Stephen Perse Foundation Parent Portal - Rosedale House Newsletter, 15 November 2019

Dear Parents, Katie Milne

With the nights drawing in and temperatures turning a little arctic, teaching staff across our schools are thinking ahead to Christmas. The pace gathers around the corridors of Madingley and Rosedale and the sense of excitement builds. This excitement stems from the enjoyment of the many opportunities that our pupils will experience in the build up to the end of term.

I am pleased to be able to provide notice of a number of exciting opportunities for our pupils all of which have a festive theme. The launch of our Christmas card competition, a school disco and a Christmas jumper sale will no doubt add to the festive cheer. Sustainability is always a present thought when planning school events and I am pleased to note that our Christmas card competition is going digital, contributing to a reduction of paper production and in the reduction in the tons of ecological damaging glitter that seems a compulsory additional to any card. The Year 6 Christmas jumper sale encourages the key message of reusing items of clothing rather than purchasing new, pupils will be able to support our house charities with the knowledge that they are doing their ‘bit’! Let us not forget about the PFA’s Christmas Fair on the 7 December. Your support at this event would be appreciated, I am sure that parents and children alike will enjoy the variety of stalls that are being planned. I hope to see as many of you there as possible.

With the help of Mr West we have kick started our programme of 1 o’clock talks, part of our Inspire Me programme. We welcomed Mrs Shah to Rosedale House. Year 4-6 arrived in droves to enjoy an interesting talk on the Internet of Things (IoT). Lasting for 20 minutes these pupils learnt about cryptography and the importance of protecting data that is sent across wireless networks. Is it never too young to hear about the working world and to identify interests and options that are available. We have had a number of parents express an interest in giving a talk to the children at school and we would be very happy to hear from you if this is something that you would be prepared to offer. Please do get in touch!

I have recently attended the Apple Distinguished Schools conference. Made up of 48 schools across the UK, the Stephen Perse Foundation has held this status for the last 7 years. Ms Aisling Brown, Senior School Digital Strategist and Stephen Perse teacher, spoke to the group of schools on the importance of an individualised approach to digital accessibility that we have developed right through our 3-18 curriculum. Watching our children personalise the iPad; setting it up to reflect a learning style that works for them is a timely reminder of the purpose behind equipping our classrooms with this technology.

We are very proud of our progression of digital opportunity throughout the Stephen Perse Foundation and pupils in Years 2-6 have recently completed the national Bebras competition. This competition offers a good benchmark to monitor progress and identify those that enjoy the challenge of applying their computational thinking skills to problematic tasks. We await the results in the hope that some of our Year 6 pupils get invited to the next stage of the competition later in the year.

School at Rosedale and Madingley is an enjoyable experience, you only have to poke your head into classrooms to see that the curriculum that is on offer inspires curiosity, engagement and a love for learning. Our classrooms are noisy, productive places and our pupils rise to the daily challenges that they face. Once again there have been opportunities to take learning outside of the classroom and I would encourage you to read about Year 6’s visit to The American Cemetery or their Remembrance activity at Latham Road as well as Year 4’s recent collaboration day.

With best wishes

David Hewlett

Head of Rosedale House and Madingley

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