Head’s blog
I hope you enjoy reading my final letter of the term to parents. It really sums up the lovely atmosphere around the school and the incredible learning and hard work that has taken place over the course of this term.
Despite the shorter week we have certainly crammed a lot into the last few days, with Christmas activities galore! Our Christmas lunch was delicious and very festive. Thank you to Maggie and her fantastic team for putting on a great feast, and indeed for making all our meals each and every day. It was a perfect opportunity to give her a huge round of applause to show our gratitude.
The Christmas parties were a great success as ever, with super outfits, party games and treats. We were fortunate to have a very special visitor at Grimsdell who called in on each of the parties – Santa Claus! Santa was a very good sport and he enjoyed meeting the children and bossing Mr Dobson around to check on his reindeer. The children shrieked with joy when they saw him!
Our final assembly was also a bit of a Christmas cracker, with our final time to shine awards of the term, a celebration of birthdays and the announcement of the winning house for the term! The children waited in anticipation as Mr Dobson announced the results. Willow had 967 points, Oak had 997 points meaning Beech were the winners this term with 1005 points – a difference of just 8 points! The Beech house captains, Anelo and Lucia claimed the house cup proudly and Mrs Dean (Head of Beech House) did little to contain her joy! Congratulations to Beech house – we hope you enjoyed your extra playtime. We also congratulated the other two houses for gaining so many smileys over the term and explained that sometimes in life we win and are ahead – and sometimes we are not, but there will always be a next time. I was very impressed with the maturity of the children in absorbing this message.
The excitement and effort to gain smileys as really enabled us to scatter the Grimsdell Way even more effectively around our school. We look forward to announcing next term’s house event in January.
Our assembly concluded with a wonderful rendition of ‘Merry Christmas Everyone’ with all the staff and children standing and dancing together. It was a really special moment.
By now you should all have received your child’s learning journals to peruse over the holidays. We hope you enjoy them and feel proud of the learning process and outcomes that the children have experienced and achieved this term. Please remember to bring them back in January. I am sure there will be much excitement as the new theme reveals itself.
The Present Room event was a great success and I loved seeing the children think carefully about what to choose for their loved one. I am so grateful to the GPA for organising this. It is lovely to have traditional events but also to have fresh and new ideas and experiences. The GPA and I would also like to thank all the Grimsdell parents for their incredible support this year.
Finally I would like to thank the staff for their tremendous efforts with the children and the curriculum this term. They have worked long hours and devoted much of their spare time to ensuring that each and every day offers golden learning opportunities for the children. We all appreciate the many gifts you have generously given this Christmas and are hugely grateful but actually it is really the lovely messages in your cards that mean the most.
Thank you for all your support and have a wonderful festive break with your families and friends.
See you in 2018 and Merry Christmas everyone!
Best wishes, Kate Simon
