cooperation.

First Aid 

First Aid Notice

If you son/daughter needs to take medication at school it has to be brought to school by an adult and a form needs to be signed.  Please do not send medication in with your son/daughter as this is going against our school policy and the medication may not be administered.  Your help and cooperation is greatly appreciated.

Sun Newspaper

The Sun newspaper is offering primary schools the chance to claim a set of free Collins Big Cat books worth over £600 (106 books). 

To claim this offer, we need to collect 3,500 tokens printed in The Sun and The Sun on Sunday from Saturday, November 23rd - Saturday, January 18th 2020. 

Please help us claim this fantastic offer by collecting the tokens and placing them in a designated box at the front office.

School Lunches

A reminder that Year 5 and 6 students continue to receive free school lunches as part of the Mayor of Newham's initiative, however, when students start Year 7 they must pay for their school lunches through your Parent Pay account. A letter was sent again last week regarding this, including how to sign up through the Newham website if you feel you are eligible for Free School Meals. 

The letter is available again by clicking here. 

All families can sign up for Free School Meals (if eligible) at any time; it is advisable that current Year 6 parents look into doing so this year to avoid delays when their child starts Year 7. 

If your account runs out of funds, students are to visit Ms Nandra in E1 at lunch time - she will support students to get their lunch that day, and will contact parents to remind them to top up the account. Please note, we are unable to keep providing lunch for your child if the balance is still negative. 

If you have any questions or require any support to sign up for Free School Meals, please contact Ms Nandra through the front reception or via email at rnandra@school21.org.uk. 

Update your Child's Walking Home Alone Permission

All Year 5 and 6 students whose parents give permission for them to travel home alone must complete the online permission form sent home earlier this week. The link for doing so is available again here. 

Please note that students will not be permitted to walk home unless this permission has been received. If you have any problems completing the form, please contact the front reception for support. Please also remember that if someone who is not the regular adult collects your child, they must give the password for collection. Thank you for your support in this matter. 

Middle School Homework

This year all of our 12 coaching groups / classrooms have their own Google Classroom set up. All home learning tasks will be set through these online portals. Parents are warmly invited to sign up as guardians on these classrooms; this will give you the opportunity to see all the tasks set for your child so you can keep up to date and support them at home. If you would like to be added to your child's classroom, please follow this link to add your details. 

Recognition Board

Due to a technical issue last week, some days were squashed into the same word cloud! It was a positive week with just under 700 students names making it onto the board. Keep demonstrating our values of Humanity, Excellence, Community, Responsibility and Openness! 

Please note the Lunch Menu has changed

The Lunch Menu for This Week is Week 1!