Y2 Newsletter 21.04.23

Living our school values: 

A note from Mrs McCormack (Primary Principal):

Dear Parents,

Welcome back to Term 3! It's great to see all our students return to school after the holidays, refreshed and ready to learn.

This week, we are happy to have hosted Parent-Teacher Meetings across all year groups. This is an opportunity for us to celebrate the successes of our fantastic students and for you to discuss their progress with their teachers. Many of these meetings have happened in person, but we are also delighted to continue offering meetings via MS Teams.

Term 3 is always a busy one for us, with a great many activities and events taking place. It is also a time when we start to plan for our new academic year, including resource orders, class allocations, and teacher placements. Next week, I will be sharing information on the small number of, valued staff members who are leaving us this year. This will give you a chance to say a fond farewell!

On that note, do you know someone who might wish to join the Patana teaching team? We are always looking for qualified and experienced cover teachers, able to join us for short- and medium-term placements. If you know of someone who might be a good fit, please pass on my email contacts of samc@patana.ac.th.

We are all looking forward to an exciting and productive Term 3, filled with new learning opportunities, engaging activities, and meaningful experiences for all our students. 

Thank you for your ongoing support.

Learning

Term 3 - You are what you eat!

Please visit our curriculum pages to find out more about this exciting learning!

RSE - Relationships and Sex Education Presentations

During Term 3, we introduce age-appropriate RSE units as part of our Personal, Social, and Health Education curriculum in Years 1 to 6.

These units help children develop an understanding of their own physical, social, and emotional development, and encompass key values such as respect, kindness, and consent.

It was fantastic to see so many parents at our presentation on Tuesday. A copy of the presentation is attached below:

Next Week:

The students will learn about lifecycles in nature and how different animals and plants grow and change. They will look at the lifecycle of a plant from seed to flower and also a frog.

Music - Performance Week

We are excited to have two musical performance opportunities happening soon. Performance week is happening in regular class music lessons during, 8^th-12th May. (At the end of Performance Week on Saturday 13^th May, we are also holding our Solo Festival for which applications have now closed.)

Performance Week is an opportunity for any child who is learning a musical instrument to perform in front of a small audience during their regular timetabled music lesson. Children can sign up to perform during their music lessons and it is an internal event with no spectators. We encourage all students who learn a musical instrument to participate.

Please support your child to perform if they take lessons on an instrument and please help them to bring their music/instrument on the right day:

Monday 8^th May 2B

Tuesday 9^th May 2F and 2W

Wednesday 10^th May 2M

Thursday 11^th May 2A and 2P

Friday 12^th May 2J and 2C

Year 2 Sleepover - Thursday 15th of June 2023

As part of our PSHE learning in Term 3 about changes and trying new things, we are pleased to share that the Year 2 sleepover will return this year. This involves a one-night stay in school with the teachers. 

The sleepover is a valuable learning experience for our students as it offers the opportunity for them to take a risk and develop independence within a secure and safe environment.

Being away from home can bring up many feelings for young students, so to prepare for this please begin talking about this event at home with your children. 

If you have any immediate questions please contact Mr Joe Bower: jobo@patana.ac.th

Global Citizenship

Children of the Forest Challenge - Appeal for Sponsorship Money

Dear parents,

You will recall that the children took part in the Children of the Forest Challenge on the last day of term. This was our main charity fundraising event for Term 2 where we raise money for our Year 2 Charity – Children of the Forest.

We would like to thank all of you who have sent sponsorship money to school already, and kindly remind any parents who have not yet done so, to please send money as soon as you can.

Many thanks for your generous support.

Year 2 Team

General Information

Smart Watches

Over the last months, we have noticed an increase in the number of students wearing smartwatches to school.

While we encourage our students to develop independence and learn how to tell the time, smartwatches do offer online functions like that of a mobile phone.

Features such as gaming, internet browsing, and the ability to make and receive calls are potentially distracting for our students and can pose a risk to safety and privacy.

In light of this, we have made the decision that effective from Term 3, students will be required to keep their smartwatches safely stored in their bags during the school day.

Smart watches can be taken out of bags once a child exits the school gates at 2:30 pm or once their ECA has ended at 3:30 pm or 4:30 pm. However, we ask that children refrain from taking or sending images whilst on the school bus.

Smartwatches are valuable and precious items. Please be aware that the school takes no responsibility for the loss or damage of smartwatches.

Thank you for your cooperation and support in maintaining a safe and positive learning environment for all our students.

PTG - Nominations AGM

Swimming Survey

We are exploring the possibility of offering weekend swimming lessons on campus during the 2023/24 academic year, led by our full time TigerSharks coaching team. The lessons would follow a maximum ratio of 1:5, with lessons comprising of 30 minutes.

To help us ensure we target the offering appropriately, please help us by filling in the link here. It should take no more than 1 minute to complete and will help with our planning for introducing this to our current programme. Real data requires 100 parents to feedback so please join the conversation.

Deadline for responses is Monday 24th April, thank you in advance for your support with this.

Birthday celebrations

We cannot give out party bags or gifts - please keep these for any sort of celebration that you do out of school.

If you would like to send in some birthday treats for your child to share with their class, please arrange a day with your child's class teacher. We will only be able to manage individual items like brownies, doughnuts or cupcakes. Please remember we are a nut-free Primary School.

These children are celebrating birthdays over the holidays...