Dear Parents / Carers

Welcome to the first newsletter of the academic year and welcome back Woodside families. Much like I mentioned in my letter last week, I want to say thank you to the community for welcoming me to Woodside Primary School. Personally, I have spent this past week walking around school, chatting to children and staff, as well as speaking to parents before and after school.

September is such an exciting time for us in schools and this first full week back has been an absolute joy. The children are settling back into their routines in their new classrooms and learning is already well underway. 

We will be making our curriculum newsletters online and we will communicate when these are live. We are also looking forward to having all families come in for our 'Meet the Teacher' sessions which are taking place from Monday. More information is shared below. We will be relaunching the school Twitter feed (or ‘X’ as it is now known); for new parents, you may follow us by searching for @PrimaryWoodside.

We are really excited for a successful year ahead in 2022-23 and look forward to sharing our school priorities with you. As a leader at the school, we welcome community feedback and conversations so please do speak to us and we cannot wait to engage with you further over the year.

Iman Atwal

Headteacher

We expect pupils to maintain a high standard of attendance here at Woodside. We want all our pupils to be able to achieve their very best and in order to do this, they need to be in school as much as possible so they don't miss out on any learning. Everyday is a new learning opportunity!

Woodside Surplus Food Store

Our Surplus Food Store is back!! 

We are pleased to continue working in conjunction with The Felix Project, a London charity which rescues surplus food from supermarkets and delivers to organisations to redistribute within their community. Help us in the fight against food waste and visit Woodside Surplus Food Store .   

Our Surplus Food Store is available in our Community room;

Every Wednesday and Thursday  between 8.45am – 9.15am and 3pm - 3.20pm

Polite reminder - We are operating a ‘pay-as-you-feel’ model whereby you pay what you can afford for the food and the money will go towards buying produce that we wouldn’t usually receive through the project such as pasta and other non-perishable goods. Please bring your own bags and if you are able to donate any spare bags, they would be gratefully received. 

We know how hard  things are for many families right now - if you are finding things particularly difficult financially, please come and see me. Also look out for communication through Arbor and future Newsletters for links to other organisations that may be able to offer further support.

Mrs Georgiades

Free School Meals for All!!

In response to the ‘Cost of Living Crisis’, the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan has provided funding for all Primary school children in state-funded schools to receive free school meals for this academic year. This means that all children from Reception to Year 6 will be able to have a school dinner absolutely free. 

This funding does not automatically entitle you to Free School Meal vouchers in the school holidays. Your child may also be entitled to free school meal vouchers during the school holidays if you are in receipt of any of the following qualifying benefits:

• Income Support

• income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance

• income-related Employment and Support Allowance

• support under Part VI of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999

• the guaranteed element of Pension Credit

• Child Tax Credit (provided you’re not also entitled to Working Tax Credit and have an annual gross income of no more than £16,190)

• Working Tax Credit run-on - paid for 4 weeks after you stop qualifying for Working Tax Credit

• Universal Credit - if you apply on or after 1 April 2018 your household income must be less than £7,400 a year (after tax and not including any benefits you get)

To check whether your child is entitled to Free School Meal vouchers during the school holidays, please see Mrs Hewitt in the school office – you will need to give her your full name, date of birth and National Insurance number in order for her to check your eligibility.

Please note that this year, we are asking children to change in school. They should bring in their PE bags and keep them in school for the term and take them home at the end of the term. Thank you for supporting us with this.

All children need elastic fronted plimsolls for indoor/outdoor PE which are best kept in a drawstring bag on their cloak peg. Children will need black/blue shorts and a white T-shirt in their PE bag to wear for PE lessons. 

Nursery

The Nursery team would like to welcome back our old and new families. This week we welcomed Nursery returnees. We have also been welcoming new families who have joined us to be part of Woodside. Nursery children have been catching up with their friends and others looking for their friends who have gone to Reception. They have been exploring and showing their grown-ups their favourite areas in the Nursery both indoors and outdoors. At the end of the settling time the children did not want to go home! Looking forward to an exciting journey where children will be talking more about themselves through our core text ‘Happy to be me.’ It has also been good to see that our returnees have not forgotten our expectations for when we are on the carpet or when we they hear the tambourine and what the sound means. 

Reception

We were very excited to welcome our new children to their Reception classes and they have settled in very well. Children have been making new friends and discovering all the wonderful learning available to them in the indoor and outdoor area.

In Literacy: We have enjoyed listening to, retelling and acting out ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’.

Home Learning: Enjoy sharing a familiar story with your child. Can your child remember and tell you that story and the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears?

Phonics: At Woodside we follow the Little Wandle scheme of phonics and reading. 

This week, we have been learning the graphemes (letter name) and phonemes (letter sound); s a t p. 

Home Learning: Find things that start with the grapheme and phoneme (sound); s a t p. 

In Maths: We have enjoyed singing number songs and talking about basic counting skills, or example, we count every object once and the last number is the total.

Home Learning: Count objects around the home. How many beds are there? How many bowls are there? How many shoes are there? 

Reminder: Please label your child’s clothes, lunch bags and water bottles. It helps them and us!

We look forward to seeing you all next week.

The Reception Team

Ms Hunte, Ms King, Ms Brown, Mrs Katsaounis, Mrs Patel, Ms Georgiades and Ms Lee.

Year 1

Year 1 have started a new core text ‘My Shadow is Pink’ and children were sharing about their interests and likes. In English, we have been recording our sentences about things we like and enjoy doing. In Maths, we have been learning the place value of numbers up to 10, counting numbers out from a larger group, sorting and representing objects. 

Year 4

We are glad to say our Year 4s have settled in beautifully in their various classes and are enjoying their learning. Our core text for this term is, 'The Girl Who Stole an Elephant'. The book explores themes of morality, friendship, teamwork and loyalty. During our English lesson, the children used role play to explore if Chaya (the main character) was right to steal the Queen’s jewels to help her friend who was badly injured and desperately needed money to pay for his hospital bills. It was interesting to hear the different views of the children:

“It is bad to steal because when you are caught you might go to prison and the goods stolen will be taken from you too.”

“It is only good to steal if you are going to use the money to help people in need.”

What do you think? Is there ever a good reason to steal?

Meet the Teacher parents’ sessions

Please remember to come and meet your child’s teacher next week. 

For most classes in years 1-6 this takes place on Monday at 3.30pm, with the same session repeated at 3.45pm.

Beech class (year 1)  - session will take place on Tuesday at 3.30pm

Fir class (year 2) - session will be held later this term.

Please make sure you know which class your child is in so that you join the correct class to find out about your child’s learning this year.

We look forward to seeing you.

Nasal Flu Vaccination Programme

Today your child should have brought home a letter about the NHS annual flu vaccination programme for this winter.

The Immunisation Team’s visit will take place on 11th October.

Flu can be an unpleasant illness and sometimes causes serious complications. This annual vaccination programme is a quick and simple spray up the nose. It is in place to help protect your child against the flu. It also helps protect more vulnerable members of our community by reducing the spread of flu.

The letter was accompanied by a consent form. You should return the form to school as soon as possible whether or not you give your consent to the vaccine.

Please read the letter carefully for more information, or contact the office if you did not receive the letter and form.

You can now find any letters sent home by email on our school website.

Recent letters:

• First Week Back

• PE Letter

• Meet the Teacher

• Good Attendance

Follow this link for more information: https://www.woodside.croydon.sch.uk/page/?title=Letters+Home&pid=23 

Collaboration matters   Excellence in everything   Community first   Equity for everyone   Continuous growth