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MOUNT PLEASANT PRESS
Visit us at www.mountpleasant.highland.sch.uk

16 MAY 2006

WELCOME BACK
Apologies for a belated welcome back. I hope you all had an enjoyable Easter Break. This is always a very busy term and already I feel as though it is running away with us!

CHICKEN POX
Just to make parents aware we have about half a dozen children off school with chickenpox.

EDINBURGH TRIP
We had a very enjoyable if tiring trip to Edinburgh with P7. On more than one occasion we received compliments for the children’s behaviour.

We hope to repeat the experience for next years P7 class and with this in mind there will be a meeting for all P6 parents on Wednesday, 24 May at 7.00 pm in the Parents’ Room. I hope all parents will be able to attend to allow us to make a decision about next year’s trip.

FOOTBALL/NETBALL DATES
26/05/06 Mount Pleasant V Miller Academy (at Mount Pleasant) afternoon
01/06/06 Round Robin against Castletown and Halkirk (at Halkirk) all day
13/06/06 Pennyland V Mount Pleasant (at Pennyland) afternoon
wk beg 19 June for East V West if we’re lucky.

For all of these matches parents/carers are most welcome to come along and support our teams.

OTHER DATES FOR TERM 4
Walk to School Week Monday, 22 May – Friday, 26 May
Sports Day Monday, 29 May (weather permitting)
Festival Week Monday, 5 June – Friday, 9 June
Parents’ Evenings Monday, 5 and Tuesday, 6 June
New Nursery intake meetings Wednesday, 7 June
P6/P2/P1 Trips Monday, 12 June
N3 Trip Tuesday, 20 June
N4 trip Wednesday, 21 June
Inter School Sports Wednesday, 21 June
P7 High School visit Thursday, 22 June
Teddy Bear’s Picnic Friday, 23 June
School Board Meeting Monday, 26 June
P5 Trip Tuesday, 27 June

HOLIDAY DATES ARE LISTED AT THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER
ALL DATES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE

THANK YOU TO VOLUNTEERS
I would like to thank all those who volunteered to help with the P6/7 football coaching for this term. Mr McEwan and Mr Gunn are now organising coaching sessions and these seem to be going well. The local Active Schools Co-ordinator will also be providing a few sessions this term for the P4/5 pupils interested in football.

Unfortunately I was unable to contact some of those who volunteered and in preparation for next session I would like to ask anyone still interested in coaching to contact the school office again. If you would be willing to volunteer to take any other after school club, please contact the school office.

SNAG – WELLIE BOOT APPEAL
Following our recent SNAG meeting, Mrs Cassidy has had the idea of planting fruit/veg with some of the children. We would like to fill wellie boots with compost and plant in them. If you have any old wellies ready to go out please donate them to the school. We will be collecting for the next few months to ensure we have enough for this activity.

MISSING JACKET
At our disco in Skinandis (the one for the younger children) a boys new jacket has gone missing. It is a NEXT denim jacket size about age 9/10 yrs. It has zips in the inside which would allow you to zip in a fleece liner. If anyone has taken it home by mistake could you please hand it in to the school office and I will ensure it gets passed back to its owner.

CYCLING TO SCHOOL
I have been approached by some parents regarding children, who have not yet participated in Cycling Proficiency training, cycling to school. I have agreed that children of any age may cycle to school provided they are supervised by a parent /carer. The main rules to observe are that cycle helmets must be worn; bikes should be dismounted at the Crossing Patrol area and walked to the cycle storage area and should not be approached by any pupils during the school day.

I am hopeful that P6 Cycling Proficiency training will take place this term.

WALK TO SCHOOL WEEK
Walk to School Week runs from Monday, 22 May – Friday, 26 May. During this week children will be issued with further information regarding this. If your child does not already walk to school please consider ways in which they might participate e.g. parking your car further away from the school and walking the remainder of the journey to school.

ENROLMENT
We have had very successful enrolments for next session with 26 children enrolling for P1, 26 for N4 and 18 for N3. This takes our school roll to 218 for the coming session.

NURSERY PLEA
Now that we have managed to establish an enclosed Nursery playground the Nursery staff would like to ensure it is adequately equipped. As you can imagine providing a variety of outdoor toys for our 3 and 4 year olds will be an expensive business. The PSA have agreed to contribute to these costs but we hoped that if anyone had any outdoor toys in good condition they would consider donating these to the school. Any items will be gratefully received.

UNIFORM
In response to a request from the Pupil Council I have acquired a sample of a hooded sweatshirt from our uniform suppliers. This has been shown to all pupils and the response in general has been very positive. The company have also sent a sample of a reversible rain jacket/fleece as they are no longer able to provide the rain jackets we have had up until now – although we have one or two still in stock. These new items are available to order now. They will be on display at the forthcoming parents’ evenings but if you would like to see them before then please pop in to the school office.

I have attached an order form to this newsletter to allow parents to place their uniform order ready for next session. All orders to be returned with payment by Friday, 16 June. This should ensure the order is with us by the end of term.

REPORT CARDS
Report cards will be issued on Wednesday, 17 May. The coloured response slips accompanying these should be returned whether you require an appointment with your child’s teacher or not as this provides confirmation to the school that you have received the report. Parents’ Evenings are set for Monday, 5 and Tuesday, 6 June.

SCHOLASTIC BOOKFAIR – 29/05/06 – 06/06/06
Please find attached a leaflet showing some of the books which will be available at our forthcoming book fair. Please note this is for information only and should not be used to order books. The book fair will run from 29 May (Sports Day) and will be available to parents on parents’ evenings. Parents are also welcome to come and view the books during the school day by arrangement. We have a separate order form for parents who may wish to order books for children as gifts, etc.

As usual all children will visit the fair during the school day. The children write down two or three titles which appeal to them and take their slip home to let parents see their choices. Parents can then delete/add any titles they wish. Once parents are happy with the order children should return their slips to the school office with payment. Orders usually take two to three weeks to arrive so we should have them by the end of term.

Parents should not feel obliged to buy books from the fair however, we have found the overall standard of the books and services provided by Scholastic to be excellent and the school receives 60% commission in book purchases. We will use this commission to supplement our library and project resources.

SPONSORED WALK
Miss Fraser is taking part in The Moonwalk Edinburgh (26.2 miles) on Saturday, 24 June. This is a sponsored walk which raised funds for breast cancer research and cancer care.

If you would like to support her in this event, please contact the school office.

SCHOOL BOARD
Despite recent additions to the School Board we still require another parent member. If you are interested or would like further information, please contact Hilary at the school office.

Copies of School Board minutes are available on the school website and also on the notice board outside the office. The next meeting will be held on Monday, 26 June at 7.00 pm.

PSA NEWS
The recent PSA disco in Skinandis raised £482 for the PSA fund. Many thanks to everyone who volunteered to help supervise on the night.

The next PSA meeting will be held on Wednesday, 31 May at 6.30 pm. Copies of PSA minutes are available on the school website and also on the notice board outside the school office.

COLLECTION ITEMS
With the Nestle tokens collected we have been able to ‘purchase’ two sets of non fiction project books. One set for the Victorians topic and one for the Farm topic. Thank you to everyone who helped with this collection. Please continue to collect any Nestle tokens you can as we have been informed they will be starting a new collection in the new school year.

We are also collecting Ariel ‘Tokens for Tennis’ if anyone has any of these.

Children should take all collection items to the school office or collection area first thing each morning to avoid disrupting classes.

We continue to collect:
· Empty ink cartridges.
· Stamps
· Persil Stars

HOLIDAY/IN-SERVICE DATES

School Closes (at the end of the school day on)             School Opens (9.00 am on)

Friday, 30 June 2006 (at 12.30 pm)
Tuesday, 15 August 2006
Friday, 6 October 2006 
Monday, 23 October 2006
Friday, 17 November 2006  
Wednesday, 22 November 2006
Thursday, 21 December 2006   
Monday, 8 January 2007
Wednesday, 7 February 2007  
Tuesday, 13 February 2007
Friday, 30 March 2007       
Tuesday, 17 April 2007
Friday, 4 May 2007 
Tuesday, 8 May 2007
Thursday, 28 June 2007
Tuesday, 14 August 2007
Friday, 5 October 2007    
Monday, 22 October 2007
Thursday, 20 December 2007 
Monday, 7 January 2008
Wednesday, 6 February 2008  
Tuesday, 12 February 2008
Thursday, 20 March 2008 
Monday, 7 April 2008
Friday, 27 June 2008    
Tuesday, 19 August 2008

ALL DATES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE

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