Spring term 2010

10 March 2010

Our annual Funky Fashion parade on Friday morning was the culmination of our Book Week activities and it was a very successful event with some wonderful costumes and extremely creative designs. There was some very loose interpretation of the criteria set as the likes of Lady Gaga and Amy Winehouse, who stole the show, demonstrated! The Michael Rosen video link was also extremely popular with the children. It was a great example of how modern technology can help someone as popular and well-known as Michael Rosen reach a much wider audience and the technology did not let us down! Congratulations to Mrs Stewart, our IT guru!

I hope that those of you, who have attended our earlier Parents’ evenings have found them useful and informative. Once again, feedback on any of the current issues is welcomed and I look forward to meeting with many of you on Wednesday, which is the last of our evenings for this term.

Our class concerts take place this week and I do hope that many of you will be able to attend. All children, however musical they might be, just love to have the opportunity to perform in front of an audience so the more the merrier! Another upcoming event, which may be of interest is the P5 and P6 swimming gala, which takes place next Wednesday morning, 17th March at 10 am.

3 March 2010

One of the undoubted highlights of the week for us was the fact that our Chamber Choir under the excellent tutelage of Mrs Russell emerged as winners of the Edinburgh Schools’ Choir Competition. I was very sorry not to have been present at the competition but by all accounts, they were a credit to both themselves and the school, not only by the way they sang but by the manner in which they behaved. In tune with the recent winter Olympics and the Vancouver 2010 motto, they were indeed glowing with pride. As a result of their success, they have been invited to take part in the Highlights concert on March 6th in the Queen’s Hall. Performers who have particularly impressed the adjudicators are selected to take part and we are very honoured to be invited. The first half is a lovely mix of recitation and poetry, solo singing, and instrumental playing. The second half is the concerto competition when 4 young people play their solo instruments with an orchestra.

This week is Book Week and we hope that all the children will take the opportunity of refocusing their attention on books and the great pleasure to be derived from books. On Thursday, Primary 3 – 6 children will be enjoying, through a video link, a presentation by Michael Rosen, past Children’s Laureate. He will be reading extracts from his very popular books and poems and inviting questions from his audience of many school children across the country. Friday morning once again sees our annual Funky Fashion parade, where staff and pupils alike get to dress up as their favourite character.

I look forward to seeing many of you at the upcoming Parents’ evenings, which take place this Tuesday 2nd March and Thursday, 4th March and the following Wednesday, 10th March.

24 February 20010

I hope that you all managed to enjoy a relaxing mid-term break. I know that many of you, like me, were benefitting from the optimum conditions on the Scottish mountains. I hope wherever you were, you had an enjoyable time.

Last Thursday, we all enjoyed a very entertaining Junior School concert, where many budding young musicians were demonstrating their many talents. Many thanks to both the performers and their teachers, notably Mrs Russell, Mrs Penman, Mrs Scott and Mrs Ferguson from the Junior School side and to Dr Coad and Mr Tully.

Last week also saw ‘the opening’ of our own Forest School for our youngest pupils in the grounds of the Junior School, thanks to the supreme efforts of a Junior School parent, Mrs Clare Nugent. We are also greatly indebted to the Parents’ Association, who helped with financial support in order that we could clear a suitable site. For those of you, who may be unfamiliar with Forest Schools, these were developed in the UK after a visit by a team of early years staff from Bridgwater College to Denmark in the mid-1990’s. Forest School compliments the Curriculum for Excellence by offering hands-on play and learning in an outdoors, natural context. At this stage, The Edinburgh Academy sees its Forest School project as a core experience for all children ahead of their transition to primary education.

10 February 2010

I do hope all of those, who rely on the diary for key dates have taken note of the fact that the Junior Concert, which involves some of our Junior School pupils, has been postponed until Thursday 18th February. This will take place in the Main Hall at Henderson Row and commence at 7pm. The reason of course for the postponement is for the very important rugby fixture, which takes place on Thursday evening at Murrayfield. Many of the Junior School staff, parents and children wish to support our rugby team in their endeavours to lift the Scottish Schools trophy on Thursday. Best of luck from all the Junior School!

As half-term approaches, may I take this opportunity to wish you a very relaxing weekend with friends and family.

03 February 2010

It has been a week of relative calm with the annual assessment programme being the main focus last week. However, there is plenty on the horizon to look forward to, not least the Primary 1 Highland Games! One event, which I would like to draw your attention to is the annual Junior School Parents’ Seminar, which is being held on Tuesday, 23rd February at 7pm. There will be 3 parts to the programme, comprising Managing Pupils’ behaviour positively, our Reporting Programme and finally Mathletics, where you will have the opportunity to put your mathematical skills to the test with our new online programme! We do hope that there will be a good attendance at this event as I believe that real success with any of these programmes depends on good understanding and partnership between parent, pupil and school. We hope the evening will be both informative and fun!

Spring term 2010

27 January 2010

Thank you to all those of you, who supported our Scots Language and Culture Competition, which took place last Friday. I hope those of you, who attended, enjoyed the event and like me, were quite astounded by the standard of singing and recitation achieved by children as young as 5 years old! Congratulations to all the participants, with a special mention to Angus Reynolds, who surely must have his name up in lights one day and to Dundas, who were the overall winners of the Division trophy.

The Primary 6s held their very own Burns Supper on Thursday evening and once again, all participants who took either a speaking or musical part surpassed themselves. Alfie Tomasson, who did the Toast to the Lassies, will surely have a place at a future Senior School Burns Supper and will be one for Mrs Stark to look out for in the future!

This week is a somewhat calmer week with all pupils involved in the annual assessment programme.

20 January 2010

The season of Burns is upon us and here in the Junior School we are immersing ourselves in Scots culture and verse over the next week or two. On Friday we will be holding our second ever Scots Language and Culture competition, where many will be competing for the much coveted trophy. I am looking forward to it immensely, although being on the judging panel, is one of the hardest jobs I have to do over the course of the session. The standard looks to be as high as ever and in advance, I congratulate all our competitors, who are working so hard at learning their lines, practising their songs and fine tuning their accents!

On Thursday of this week, the Primary 6s have organised their own Burns supper, the responsibility being theirs down to the last detail. This is the first time the Primary 6s have held such an event so many of the staff, who have accepted the invitation to attend are looking forward to being the recipients for a change! I am sure it will be a great success and will become a standing item on the Primary 6 calendar.

13 January 2010

Happy New Year to you all – I do hope it was a good one. It was certainly a snowy one and in my neck of the woods, 120 centimetres of snow fell over the Christmas period, creating a veritable winter wonderland! However, I wonder if any felt like me come the 4th January, and despite the pleasures of having all the family home for the Christmas period, it was in fact quite nice to get back to the routine, at least out of the kitchen sink for a little while! This sentiment ( not in relation to domestic chores, I suspect) seemed to be echoed by all the boys and girls last week as they seemed pleased to be back once more and enjoyed seeing their friends and playing in the snow, to say nothing of getting down to work!

There are lots of dates for your diary coming up and I must apologise for the administrative error, which resulted in several key Junior School dates not being included in this year’s term diary. I hope you have all now received the communication from Mr Dean, which outlines any important dates, which are missing. I look forward to another action-packed term.