PDO 

School  Newsletter

  16th March 2023

Dear Parents,

This week, the staff engaged with training consultants from Read Write Inc and learnt about the most up-to-date method of teaching reading using this scheme. The children have still been very busy as you can see below, even though they were only in school for 3 days this week.

There will be even more excitement next week as we have some more special visitors in school on Sunday!

Gentle reminder:  PDO SCHOOL WILL CLOSE AT 11:30 AM ON TUESDAY AND WEDNESDAY due to Parent Teacher Conferences.

Please take some time to view the Class Pages for more detailed information about your child's learning this week and any class notices here. 

Ramadan 

The holy month of Ramadan will likely begin on the evening of Wednesday 22nd March this year in Oman.

PDO School will continue to be culturally supportive and sensitive to those in our community who will be fasting during this time.

All elements of the school curriculum will continue during Ramadan. However, we will support those children who will be observing the fast. 


If your child will be fasting during Ramadan, please  complete the Google Form below by Sunday March 19th.


Before involving your children in the fast, please consider the demands of fasting upon them whilst they are at school and participating in activities. Should we have any concerns about your fasting child’s health and well-being during the school day, our school nurse will contact you. 

P.E. will continue as normal, but activities will be adjusted to meet the energy levels of fasting children. If you have any concerns or queries regarding curriculum arrangements, please contact us at notices@pdoschool.com

During Ramadan, we ask for everyone’s cooperation with regard to the conservative dress code whilst on school premises:

-  Ladies,  no gym wear and please ensure that your shoulders and knees are covered, your necklines are not too low and that clothing is loose fitting. 

-  Gentlemen, please wear full-length trousers. 


Thank you in advance to you all for your support and understanding.


Year 5 Trip to Snow Oman and Sleepover

Year 5 children went on a fantastic trip to Snow Oman this week. They enjoyed lots of fun activities such as ice skating, zorbing, sledging, construction and - for some daredevils - ziplining. Well done, once again, to all of the children for displaying fantastic behaviour and excellent manners, making all of us at PDO School proud!

On Wednesday night, the children also got to pitch up tents in the sports hall and enjoy a sleepover with their friends. They even got to have an early morning pool party!

Miss Joanna and Miss Munira

Early Years

FS1A/B

Children in FS1A/B have been participating in daily physical development activities in the Early Years Gym, where they have been learning to follow instructions, respond to 'stop' and 'go' and travel under, over and through soft play equipment.

Miss Dawn - Leader for Early Years 

FS1B

In FS1B, children have been continuing with their phonics journey. We now have one group taking part in the Letters and Sounds Phase 1 (distinguishing sounds) and another group beginning the Read Write Inc. Nursery programme where  they learn single letter sounds.                                                                        

FS2

Children in FS2 are continuing with the first stage of their transition to Year 1 programme.  All children in the year group meet in one classroom and join in with an English or Maths carpet time and then complete focused tasks in small groups.

Science

As a part of their unit on Properties and Changes of Materials, the year 5 children have been carrying out experiments to find out which factors affect the rate of dissolving the most. In separate experiments they tested change of water temperature, amount of stirring and quantity of solute - in this experiment they used salt as the solute.

Mr Joe - Leader for Science

Year 2 have been studying the Uses of Everyday Materials. The children used their knowledge of the properties of materials in a fun investigation. They had to use a variety of materials to design a safe landing zone for and egg! The aim was to make sure the egg landed softly and didn't bounce of the landing zone!

French 

Currently in French Year 1 and Year 2 are learning words for some body parts in order to be able to sing the song, Head, Shoulders Knees and Toes in French. Look out for videos on the class pages at the end of term!


Miss Becky - Leader for MFL

 Year 3 are using there knowledge of numbers  to 20 and the rainforest animals they have already learned to be able to  say and write how many animals there are using plurals. 


Years 4 to 6 are working towards being able to talk about their family members. So far they have learned to talk about their immediate family, saying how many siblings they have as well as reading about famous characters' siblings from books and films to help them form their own sentences in French.

Computing

This week 3M continued to develop their understanding of ordering objects/images in a branching database structure. They learnt how to use an online database tool to arrange objects into a branching database, and created their own questions with yes or no answers. The children showed that their branching database worked through testing. Please click here to have a go at making your own branching database. 

Miss Kirsty -  Leader for IT

Rock Bottom Performance at BSM

On Tuesday the Years 3, 4, 5 and 6 children travelled by bus to watch the BSM Primary School production, Rock Bottom. The children thoroughly enjoyed the experience of attending an inter-school event held at our neighbouring school. 

"The jokes were hilarious. What do you call cheese that's not yours?...Nacho Cheese." - Veda Y6N

"The actors were great. They remembered all of their lines without their scripts!" - Arnav Y6L

Out of School Achievements

 Last weekend, Rory (Y2T) and Sissi (Y5J) took part in a rugby tournament at The Sultan School. They played against teams from Oman, Abu Dhabi and Bahrain. This was their first competitive tournament and they did extremely well. Sissi's team came third in their age group and Rory's team won. 

Congratulations to Rory and Sissi!

Welcome to PDO School 

PDO School is very excited to welcome Miss Pamela as a new teacher. Miss Pamela has joined us from Bonny School in Nigeria and will teach initially in Early Years to cover Miss Wafa's class while Miss Wafa is away on maternity leave in May. She will join the Early Years Team from next week, in order to get to know the children in readiness for this new role.

On another note in Early Years, we are delighted to welcome Miss Madhu to our Early Years department.

 Miss Madhu is a highly experienced Learning Assistant who has worked with children from FS1A to Year 1 at PDO School for the last 10 years.  She will begin supporting in the Camel Class from Sunday 19th March.

Changes to the Enrichment Signup 

As you will be aware from previous school notices and newsletters, In Term 3, we are trialling a new sign up method for enrichment. Due to the increase in popularity, the old sign up system has ceased to become fair on parents, children or teachers running activities.

·         The first change is that on Sunday 19th March 2023, you will receive an electronic copy of the Term 3 Enrichment booklet.  Previously the booklet was sent out during the first week of the new term.  


•   Instead of the 5pm first come sign up method we have run in the past; parents will have a two day sign up period where they can talk to children and decide upon the activities best suited to their interests and requirements.


·         Using a link to an online form, children can select 3 options of interest from the list (Although only up to two activities will be offered). The link will be open Monday 20th and Tuesday 21st March 2023.


Please note there is a separate webpage selection for each child. When selections have been received from parents, we will endeavour to allocate places as follows:


·         If your child receives an invitation for two or more Advanced Skill Development Clubs, such as Selected Basketball, Swimming Club, Take Ten Keyboards and Cross Strings, you will not receive an invitation to join an Additional After School Club. Extra Support Clubs are not included in this criteria.


·         If your Y3-Y6 child receives one Advanced Skill Development Activity, you will receive an invitation for up to one Additional After School Club.


·         If your Y3 - Y6 child does not receive an invitation for an Advanced Skill Development Activity, you will receive up to two Additional After School Club invitations.


·         Y1 - Y2 students will be allocated one activity each.


·       We will email an overview of the clubs which your child/ren has been enrolled in by the first week of Term 3 (week beginning Sunday 16th April).


·       All After School Clubs will start after EID on Sunday 30th April, and run until the week ending Thursday 22 June 2023.


The results of the online form are still very difficult to predict so completing it early will give us time to readjust the staffing or timetable to better suit the children’s needs. This will hopefully be less stressful for parents and children than the current process.

If there are still insufficient spaces available for the number of children choosing an activity, those children who have missed out will be given priority at the next available opportunity.

Please note that ONLY AFTER SCHOOL COURSES detailed in this book are available via the online signing up system. For early morning and lunchtime activities, parents can email the school or children can speak directly to the teacher running the course.

If you have any further queries or questions, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Mr Gary - Leader of Enrichment gruston@pdoschool.com 

School Photographs

Our school photographer from Foto Magic, who is based in City Centre Qurum, was in school on Wednesday and Thursday this week taking class and individual photographs of all students outside in our gardens. Our Year 5 students, who were on a class trip and camp, will have their pictures taken early on Monday 27th March. Any other students who were absent for the photographs, can have individual photographs taken on Monday 27th March.

We expect that the photographs will be ready in the next few weeks. There will be a charge of apx 6 OMR for a set of a class and individual photograph. The class photos will be 8"x12" and the individual portrait will be 6"x8". There will also be 4 passport size portraits. There will be an additional charge for each sibling photograph, for parents who choose this option, which will be confirmed.

Miss Zoe 

notices@pdoschool.com

Leaving Oman 

We request that parents who have plans to move away from Oman, to please provide us with the details as soon as possible by emailing Ms Cheryl, cfox@pdoschool.com or Ms Kath, kmorgan@pdoschool.com .  This will allow us time to prepare the Transfer Certificate and other documents your child may require for their application to a new school, as well as to be able to give your child a traditional school farewell.  

Dates for your Diary



Parental Concerns:

 

At PDO School, we acknowledge that, from time to time, parents may wish to express concerns about specific aspects of their child’s education. We are always happy to investigate and respond to these concerns. Please note that, for the Class Teachers, it is important that even informal discussions take place outside their teaching time. 

What do I do if I have a concern?

Please make the Class Teacher your first point of contact if your concern is not successfully resolved, please contact the school via notices@pdoschool.com to make an appointment with the Headteacher, Cheryl Fox,  or the Deputy Headteacher, Ms. Kath Morgan.

Mr. Hamed, our School Manager, is also happy to listen to any parental concerns that have not been resolved successfully.

Wishing everyone a pleasant weekend

Cheryl Fox

         Headteacher                                                            Deputy Headteacher                                                         School Nurse


cfox@pdoschool.com       kmorgan@pdoschool.com                                   nurse@pdoschool.com