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10th December 2025
10th December 2025
Dear Parents
Dear Parents
Reporting time is here, whether via a Parent Teacher Consultation or a written report, and it's a wonderful time to celebrate your child's progress! As you look through their achievements, remember that school success is a team effort. Here is some advice to help you support your child's learning journey, now and in the future. As parents you want to know how you can help, hopefully you will find the advice below helpful.
Reading is the absolute cornerstone of all learning! Strong reading skills support the understanding of subjects across the board, from comprehension in English Language to interpreting text in History and following complex instructions in Science.
Read together, every day. Even a few minutes’ matter.
Explore different materials: Comics, non-fiction books on topics they study recipes, and newspapers.
Make it fun! Use funny voices, ask questions about the characters and let your child choose the books.
Building Resilience: The Key to Future and Learning Dispositions
While developing academically is important, your child will also need strong personal skills, or dispositions. One of the most important is resilience.
The Power of 'Yet' (Carol Dweck's Growth Mindset): This concept, helps children understand that intelligence isn't fixed. When your child struggles with a maths problem or a writing task, help them change their language from "I can't do this" to "I can't do this yet." This encourages a Growth Mindset, where they believe their abilities can be developed through dedication and effort.
Embrace the Struggle: You can build resilience by allowing them to face safe, challenging situations without immediately stepping in. Let them wrestle with a tricky puzzle, organise their own school bag for the next day, or figure out a minor disagreement with a friend. When they solve it themselves, their confidence and resilience soar! Don't always provide the answer; instead, ask, "What have you tried so far? What resources do you have?"
Skills for the Future: Beyond Maths and Literacy
The future job market demands more than just traditional academic skills. Alongside achieving competency in Literacy and Numeracy, we are also focusing on the essential skills employers highly value:
· Resilience
· Communication (expressing ideas clearly, both written and verbal)
· Collaboration (working well in a team, a key skill for all school projects)
By developing these at home and school, we are preparing them for success in the future and beyond.
Your Role: Support and Interest in Their Journey
More than anything, your child needs to know you care about their learning.
Show Interest: Ask specific questions about their learning, linking it to the curriculum. Rather than, "How was school?" consider, "Tell me about the Oman unit you learned about today," or "Show me the methods you used to solve that column subtraction."
Be the biggest supporter: Praise the effort they put in, not just the result. "I love how hard you kept trying on that reading comprehension!"
A Final Note on the Journey
Parenting is the hardest, most rewarding job there is. Remember to enjoy the journey. The years your child spends in primary school can feel long in the day-to-day, but they are incredibly short in the grand scheme of things. Celebrate the small victories, laugh at the funny moments, and cherish this time.
We are here to support you and your child as they progress through these important years of their education!
Tim Robinson
Tim Robinson
Headteacher
Headteacher
Our PLG Journey: Together as a Learning Community
Our PLG Journey: Together as a Learning Community
We are excited to continue sharing our Personal Goals Padlet platform in our weekly newsletter to celebrate achievements together as a wider community.
We kindly ask for your support in capturing moments when your child demonstrates any of the Personal Learning Goals - whether at home, in the park, during outdoor play or in daily routines. For example, if your child shows collaboration while playing outside, you may upload one photo and select the appropriate Personal Goal folder (e.g., “Collaboration”).
Families are welcome to share one photo per week if they wish, highlighting a Personal Goal your child has demonstrated.
Please click on the Padlet link below to share your child’s achievement with our community. This is a wonderful opportunity for children to celebrate their out-of-school achievements and for us to reinforce that their Personal Learning Goals are transferable skills beyond the classroom.
Thank you for supporting the celebration of children’s achievements.
The IC Team
Radisson Hormuz Grand Tree Lighting Ceremony
Radisson Hormuz Grand Tree Lighting Ceremony
The Christmas Choir enjoyed a fabulous evening at the Hormuz Grand Tree Lighting Ceremony on Monday 8th December. 45 children participated at the event which is possibly the largest number of children we have ever taken!
An enormous thankyou to all of the staff who have supported this event and to the parents who came to enjoy the evening.
Please click on the list below for Miss Jo's photos from the event, including the choir, family photos and the gingerbread house competition.
Mr Gary
PDO Club Christmas Choir Performance
PDO Club Christmas Choir Performance
To complete the Christmas singing events, the PDO Christmas Choir will be performing at PDO Club on Thursday 11th December. Can children arrive by 5pm please in their PDO School uniform and a red or green shirt.
Just a quick reminder to parents that parents are responsible for their children until we gather them together at the rear of the Boat Club at around 5.10pm. After the performance, children will return to the rear of the Boat Club where parents can collect them. For safety reasons, it is very important that children are signed in and out, both before and after the performance.
If you have any questions, please email on gruston@pdoschool.com
Thank you in advance for your cooperation.
Mr Gary
Our School Choir singing Winter songs!
Our School Choir singing Winter songs!
At 1:15pm on Tuesday 16th December our school choir will perform a medley of Winter songs for our children in the Learning Souq!
We invite parents of the children in the choir to attend. Please arrive by 1:10pm at the main reception. If other parents wished to join, you are also welcome to attend.
Year 2 and Year 3 Music Club
Year 2 and Year 3 Music Club
This term, children in the Years 2 and 3 have had the opportunity to experience a variety of ways of making music. These include African drums, ukuleles, keyboards, singing, tamboo bamboo, tuned percussion instruments, staff wars and GarageBand.
Well done to everyone for the excellent work that has been achieved this term.
Year 1 Music
Year 1 Music
In Year 1 Music, children have been learning about simple rhythm and playing to a beat. This has been done in a variety of ways and on numerous hand percussion instruments. At the end of the unit, children decided upon there own rhythms and performed them in time to an Omani march.
December Informal Concert
December Informal Concert
Well done to everyone who performed at the Informal Concert on Thursday 4th December. The concert was an opportunity for those involved in after school, lunch and break time extra curricular music clubs to perform to an audience. We heard Guitars, recorders, band, keyboards and African drumming groups. Every group performed wonderfully and thank you to all the adults and children who came along to listen.
Open the link below to watch some of the performances.
December Informal Concert video
Mr Gary
Early Years
Early Years
The children in Early Years have been enjoying developing their strength, flexibility, balance and coordination by playing outside and enjoying time with their friends.
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It has been wonderful to see the progression in these skills, especially among our youngest learners, many of whom have only been in school for a few weeks. They are growing in confidence each day and building meaningful friendships, all while exploring our wonderful outdoor areas and using their imagination as they play.
Milepost 1
Milepost 1
This week in Milepost 1 the children investigated animals in Oman during their weekly assembly.
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Ms Marya and the LSAs of MP1 led an exciting assembly for the Year 1 and 2 children! First she sorted the children into their house colours and gave each house an animal criteria. Yellow - land animals of Oman, Red - dangerous animals of Oman, Blue - marine life in Oman and Green - endangered animals in Oman. This supports the IPC learning journeys of Beautiful Oman: Marine Life in Year 2 and Land Animals in Year 1. The children demonstrated excellent collaborative skills as they researched their animals and everyone came together at the end to create an animals of Oman structure. They also found out lots of information about the animals of Oman and now know how to keep animals safe and which ones to avoid! Thank you Ms Marya and the MP1 LSAs for providing the children with an enjoyable learning experience.
Milepost 2
Milepost 2
Year 4 have been fully immersed in our IPC unit, Beautiful Oman: Food, exploring the rich flavours and traditions of Omani cuisine. We began our learning with a visit to the majlis, where the children enjoyed warm spiced milk served with dates, a welcoming Omani tradition that set the scene for our unit beautifully.
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The children took part in a sensory activity, exploring a range of traditional Omani spices. They smelled, observed, and discussed each one, building vocabulary and deepening their understanding of the ingredients often used in local dishes.
Another highlight was making Chips Oman sandwiches, which the children thoroughly enjoyed before writing clear and detailed instructions on how to make them. Next, the children will be creating their own innovated recipes by combining popular Omani snacks with foods and flavours from their own home countries and traditions. We’re excited to see the creative combinations they come up with!
Milepost 3
Milepost 3
This week, all of Milepost 3 took part in an exciting Times Table Rockstars Battle of the Bands competition, challenging students to showcase their rapid recall of multiplication facts across a thrilling 24-hour period. Every child showed impressive resilience, collaboration and determination as they worked to support their band. A huge congratulations to Class 5M, who emerged as the Battle of the Bands champions for Term 1!
RoboThink
RoboThink
The children have successfully completed a twelve-week RoboThink after-school programme, where they explored robotics, coding, and engineering through a series of exciting hands-on challenges. Over the weeks, they designed, built, and programmed their own moving robots, developing problem-solving skills, creativity, and teamwork as they experimented with new ideas. Their enthusiasm grew with each session, and they took great pride in seeing their creations come to life!
Congratulations to our Learners of the Week!
Congratulations to our Learners of the Week!
A huge congratulations to our newest Learners of the Week! This award recognises the incredible effort they put into their learning and the excellent ways they are putting their personal goals into practice. It's fantastic to see them growing and becoming such dedicated and confident learners.
Wishing you a pleasant weekend,
Wishing you a pleasant weekend,
The PDO School Team
The PDO School Team
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