You will have received an email this week with details about changes to the law regarding fixed penalty notices for unauthorised absence.  Please take the time to read these documents. You can read them here:  

It has come to our attention that some children in Year 6 are involved in WhatsApp group chats and that some children have been using inappropriate vocabulary and inappropriate images have been shared. We have also been made aware that people have been added to these groups that do not attend Almond Hill and therefore could be to be strangers to other children within said group. Individual families have been contacted where necessary but we don't always know exactly who are in the groups.  As always, I would urge parents to monitor what their child is doing on their phone and restrict their access to WhatsApp group chats.

I hope families are looking forward to the Year 6 graduations next week! As a reminder, the dates for each class are as follows:  

Where possible, please arrange for younger siblings to be collected on the day of the graduation as space in the hall will be limited and it is nice for children in Year 6 to have this time to celebrate. Where this is absolutely impossible, please inform the class teacher of the younger sibling that they will need to be taken to the hall at the end of the school day. The Year 6 teachers have been busy putting together a wonderful event for you all and we hope to see as many of you there as possible. 

Please don’t worry about what the children wear for the event. Children may wear an outfit of their choice be that formal attire or something more laid back and as always, we do not expect you to buy anything specifically for the afternoon. Children will need to wear uniform to school and they will change into their chosen outfit for the afternoon. 

We will be taking collections for Bags 2 School on Monday 15th July (only). If you have anything you would like to bring in, please leave in the quadrant on the morning of 15th July. 

For information on what can be collected, please follow the link below: https://bag2school.com/what-we-collect  

Our next SEND/Pastoral coffee morning will take place from 8.30am until 9.15am on Tuesday 16th July.  This is a great opportunity to chat with Mrs Birchall, our SENCo and Mrs Burgess, our Pastoral Lead.

We hope to see many of you there!

Please be reminded children should not be bringing toys in from home – including trading cards. We really appreciate parental support in this decision. If children repeatedly bring unnecessary items into school, we may leave them in the office for parents to collect. 

We have heard of 2 incidents this week where a child has come off their bike either on their way to or when leaving school. We think it is fantastic that children are biking to school. It is great exercise and better for the environment than driving but would urge parents to ensure children are wearing helmets when riding.  

Please note, our school kitchen does not offer halal meat. There is always a vegetarian, meat, jacket potato and cold lunch option available.  

Each day, a member of our senior leadership team are on gate duty to welcome families into school. We thought it would be useful to share which member of staff is on duty on which days. Feel free to say hello! 
Monday - Mrs Birchall (SENCo) 
Tuesday -Mrs Fordham (Headteacher) 
Wednesday - Mrs Burgess (Pastoral Lead)  
Thursday - Mrs Cawthorn (School Business Manager) 
Friday -Mrs Fordham (Headteacher) 

Mrs Barker, our Pastoral Teaching Assistant sometimes covers these days when needed.

Social Media Usage: 

All year groups mentioned connecting with others on WhatsApp (13+), TikTok (13+), SnapChat (13+), and some even on Instagram (13+) and Discord (13+). What is concerning is that many Yr5-6 pupils said they have public accounts. This presents obvious risk, as it opens them up to anyone making a direct connection. I urge you to have open discussions with your children about using social media and emphasize the importance of maintaining private social media accounts. This approach is not only safer but also contributes to a more positive online experience. What was also a little worrying, is that some children were not actually sure if their accounts are public or private.  

Online Gaming: 

In terms of gaming, games like GTA (18+) and Call of Duty (18+), along with the usual suspects, such as Roblox, Minecraft, and Fortnite were mentioned. Worryingly, most gamers (across all year groups) admitted to regularly playing and chatting with people they don’t know. It's highly advisable for parents to fully understand the risks of online grooming and engage in age-appropriate conversations with their children about it. 

Warning Signs (Online Grooming): 

We discussed 4 crucial warning signs that children should be aware of to reduce the risk of online grooming. 

Someone showing an interest: Sharing personal information online (everything from names and addresses, to hobbies and interests) with others could lead them into further conversation and make it easier for online predators to find out more about them. 

Decline gifts: Children should not accept gifts, as adults looking to exploit them might offer in-game currency or online gifts as a way to gain trust. 

Reject private connections: Children should avoid connecting privately with unknown individuals. Adults sometimes try to move public conversations to private platforms like WhatsApp or Snapchat. 

Never meet up: Meeting in person with online friends is obviously highly risky. 

Action Steps for Parents: 

I urge all parents to take the time to fully understand what their children are doing online and the functions available on the apps and games they use: 

• Can they chat with others? 

• Can they connect with people they don't know? 

• What kind of content can they be exposed to? 

• What are the age ratings of the games and apps they use? 

• What settings are available to limit risk and encourage a more positive environment? 

Action Steps for Parents and Children Together: 

• Sit down with your children and explore privacy settings in the games and apps your children have access to.

• Ask children to show you how they BLOCK & REPORT people in the games they play (lots of children can say you should, but not all know how to).

• If they use social media, check if their accounts are private or public.

Knowledge is the key to fostering meaningful conversations and sharing ideas on how to ensure online safety at home. If we all (school / parents / carers) work together, we can create a safer online environment for our children.  

Unbelievably, we have a little over 3 weeks left of this academic year! I know it can get quite busy and there are lots of things to keep on top of so I wanted to add a little reminder of the key dates for the next few weeks: 

Monday 1st July – some children from Year 6 will be visiting the library during the school day – parents will have been informed today if their child is taking part in this visit.  

Tuesday 2nd July – Some children in Year 4 along with the Sports Captains will be taking part in Path2Paris at Barnwell. Parents have been contacted if their child is taking part.  

Tuesday 2nd July - Year 6 Rounders event (by invitation)

Wednesday 3rd July – Year 4 trip to Shuttleworth. More details towards the end of this newsletter.  

Wednesday 3rd July – Year 3 Rounders at Marriotts School – by invitation.

Wednesday 3rd July – Uniform sale after school – if the weather allows, this will take place in the quadrant.  

Wednesday 3rd July – Year 5 Grafham information meeting hosted by Miss Simmons in the hall at 6.00pm. Children are welcome to attend. Please enter site via the drop-off zone. 

Friday 5th July – Upper school singing assembly – please check your payment history on Gateway to check if you booked a space for this.  

Friday 5th July - Year 3/4 Tennis event in St Albans (by invitation)

Tuesday 9th July – Rocksteady concert in the hall from 10.00am. Please check your emails from Rocksteady.

Tuesday 9th July  - Parents will be informed of their child's class teacher for next year.

Thursday 11th July – Hertfordshire’s Transition Day. We will welcome our new Year 3 children for the day, children will spend the day with their new teacher in their new classes and Year 6 children will attend their new secondary school. A big day for everyone. 

W/C 15th July – Reports will be sent home electronically.

Graduation week – Tickets have been sent home with children. We can’t wait to welcome families to this wonderful event. Please note, you have been given 3 tickets for guests (this does not include your child). We are unable to offer more tickets due to space limitations in the hall. 
Monday 15th July – 6S 
Tuesday 16th July – 6B 
Wednesday 17th July – 6C 

Wednesday 17th July – Book sale  

Friday 19th July – Year 6 trip to Fairlands TBC 

Monday 22nd July – Last day of term  
Please note, as always, there will be a cold option only for lunch on this day.  We understand that Letchmore do not finish until Tuesday 23rd July. Where we can, Letchmore and Almond Hill have the same term dates and INSET days but we are separate schools with different commitments so sometimes, differences can’t be avoided. However, I do not want to put unnecessary pressure on families with children in both schools so we will finish early as planned on Monday (12.30pm) but for those parents who really need it, school will remain open until 3.15pm. Children will be invited to watch a film in the hall and will be supervised by support staff. This will be the last day of junior school for Year 6 and their early finish is a rite of passage that we do not want to take away.  

Thank you to those parents who attended the sessions. We hope you found them useful. Parents who did come to both sessions were lovely and engaging which is really appreciated. If you are interested in viewing the slides from the presentation, these can be found below.  

We understand there may have been some parents who could not join the online meeting and we can only apologise for this. If you have any questions regarding therapeutic thinking, please contact Mrs Burgess.

Parents may remember the wonderful ‘Parenting in the Digital World’ workshop we offered in February. The feedback from the parents who were able to attend was overwhelmingly positive. I too found the session invaluable which is why I am really pleased to tell you that Richard will be visiting our school on Wednesday 19th June to work with the children. He will be delivering 2 sessions (one for the lower school and one for the upper school) on this day.  

https://thestaysafeinitiative.org.uk/our-work/online-safety/  

Parent view from our parent forum meetings suggest that Year 5 parents would like more information about Grafham before starting Year 6. With this in mind, Miss Simmons will be holding a Grafham information meeting for Year 5 parents on Wednesday 3rd July at 6pm. Here you will have the opportunity to find out more about the trip and ask any questions you may have. Year 5 children are welcome to attend with parents/carers. 

To gather an idea on numbers and if you haven't already, please let us know if you will be coming by submitting the form below: 

Some parents in Year 6 will have had children who have already come up through the school and moved onto secondary school but for others, this may be your first child who has reached Year 6 at Almond Hill.  We believe it is important to recognise the hard work, achievements and memories that are made in the time children are here which is why we hold ‘graduations’ for all children in Year 6. It is a wonderful opportunity to really celebrate with families and would love for as many parents to attend as possible. Due to space limitations in the hall, we can allow up to 3 guests per child.  

The graduation will run from 2pm-4pm on the day so where possible, please arrange alternative collection for younger siblings. We like to keep as much of the event a surprise where we can but can assure you, you won’t want to miss it!  

Children will be given 3 tickets to bring home today – please give these to your child’s guests to bring with them. We know that families will want to come but I must stress that we will be up to our maximum capacity for fire regulations so will not be able to allow additional people to attend.  

Monday 15th July - 6S  
Tuesday 16th July – 6B  
Wednesday 17th July - 6C   

I would like to thank the parents who attended the parents' forum hosted by Miss Simmons this week. This is a really good opportunity to discuss issues that matter to you and has resulted in some really good partnership work resulting in changes to the newsletter, increased accessibility to Bikeability and the return to World Book Day dressing up to name but a few!  Children thrive best when school and home work together.

As a direct result of feedback from our parent forum meeting, we are holding a meeting for Year 5 parents to share information about Grafham (you will find more information on this further down).

We hosted a SEND/Pastoral afternoon tea earlier in the term but unlike previous events, the turnout was extremely low. Again, this is the chance for parents to come and talk about all things SEND and pastoral and the team are there to talk to. We had planned another coffee morning after drop off after half term but would like to know from parents if these chances to meet with the team are useful and wanted to ask what the barriers are to attending. Please comment below to let us know if you would like to discuss SEND and pastoral and what the barriers are to coming to the planned events. If we know what they are, we can try and work around them. The form will close on Thursday 6th June.

I would also like to thank our parent volunteers that are regularly coming in now. It is great to see this slowly increase again after Covid and we are really pleased to have the help! If you have a few hours that you think you could offer to come and help in school, we would be most grateful. Please let us know via the admin email address - admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk

I am sure children have been telling you all about the wonderful new books that have landed in our class libraries over the last couple of weeks. Our Year 6 HTAs have been working very hard getting these labelled and distributed. We still have some books left to arrive which will be delivered after half term. This week in assembly, children were presented with their certificates of participation and our winners were announced…

Lower School Winner – Idris in Year 3

Upper School Winner –Ahyan in Year 5

Both winners selected a book of their choice as a prize. Happy reading!

Unfortunately, we had lots of no shows this week at our upper school singing assembly – more than half of parents who had booked did not attend. This is a real shame and disappointing for the parents who wanted to come but were unable to due to lack of spaces. The office team have received lots of emails and queries about the sing-a-longs and I would like to remind parents that this has been advertised and spoken about on the newsletter weekly since 19^th April. We have also had lots of last minute emails to change/swap/cancel/check bookings. Some of which are not sent until the morning of the assembly. As I am sure you can appreciate, in the morning, the office team are busy ensuring all children have arrived and checking on dinners and may miss last minute emails. Please check your payment history on School Gateway to check if you have a space booked. If you do and you can no longer come, please let us know. If you do not have a space booked but would like to come, you may come along on the morning of the assembly and we will of course let you in if there are ‘no shows’ (we really don’t want any empty seats!) but we cannot guarantee this will be the case.

A parent has mentioned that it is often difficult to safely manoeuvre around the Year 3 classrooms during drop off and collection due to parents congregating on the steps. Please can I ask parents to not wait on the steps for children and keep this clear for families coming in/leaving site.

On Wednesday 5^th June, our photographers will be in school taking class photos. Please send children into school in full uniform (including red school jumper) in the morning. If children are due to have PE, they will need to bring their PE kit to change into for their lesson.

We are looking forward to welcoming parents to our sports days after half term. This year’s sports days will take place in the morning from 9.00am-11.00am.  Parents should make their way to the school field after drop off.

School will be selling light refreshments and baseball caps so please bring cash with you. There will also be the opportunity to purchase pre-loved books and school uniform. These will be available at the end of sports day too so please take the time to look around and grab a bargain!

Mrs Burgess, our Pastoral Lead, will be running workshops for parents on Therapeutic Thinking. This is an opportunity for parents to gain an insight into the school's behaviour management approach and how we consider what a child's behaviour might be trying to tell us.  She will be hosting 2 sessions. The first will take place in the hall at 2.00pm and will last approximately 1 hour. The second will take place online (via Microsoft Teams) at 6.00pm. We hope to see as many parents there as possible.

Join the meeting now

Meeting ID: 329 620 471 472

Passcode: BSwoGb

Parents may remember the wonderful ‘Parenting in the Digital World’ workshop we offered in February. The feedback from the parents who were able to attend was overwhelmingly positive. I too found the session invaluable which is why I am really pleased to tell you that Richard will be visiting our school on Wednesday 19th June to work with the children. He will be delivering 2 sessions (one for the lower school and one for the upper school) on this day. If you would like more information on the Stay Safe Initiative and what they do, please visit their website below:

https://thestaysafeinitiative.org.uk/our-work/online-safety/

Parent view from our parent forum meetings suggest that Year 5 parents would like more information about Grafham before starting Year 6. With this in mind, Miss Simmons will be holding a Grafham information meeting for Year 5 parents on Wednesday 3^rd July at 6pm. Here you will have the opportunity to find out more about the trip and ask any questions you may have. Year 5 children are welcome to attend with parents/carers.

To gather an idea on numbers, please let us know if you will be coming by submitting the form below:

The year 6 team are busy organising the graduation events for July. Tickets will be given to children after half term. Please remember, we can only allow 3 guests per child. This brings us to our limit in the hall for fire safety.

A reminder of the dates:

Monday 15th July - 6S  
Tuesday 16th July – 6B  
Wednesday 17th July - 6C

2.00-4.00pm in the school hall. 

The summer term finishes on Monday 22^nd July. Please note, as always, there will be a cold option only for lunch on this day.  We understand that Letchmore do not finish until Tuesday 23^rd July. Where we can, Letchmore and Almond Hill have the same term dates and INSET days but we are separate schools with different commitments so sometimes, differences can’t be avoided. However, I do not want to put unnecessary pressure on families with children in both schools so we will finish early as planned on Monday (12.30pm) but for those parents who really need it, school will remain open until 3.15pm. Children will be invited to watch a film in the hall and will be supervised by support staff. This will be the last day of junior school for Year 6 and their early finish is a rite of passage that we do not want to take away.

There are a handful of spaces left on the lower school sing along on Friday 14th June. All other dates are now fully booked. 

Lower School – Friday 17th May and 14th June 9.00-9.25am 
Upper School – Friday 24th May and 5th July 9.00-9.25am 

Year 6 Graduation Events 
Some parents in Year 6 will have had children who have already come up through the school and moved onto secondary school but for others, this may be your first child who has reached Year 6 at Almond Hill.  We believe it is important to recognise the hard work, achievements and memories that are made in the time children are here which is why we hold ‘graduations’ for all children in Year 6. It is a wonderful opportunity to really celebrate with families and would love for as many parents to attend as possible. Due to space limitations in the hall, we can allow up to 3 guests per child. The graduation will run from 2pm-4pm on the day so where possible, please arrange alternative collection for younger siblings. We like to keep as much of the event a surprise where we can but can assure you, you won’t want to miss it! Nearer to the time, children will be given 3 tickets to bring home to give to their guests. These will need to be brought with you on the day of your child’s graduation. We know that families will want to attend but I must stress that we will be up to our maximum capacity for fire regulations so will not be able to allow additional people to attend.  

Monday 15th July - 6S  
Tuesday 16th July – 6B  
Wednesday 17th July - 6C

I am pleased to tell parents that we will be offering another opportunity for parents to find out about their children’s experiences at school. Mrs. Cleaves our music co-ordinator has kindly offered to ‘throw open the doors’ for our weekly singing assemblies. Parents are invited straight after drop off on selected Friday mornings to spend around 30 minutes listening (and participating if they wish!) to our music assembly.  There will be 30 places each week. Places can be booked on School Gateway on a first come first served basis and once full, it will automatically close. The booking opened Monday 22^nd April and unless full, will close the day before each event.     

Lower School – Friday 17^th May and 14^th June 9.00-9.25am
Upper School – Friday 24^th May and 5^th July 9.00-9.25am

The term dates for 2024/25 are now on our website (including INSET days). Please follow the link to view.

https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/page/?title=Term+Dates&pid=24

INSET/Occasional days for 2024/25: 

Monday 2^nd September 
Friday 20^th December
Monday 6^th January 
Friday 20^th June
Monday 23^rd June (Occasional Day)
Wednesday 23^rd July 

Thank you for bearing with us whilst we dealt with the issue with clubs over the weekend. As you know, Arbor is a new system and we are learning to get to grips with all the things it can do but unfortunately, when learning, this doesn't always go to plan.  We open events on a weekend to make it easier and fairer for parents to book but our office staff do not work at weekends so if there is a problem, we will need your patience in getting it fixed for you.

We will be welcoming some Pirates into school on Wednesday 8^th May for our inspiring writing day. We would like to invite Year 3 children to join them in dressing like a pirate! We welcome all forms of pirate dress but ask that no weapons (swords, cutlasses etc.) are brought into school and that outfits are still suitable for break/lunch time. We are looking forward to an exciting day with our new pirate friends! 

This is not compulsory and if children would prefer not to dress up, they should come to school in their uniform as normal.

Miss Baxter will be leaving Almond Hill next Friday to start a new adventure in Early Years. I am sure parents will join me in wishing Miss Baxter all the very best in her new job. 

Year 4, 5 and 6 will be teaching RHE in the summer term. It is part of our policy to offer parents the opportunity to ask questions and view the resources that will be used in lessons, the vast majority of which is statutory. These meetings will be held online via Teams and links for these are below. 

Due to some clashing dates that have been brought to our attention for events outside of school that we cannot influence, we will need to change the proposed dates for sports days - we will still be holding the lower school sports day in the morning of Thursday 6th June but the Upper school  will now be on Friday 7th June. Sorry for any inconvenience. We appreciate for parents with children in upper and lower school, this may present a challenge but unfortunately, we are struggling to fit in all of the planned events whilst also avoiding events in feeder schools and sporting fixtures/educational events externally planned.  

Recently, cases of head lice have been identified in the school. Whilst lice are nothing more than a nuisance, it is important that children are checked regularly so that any head lice can be dealt with quickly.

How to get rid of head lice

Treat head lice as soon as you spot them. You can treat head lice without seeing a GP.

You should check everyone in the house and start treating anyone who has head lice on the same day.

There's no need to keep your child off school if they have head lice.

Please follow the link for tips and advice. 

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/head-lice-and-nits/

We have lots of sporting events coming up and as part of our commitment to increasing our offer for children, we hope to be able to offer these opportunities on a regular basis. We know that the location of some events can prove tricky for parents with dropping off and collecting from the venue. If you are not able to commit to this, please can we ask that you decline the consent on Arbor (ideally with a note to explain why) so we can offer the place to another child. We are having to cancel events due to lack of numbers which could be rectified if consent was completed more promptly. There may also be occasions where we are able to offer lifts to those who are unable to get there (this is dependent on a few things, including the member of staff having the appropriate insurance) so it is always worth telling us.  

The school government were treated to a visit from a representative of Letchworth Garden House Hospice on Tuesday afternoon in recognition of their great work raising money for both this charity and Cancer Research with the bake sales last half term which was so well supported by our school community. Each member received a certificate to acknowledge their contribution and all were excited to see a huge cheque in person. Actually, only Mrs Fordham was excited about this - one of the children commented they had never seen a cheque in person, never mind a huge one - sign of the times and Mrs Fordham's age perhaps! 

We have lots of wonderful staff here that are always keen to volunteer their time to run after school clubs for our children. We offer these clubs free of charge as we never want cost to be a barrier for accessing extra-curricular activities. However, parents will understand that staff have huge amounts of other commitments at the end of the school day so we can’t always offer as many as we would like. To increase our offer, we have begun introducing external clubs which are paid for by parents. We currently host a dance club on a Wednesday afternoon and will be introducing a Performing Arts club on a Friday and a football club on a Monday and Tuesday. We agreed for these clubs to use our space with the proviso that there were some (limited) funded spaces available for our children. If you feel that cost is a barrier for your child accessing these clubs, please email admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk FAO Mrs Fordham. All emails will be treated confidentially and I really want to build up a list of children who can benefit from these extra opportunities who might not otherwise be able to. Please do get in touch.  

We were pleasantly surprised to see so many people interested in the cycling proficiency this year so much so we had to book an additional slot. Last year, we struggled to fill a slot of 16 spaces! We know, despite adding the additional spaces, there are still people who missed out and we have been in contact with the company to see if we can increase this further. Watch this space...

In future, we will endeavour to give advanced notice of booking systems opening to allow parents to plan for this.  If possible, we will also offer some spaces to the current Year 5s next year should there be space available.  

Children are invited to dress up for World Book Day on Thursday 7th March.  Please note this is not a non-school uniform/pyjama day. If they wish to dress up, children should dress us as their favourite book character. Parents in the parents' forum had communicated they would really like to do this which is why I have reintroduced it this year but I don't want to detract from the purpose of the day, which is to celebrate books and reading, so any special activities will be linked to that. Children will be given the opportunity to 'parade' their character in class and explain who they are and which book they come from. However, those children who don't want to dress up will not be expected to. I anticipate a greater take up in the younger classes and would prefer parents didn't have to go to any extra expense - although I fully appreciate when my children were in primary school, my sewing and creative skills weren't up to it so a quick trip to a supermarket made my life easier! If your child usually has PE on Thursdays and they are dressing up, please send them in with their usual PE kit so they can change for their lesson (3C, 4H, 4L, 5P and 6B). 

We will also be doing a ‘sponsored read’ from Friday 8th March – Friday 15th March to raise money for books for our class libraries. Children were told about this in assembly on Wednesday and will have been given a sponsorship form and a reading log to bring home. For more information, please see the email that was sent to families on Wednesday. 

Some selected children from Year 6 will be invited to go to Letchmore to read with younger children. This is as a reward/positive consequence for their contribution to the school, e.g. Reading Mentors and Headteacher Assistants. The children will be told in person by Mrs Fordham.  

To recognise British Science Week, we will be inviting parents into school on Thursday 14th March to take part in some exciting science activities. Following feedback from parents, this will take place in the morning. Parents will be asked to join us at drop off and the activities will be completed by 10.15am. I hope with some advance notice many of you will be able to come along.  There will be refreshments in the hall from 8.45am. This can be accessed from the quadrant. Guides from Year 6 will ensure parents can visit all/any classrooms. Gates will be locked at 9.00am but parents can sign in and enter via the office after 9.00am. The ‘event’ will run from 9.15-10.15am.

In April, we will begin using a local provider to supply our uniform. We will continue to use our current provider ‘My Clothing’ for a short period of time whilst we transition over but wanted to give parents the heads up in case they wanted to wait before purchasing new items. Please don’t worry, the uniform is staying the same and there is no need to change the uniform you already have.  We will send you further information when items are ready to be purchased. 

We are planning Parents’ Evenings for the Spring Term on Thursday 21st and Tuesday 26th March. We would like 4O parents to have the opportunity to meet both Mrs Barham and Mrs Geer together and so their meetings will be on Thursday 7th and Thursday 21st March.   

We will be again using a hybrid system for these appointments, whereby it is parental choice whether the appointment is face to face or online.  However, following feedback from both parents and teachers, all online appointments will take place in a ‘block’ at the start of one evening and a ‘block’ at the end of the other.  We have also increased the number of in-person appointments available to parents as this was the overwhelming feedback last term.  Appointment lengths are ten minutes and teachers will need to keep to strict timings. 

The booking system will close at 1.00pm on Wednesday 13th March.  Should you wish to make any changes after this date, please contact the school office. 

The system we use for booking these meetings is the same as we use for clubs.  Please visit https://almondhill.parentseveningsystem.co.uk to book your appointment. A short guide on how to add appointments is available on the school website. Please log in with the following information: your child’s first name, surname and date of birth. 

Given how the time spent with the class teacher at parents’ evening is finite, we thought it would be beneficial for families to receive their PTI forms before parents’ evening to allow you to digest the information and plan for any questions you may have. Parents of children in 4O will receive their forms on Monday as their parents' evenings start next week. For all other classes, the forms will come home on Monday 18th March. These will come home with your children in an envelope. 

As we are all acutely aware, parking around the school site at drop off and pick up is a significant problem. We are in conversation with a local councillor to try and come up with some strategies to help improve this but this will be an ongoing project. When the school was built, there were far fewer houses and less cars on the road than there are now and the infrastructure was not built for the increased congestion. We have had a look at our demographic and thought it would interest you to see how far and wide our families come, many of whom will need to drive to school not only for the distance but to enable them to go off to work from drop off. However, there are also many families who live in the local vicinity who could absolutely benefit from walking, scooting or riding to school. We will keep you updated on any progress we make.

As mentioned in a previous newsletter, we have been working on a project that will see the very popular jungle gym almost double in size. This project has been kindly funded by Friends of Almond Hill and has started this week. Whilst work is taking place, the existing jungle gym will be 'out of bounds'. Please help us to keep children safe by not allowing younger siblings near the work site during drop off and pick up.

We received a report from a parent regarding some dangerous driving in our school drop off zone which could have very easily led to an incident involving more than one child. This facility is there to make it easier to drop off and collect children from school but it is imperative it is used safely. We understand everyone has busy lives but absolutely nothing is more important that the safety of a child. Please take care and consideration when leaving the spaces, especially when reversing and ensure you have looked for any children who may be nearby.

Please see the below letter regarding an externally run dance club being held at Almond Hill. There are 25 spaces available. When this was last opened for booking, spaces went very quickly so please book on fast to avoid disappointment.  The club takes places on a Wednesday in the hall from 3.15pm with prompt collection from the hall doors in the quadrant at 4.15pm. Following feedback from parents, there will be the opportunity for a one-week free trial before committing. Please follow the link in the letter for information and cost details. Please make sure your child has no other commitments on a Wednesday before signing up (such as tutoring).

Dear Parents/Guardian,

I, Christina Marks will be offering the students of Almond Hill School Street dance classes every Wednesday after school.

Learn the latest dance moves to popular music, these lessons teach a mixture of styles and steps.

Classes are taught by our team of passionate CMSOPA teachers who all have showbiz CVs and enhanced DBS.

Class times will run from 3:15-4:15
To register and book please follow the link below.
https://christina-marks-sopa.classforkids.io
Any queries please do not hesitate to ask.
The ethos which lies at the heart of the school is to dream, aspire, achieve and excel.

Yours Sincerely,
Christina Marks.
Email- Christinamarksschoolofperformingarts@hotmail.com
Tel- 0752585023

If you need to contact Premier Education, our wrap around care provider, you can do so by calling the following number: 07783 306 081. This phone will be answered during the hours of 7.30-8.45am and 2.30-6.00pm. Please note however that this number is for parents to pass messages to Premier such as change of collection details and cannot be used to make bookings.

Please support our uniform expectations by not allowing children to wear jewellery to school, particularly hooped earrings. Not only do these cause a safety risk, jewellery in general can cause arguments amongst the children. Children will be asked to remove jewellery if it comes into school and parents will be asked to collect from the office. Please also note we cannot take responsibility for items that have been lost or stolen.

As you will know, we updated our uniform expectations in September last year which included standardising our PE kit. Now that children wear their PE kit to school on the days they have PE, it is important they continue to look smart and ‘ready to learn’. This is expected at secondary school and getting children used to it now helps to set them up for this journey. PE kit should be plain, non-branded and should be black and red – no other colours. Please refer to our website for a reminder of our uniform expectations. https://www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/uniform

If you are having any issues regarding cost, please contact Mrs Burgess.

For sporting events, we have purchased a ‘squad kit’ for children to wear whilst representing our school. We will ask that if borrowed, the kit is washed and returned to school ASAP to be used for the next event. This will be used for the first time today at a football event at Giles. Look out for a photo on our newsletter next week!

Thank you to the parents who attended the SATs meeting on Monday. For anyone who couldn’t make it, the slides are available to view on our website. The link below will take you to our SATs resources page where you will also find past test papers. www.almondhill.herts.sch.uk/sats

As I am sure parents will have noticed, we have been working hard to offer lots of opportunities for children to take part in different events and activities. We ‘subscribe’ to Stevenage Sporting Futures who organise a variety of sporting events throughout the year. As well as this, there are adhoc events in maths, writing, visits to our feeder schools, netball/football matches and plenty more. With lots of children here, it is important we are organised when planning these events to ensure risk assessments are completed in plenty of time and everything is in place for the event to be safe and successful. We know parents are very busy and sometimes emails are missed but going forward, we will be adding a date and time to our deadlines for consents etc. If these deadlines are not met, we will offer the space to someone else. Often the sporting events have a minimum numbers requirement and if we do not have enough people, then the whole team will miss out. There are other events that we have paid for and would lose money if the space is not taken. We will endeavour to ensure our deadlines are as reasonable as possible to help parents with this although please bear with us as sometimes information from external providers is not given to us as promptly as we would like.

We have set ourselves a target this year to ensure every child is involved in an additional extracurricular sporting activity or event and are tracking this carefully to ensure all children have access to these opportunities.

I would encourage all parents who have not already done so to log in to Arbor as this will be a key method of communication for consents etc going forward.

Firstly, I would like to thank the parent who alerted me that we did not come back to the reports survey after this was completed by many parents in the summer. I can only apologise for this oversight and assure parents the feedback has been read and will be used to adapt/improve what we provide in the summer term.

I am going to take the time to address some of the points here. It was lovely to see so many responses with the vast majority being positive.

Parents told us they were happy with the length and amount of information received and particularly liked the child’s feedback section. The reports were described as ‘in depth, easy to read, and not generic’. One particular comment really stood out ‘I am always impressed with how much thought and work goes into this report, it’s a challenge to do that for each kid’. We are really grateful for such positive feedback.

As we would expect when asking for feedback, there are some areas that parents felt could be improved and some of which requires a more personal, 1-1 response and where this is possible (i.e. a name has been provided as the feedback is anonymous), I will be in touch if I have not already to discuss the reports with you

Some parents requested more information per subject regarding areas of concern and/or praise and some asked for more detailed information, particularly if their child is not at age related. Another request was for school reports to be received more regularly.  The general comments section is used to provide further information on what a child has done well or where a child needs to develop.  School reports take a huge amount of time to draft, read and rewrite and providing additional reports is not feasible. The school holds two parent and teacher meetings a year as well as the school report, but as always, parents are very welcome to meet with their child’s class teacher to discuss any areas of concern/interest. Please use the year group emails to let teachers know if you would like to speak to them about anything,

Whilst some parents said the reports felt personal, there were some who felt they were quite generic. The reports are written using a formula to ensure all parents receive the same areas of information. However, I read every school report and can assure parents they are personalised to your child.

Finally, I would like to say thank you to so many of you for responding to the survey about reports. In the past years, I have only received two or three responses and had considered not adding it to last year. I am so glad I did as I genuinely appreciate and consider all comments.

99% of current children will own a smartphone before they reach 18 📱👶. With phones and other devices offering an increasing number of ways to pass the time, it can prove difficult for young people to set them aside. As a gateway to messaging services, games, television, music and more, digital devices can become borderline indispensable items in a young person's life. 

Studies have shown, however, that managing a child’s screen time can have positive impacts on their cognitive development. The guide below provides you with some simple but effective tips to help you bring your family’s screen time down to a healthier level, while suggesting alternative activities that are far less reliant on technology.

Managing Screen Time Guide

We have not yet planned INSET dates for the next academic year but we have had some parent queries regarding the start of term in September 2024 so we have liaised with Letchmore and agreed we will have an INSET day on Monday 2^nd September and term will start on Tuesday 3^rd.  I hope that helps parents to plan their summer holidays.

Beyond the national curriculum, what do you think are the key experiences to gain at Almond Hill?

I am very grateful that parents were able to go into such detail in response to this question. There was so much positive feedback that we have collated some of the words used to provide a snapshot of the responses. It’s particularly fantastic to see words like gratitude and empathy being used after having a focus on these values.

On the other hand, some parents said they didn’t feel there was much to offer aside from the usual curriculum. Last year, I understand that some trips were cancelled and although this was beyond our control, I know this was disappointing for those affected. This year, all year groups have at least one trip planned (some have already happened) including the Year 5 trip to the Space Centre, free cinema trips for all year groups, the Year 4 Faith Tour, Zoology trips, trips to the museum, our annual residential trip for Year 6 to Grafham Water as well as lots of other in school events like our recent Feeling Good Week. We are always conscious when arranging trips as we know there is a cost involved for parents but do feel it is important for children to have opportunities to go on school trips. We have also increased our offer of school clubs by investing in clubs run by Premier Education. We also have a well established school choir for children in the upper school and our ECO committee and Journalist club, as well as teacher led after school clubs which are free of charge.

As a school with high expectations for behaviour and learning where hard work is greatly valued, we believe taking advantage of occasional opportunities like trips to the cinema where there is no cost involved and that complement the curriculum are a good idea. We are also aware that for some children, trips to the cinema happen very rarely or not at all. However, given that we are always interested to know what you think, the best way to gather your feedback is to ask. Your feedback will help us to plan future events.

Every year, children at Almond Hill vote for their Prime Minister and government. Children in Year 6 are invited to form ‘parties’ and canvas children for their votes. Each party has to come up with a school, local, national and international pledge that they promise to fulfil throughout the year. All children had to the chance to vote for this year’s school government. The votes have been checked and verified and I am pleased to tell you that the winners were the Mini Meerkats! Well done to Willow, Abbie, Harmony, Bonnie, Alexia and Roman.

Please be reminded the School Nursing Team will be in school on Tuesday 28^th November to give flu immunisations to those children with consent.

We are really looking forward to seeing parents and carers at our coffee morning on 30th November where Mrs Burgess and Mrs Birchall will be there to offer support and advice to parents about all things SEND and/or pastoral. I am also incredibly pleased to tell you one of our parents has offered to join us for the session. This particular parent has extensive personal experience about what it is like to have a child with SEND and pastoral needs. She is happy to offer support to parents who are in a similar situation to herself and her family having faced barriers throughout the primary school journey but with the help of school, has seen her child gain the necessary support to flourish in a secondary school provision. I am very grateful she is giving her time to offer families and carers a parent's view and I am sure there are many parents who could benefit from hearing about her experience. Please do come along.

On Thursday 30^th November, we are inviting all parents from Year 4 and 5 to come in and join us for a DT afternoon as part of our Autumn term engagement events. Parents with children across both year groups are able to visit children in both classes and can move freely between the two. We will be trialling a QR signing in system to (hopefully) make it quicker for parents to sign in. Please bear with us. Children from Year 6 will be helping to support this event by showing you to your child’s class. The afternoon will start at 1.30pm (but please don’t worry if you can’t get to us until later, the doors will remain open) and will finish at 2.45pm to allow parents to collect siblings from Letchmore. You are very welcome to take children home at 2.45pm from any of the classes as you leave. Please go to the classroom door where your child will be signed out by the class teacher. If your child is in Year 6, please go to the front of Acorn House where a member of the Year 6 team will assist you. Only children that are being collected by their own parents/carers may be allowed to leave before 3.15pm.

The booking system for the musical closed today. We will now work out how many tickets we still have available and will be in touch with parents to let you know when the system will reopen to allow you to book any additional tickets. This will be on a first come first served basis. We will allow parents to book one additional ticket and will open the system in the evening to allow a fair chance for working parents too.

Please can I remind parents that the facility to ‘drop and go’ is for the mornings only. In the afternoons, there is an expectation that parents park, get out of the car and collect their children from their classrooms. This is to keep all children safe as having unattended children walking through the car park presents a significant health and safety risk. Parents should not walk through any of the vehicle gates. This models to children that this is safe behaviour when it isn't. There are pedestrian gates either side of the vehicle gates. Please see the illustration below for a reminder.

Do you feel that conflict is dealt with appropriately by the school?

We appreciate that this question is more emotive for some parents than for others and people’s experiences will vary but I am pleased that generally, most parents feel conflict is dealt with appropriately and the comments left, have been taken on board by the senior leadership team.  Some parents have commented that the consequences given are not tough enough whereas other parents feel that they are too harsh.  As a school, we are moving in a direction whereby teachers are being empowered to be ‘stricter’ and there is a focus on behaviour. Learning behaviours and expectation are explained to children as they join the school and are referred to during their journey.  We want our children to move on from primary school with the tools they need to be successful in the next phase of their education and into their adult life. We need parents on board to make this successful.  It is fantastic to see that parents like the restorative conversations and peer mediators. The restorative conversation process explores how an incident has made each child feel and the aim is to develop children's reflection, empathy and problem-solving skills. The aim of the peer mediation scheme is to increase the pupils’ understanding that disagreements are a natural but manageable part of life and that they can acquire a range of skills to enhance their ability to deal with emotions related to conflict. Where there are repeated and/or serious incidents teachers will contact parents and monitor for trends. We believe conflicts should be dealt with in social times not in learning time. Currently Year 5 are being introduced to peer mediation by Mrs Hewitt and Mrs Small and parents in this year group will hear more about this going forward.

In light of this analysis we can see that in person appointments remain the most popular option for parents when booking parents’ evening appointments but a significant number of parents value online so we will continue to offer both. However it was quite a juggling act for teachers to move between in person and online appointments so in the spring term, there will be a limited number of online appointments offered at the start of one PTI day and at the end of the other. If parents require an online appointment and they have all been allocated, we would ask you to contact the office directly who will sort this for you.

I hope children are looking forward to the trips to the cinema this month. As children will be arriving back to school when lunch has begun, the kitchen will be supplying a cold packed lunch option on these days (for the children going to the cinema, all other year groups will be offered the normal menu). Please see below for a reminder of the dates and films.

As a reminder, children will need to bring a water bottle, a snack, a coat and clothes/footwear appropriate for the weather and walk. They will not be required to bring anything else. Mobile phones are not permitted on school trips. These will be kept school as normal.

Please note, if your child has asthma or requires an inhaler for any reason, they must have this with them or they will not be able to go on the trip.

Each year, the SLT and Governors develop the School Improvement Plan, what would you hope to see on it?

Some parents told us they would like regular updates about the School Improvement Plan (SIP) and how this is implemented. I agree that this has not been very regular and will endevour to keep parents updated termly regarding the SIP and how this is moving forward. The summary for this year will be shared with parents soon. A small number of you also said you would like better communication between your child’s class teacher and home aside from the use of Seesaw. Parents are offered two PTIs per year and are given an end of year report. As well as this, parents are really welcome to utilise the year group email boxes to arrange adhoc meetings with the class teacher if needed in between. We aim to keep the channels of communication open and strive for engagement with families.

Some parents commented on our offering of after school clubs and have suggested a wider selection. We completely understand why parents would want this to happen but must stress that many of our clubs are run by staff who volunteer their time and skills to run these clubs. As a school, we have started funding clubs from Premier but as I am sure you will appreciate, we have budgets we must adhere to. Therefore, although we would love to offer even more clubs, we are limited by cost and time. We would welcome parent volunteers to run after school clubs so If there are any parents with specific skills who wish to offer their time to run a club, we would be delighted!

The portal has now been opened to all families across the year groups. I am really pleased that over 75% of parents have logged on at least once. If you are struggling with this, please pop into the office where the team will be happy to help you. When you first log on, you will need to use a web browser (i.e. Chrome/Edge) to set up your account – not through the app itself.

Question 2 on our survey related to our website. We asked if parents look at the website and what they would like to see added. I am pleased to see that the vast majority of parents answered yes, they do look at the website and there were some suggestions on areas that you would like us to improve which I will address here. Some parents suggested more photos of the staff would be useful. The website already has photos of all staff members but I appreciate this may not be found easily so photos of all members of Almond Hill staff are now on our staff page.

It was requested that up to date plans for each subject were available. Our long term and medium term plans are on the website and these are regularly reviewed. However, curriculum is ever changing as we seek to improve and adapt e.g. we have been reviewing the PSHE content to ensure we are meeting the needs of the pupils so sometimes, documents may be changed after publication. They can be found here: Year group pages

Some parents would like to see more photos of events. Each class now has an iPod which they use to upload photos to Seesaw. These are also taken with staff on events to take photos where consent allows. These are then added to our website here: Photo Gallery

There were some comments regarding our website calendar. Last week, we spoke about adding clubs to the calendar which has been done. Our admin team have made a start on ‘splitting’ the calendar. This has been done before and unfortunately wasn’t as effective as some would have hoped so please let us know on our next survey if this does not work. The categories have been split into school events, term dates, clubs, lower school and upper school so you can select which you would like to view. We would suggest always having ‘school events’ ticked as well as your child’s tier to avoid missing events.  Don’t forget, you can subscribe to our calendar to keep up to date with the events going on within the school. Follow the link below, select 'subscribe' and follow the instructions for your device. School Calendar

Don’t forget to book your appointment. The booking system will close at 9.00am on Friday 6th October.  Should you wish to make any changes after this date, please contact the school office.

The system we use for booking these meetings is the same as we recently used for clubs.  Please visit https://almondhill.parentseveningsystem.co.uk to book your appointment.  Please log in with the following information: your child’s first name, surname and date of birth.

All parents are welcome to attend the first forum of the year with our parent volunteers and Miss Simmons. This will take place in school on Monday 16^th October 5:30 - 6:30pm. Please email admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk (FAO Miss Simmons) if you would like to attend.

The students of Barclay Academy have invited students in Year 5 to a matinee performance of their production of Oliver Jr by Lionel Bart - a story based on the novel Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens. This takes place at the same time as swimming lessons so non-swimmers will be going. With members of staff attending swimming and escorting children to Barclay, we would really appreciate some support from parents. If you are free and able to attend the production at Barclay, please contact the year group email: year5@almondhill.herts.sch.uk The performance is on Tuesday 17th October 1.30pm - 2.45pm and parents would be walking to and from the production with us.

In the recent visit to our school, a traffic warden reported being verbally abused/threatened by an individual visiting our school. I was disappointed to hear about this incident and would like to remind parents that traffic wardens are just doing their job which ultimately mean safer roads for our children. We have received numerous complaints regarding dangerous parking/driving around our school site and their role is to help prevent accidents from happening – something we can all agree we want.

I recently wrote to parents about the importance of attendance and have also been speaking to the children about this. In order to keep this high profile and in discussion with the children, I have decided to provide some incentives. The class with the highest weekly attendance (which has always been celebrated on the newsletter) will also receive the attendance trophy and teddy (yet to be purchased!) and an extra fifteen minutes playtime on a Friday afternoon. The logic being that their attendance is so good they can 'afford' some extra minutes of playtime as they have been in school all week. I have explained to the children and please can parents be reassured that the attendance figures of children with significant medical reasons for not being in school, will not negatively affect the class total as this cannot be avoided and the figures can be adapted to remove this impact.

We know that there were some people who wanted to book onto a club this term who were unable to due to that club being full. We are going to keep a log of those people so we can offer clubs to children on a ‘waiting list’ basis or we could offer those children first refusal on clubs later in the year. The clubs that were full were; multi-sports (Year 3), stop-frame animation (Year 4) and football (Year 6). Please note, we cannot guarantee which clubs will be run each term but we hope by doing this, clubs can be allocated as fairly as possible. If would like to add your child to the waiting list, please complete the form below.

https://forms.office.com/e/GkWjseJcY1

Whilst on the topic of clubs, please can I remind parents that at Almond Hill, we do our upmost to ensure a fair allocation for all clubs and remove barriers such as cost by making clubs freely available to all. This is facilitated by the school funding Premier clubs and for staff kindly volunteering their time free of charge. Therefore, although we would love to offer even more clubs, we are limited by cost and time. Parents may know that last year, our highly successful football club (who won both the league and the cup) was run by parent volunteers. If there are any parents with specific skills who wish to offer their time to run a club, we would be delighted! Please email admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk FAO Mrs Fordham.

We are excited to tell you that we will be having a fundraising day on Monday 25^th September to raise money for a fantastic charity. As most of you will know, The Abilities in Me Foundation writes children’s stories based on real children with a range of conditions. Money raised goes into: creating more books to help raise awareness, supporting school SEND projects and running family support events which they are looking to expand across the UK. If you would like to find out more, please go to: www.theabiltiesinme.com. All teachers will read at least one book from the range to children during the day. For a suggested donation of 50p, children are invited to wear an item of brightly coloured clothing to school on Monday 25^th September. Parents of children in Years 4, 5 and 6 will remember that the author of this book series visited the school (free of charge) last year and donated her entire series to our school library. Children were truly inspired by her visit and her books so this is a lovely way to support the charity. Payments can be made on School Gateway.

The benefits of the strong partnership we hold with you cannot be underestimated and it is with this in mind that I would like to extend an invitation for parents to join an Almond Hill ‘Parent Forum’ which was set up by Miss Simmons last year. The aim of the group is to share and discuss important educational issues affecting the school and to get parents even more involved in decision making that directly affects your children.  It is an opportunity to provide feedback, discuss future initiatives and national news related to education.

Each and every one of you is an expert in what it is like to be a parent at our school and would be welcome.

Miss Simmons plans half termly meetings to discuss an agenda jointly formed between the school leadership team and parent volunteers. The most important thing is that parents get involved. We would love approximately three parents per year group and with so many new families joining, we wanted to remind you of this opportunity.

Please email admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk FAO Miss Simmons if you would like to get involved, or even just find out more. This is a really exciting opportunity to further develop the home school partnership.

We have had some reports of children with headlice. Please check your child’s hair and treat accordingly. Please see the website for advice on treatment: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/head-lice-and-nits/

Mrs. Small, our new assistant head is responsible for physical and mental wellbeing and as such, she will be introducing Friday achievement assemblies starting on Friday 15^th September. We will begin with celebrating the children who completed the summer reading challenge over the holidays. If your child took part, please email a photo of their certificate FAO Mrs Fordham (reading subject lead) or they can bring in their certificate. I know children are very keen to be awarded their 5 house points. On this note, we will be inviting children to bring any trophies, certificates, awards or photos from achievements outside of school to share with pupils in assembly (as well as being added to our website/newsletter).  In addition to this, we will be celebrating the musical talents of our children and inviting those who play instruments to play for their peers whilst they enter the hall for assembly. If your child would like to do this, tell them to speak to Mrs. Small.

Parents will receive a letter this week regarding attendance and I would urge you all to take the time to read the information. With the cost of living crisis and more pressure on families, we saw an increase in the number of holidays taken in term time last year. I would like to remind parents that I cannot authorise time off during term time unless for exceptional circumstances. I understand parents may feel that the time off will not affect their child significantly negatively however the overall education of the class is affected if the teacher has to repeatedly catch up those who have missed prior learning.

Please download the School Gateway app to receive messages and emails from school. You will need to give your email address and you will be given a PIN number to set up your account. The email address must be the same as the one held on our school records.

To order and pay for school dinners, you will need to use School Grid. http://app.schoolgrid.co.uk

Next week, we will be on week 2. 

Parents of children who have joined us this term will have access to the Arbor Parent Portal. Many of you have already logged in which is fantastic but if you haven’t and need help with this, please contact our office. For all other year groups, this will be rolled out in the coming months.

School policy allows for children in Years 5 and 6 to bring a mobile phone to school for safety reasons if they travel to and from school independently. Mobile phones must be switched off whilst on school premises and not be used during the school day. There is no need for parents to inform the class teacher/office if their child is walking home independently. I would ask that children do not however bring their phones on school trips or after school events.

Please can I remind parents, especially those in Year 5 and 6, not to arrive at school before 8.45am. I appreciate some children are keen to get to school but the school grounds are not supervised before this time and accidents can happen.

There will be times, as parents, where you need to contact the school and general enquiries can be made via the school office by phone or email. You can also use the year group email addresses to contact your child’s year group.

If you have any concerns regarding your child, please make an appointment after school to see the class teacher initially as in most cases they will have the most up to date information on your child. If at this point you still feel you would like to speak to someone at our school, please first contact Miss Simmons, our Deputy Head (admin@almondhill.herts.sch.uk) or if your child has special educational needs or disabilities, Mrs Birchall our SENCo (iep@almondhill.herts.sch.uk).  The Designated Teacher with overall responsibility for Child Protection is Mrs Fordham, with Mrs Birchall and Mrs Burgess as deputies. The deputies (especially Mrs Burgess) deal with day to day safeguarding issues but all cases are shared with the whole safeguarding team.

Mrs Fordham can be contacted using the admin email address and will respond accordingly. However, depending on the nature of your email, it may be passed on to a more appropriate member of staff for a response.  Mrs Fordham is often unavailable at short notice and an effective and more efficient response is often achieved by speaking to someone else on the team. That being said, Mrs Fordham will always make the time to speak to parents if all other avenues have been exhausted, the matter is extremely urgent or parents have a specific reason why they believe she is the only person who can deal with the matter.