Lawhead School
March 2010
Newsletter
MUSA Workshops
The nursery and P4-7 pupils all visited the MUSA base on “The Scores” this month to
view the current exhibition. The “exhibits” came to the school to visit the P1-3 pupils
for a change. The purpose of the visits was to explore the theme “Close Up – Far
Away”. Some of the classes will then follow up with art work which will be entered
into the Young Artist Award run by MUSA.
Tennis Tasters
St Andrews tennis club coaches came into school at the beginning of March to offer
two coaching sessions to every pupil from P1-7. Great fun was had by all and
leaflets went home about the Easter coaching sessions available at the club.
Chess Club
Our thanks go to Mr Dawson who comes into school on a Friday lunchtime and runs
the club. This term the focus has been on the Chess Challenge Competition which is
run throughout the country. The competition begins internally at each club and then
finalists move on to competing at external competitions.
On Saturday 6th March 10 pupils, Mr Dawson and Mrs Stewart set off early to
Kirkintilloch to take part in a Chess Scotland tournament. In between games the
pupils were offered coaching from a junior player who has competed across the
world for Scotland which gave our players inspiration. Bronze badges were won by
Tom Constance, Rowan Currie, Karrison Driver and Archie Yarr.
6 Nations Rugby
On 13th March 15 pupils, Mr Regan and Mrs Stewart set off for Murrayfield, more in
hope than expectation of a Scottish win for the national team playing England. We
would admit it was not the most entertaining game we have been to see, but at least
we came away with a draw. The next supporter’s bus will no doubt set off again for
one of the autumn test matches in November 2010.
Extra Curricular Activities
A wide variety of clubs are available for many of the pupils in school. In most cases
there is a waiting list for places but we thought you would like to know what is
currently going on.
CLUB
WHEN
FOR WHOM
Gardening Club
Monday/Thursday
P2-3
lunchtime
Choir
Monday lunchtime
P4-7
Hip Hop
Monday after school
P3-4
Football
Alternate Mondays after
P6-7
school
Cross Country
Tuesday lunchtime
P6-7
Football
Tuesday after school
P4-5
ECO Clubs
Wednesday lunchtime
P4-5 & P6-7
Art Club
Alternate Wednesdays
P3-5
after school
Netball
Thursday lunchtime
P6-7
(summer term)
Street Dance
Thursday after school
P5-7
Chess Club
Friday lunchtime
P2-7
Cross Country
We would like to wish our P6-7 runners well for Tuesday 30th March as they compete
in the Fife event. Our thanks to Mrs Johnston who takes the club and will be
accompanying the children to the event. This is a good warm up event for the
Scottish competition which takes place at Kirkcaldy High School on Saturday 24th
April.
Swimming
Our P6 pupils will be receiving swimming lessons on Tuesday afternoons next term.
The swimming pool at Madras College, South Street is out of commission at present
so the children will be going to the leisure centre at East Sands. They will be
accompanied by Mrs Jackson and another adult.
Coaching Opportunities
Next term our P5-6 pupils will receive 5 weeks kwik cricket coaching from the youth
coaches of Largo Cricket club.
St Andrews Bowling club are also hoping to offer 3 or 4 coaching sessions for our
P6-7 pupils in May.
Violinists
Earlier this month 4 of our P6-7 violin players played a Scottish piece of music of
their own choice to their class mates. The P6-7 pupils then scored each of the
players on their performance. The winner of the competition was Rory Barnett with
Kathryn Dryburgh, Catriona Dobie and Marina Politis all receiving Burns Federation
certificates. All 4 pupils deserve praise for their effort.
StAnza Poetry
Our P7 class welcomed a member of the StAnza Poetry team to school earlier in the
month. As a result of the workshop the pupils wrote poems for the StAnza
competition. Congratulations to Laura Ferrier who received 3rd prize.
St Andrews Students’ Association Charities Campaign
We have received a letter from the above group asking us to take part in a bunting
competition in line with the Seaside Fayre taking place in April. The children have to
decorate a piece of bunting (this is provided). The group are asking for a donation of
50p - £1 to enter the competition. If your child wants to enter the competition the
bunting can be collected from the office and the money can be put into the collecting
tin provided by the group. Entries have to be back by 31st March to enable us to send
them away before end of the term.
Financial Education
Next term there will be various activities going on in the upper school to support
pupils gaining an understanding of money, costs, profit and loss and keeping
accounts. The P7 class will be running a healthy tuck shop. More details will come
out the first week of term.
House Challenges
The 4 house captains and their vice captains have been working for a number of
weeks on organising two house challenges. The event for the P4-7 pupils took place
in the hall on Monday 22nd March. They divided the pupils into teams of 5-6 pupils.
Each group were given a packet of spaghetti and mini marshmallows. The house
captains explained that the task was to build as tall a tower as possible in 50
minutes. Lots of team work was involved. The winning team came from Jubilee and
they managed to build a stand alone tower measuring 66cm. They received 100
house points. A tower measuring 65cm was in 2nd place and that team also came
from Jubilee (75 house points). In 3rd place with a tower of 64cm was a Strathtyrum
team (50 house points) and in 4th place were a team from Balgove (25 house points)
with a tower measuring 44cm. A fun afternoon!
This coming Monday (29th) it is the turn of the P1-3 pupils to enter into a challenge.
We don’t want to give too much away but weather permitting this event will take
place outside and involve lots of searching!
PTA News
The finals of Lawhead’s Got Talent are on 23rd April 2010 from 7-9pm in the hall.
Come along and see what we can do and vote for your favourite act! It should be a
great night. Soft drinks and biscuits will be available. Tickets (£2 per family) will be
on sale from the office from 19th April.
You will have seen the new trim trails that PTA funds helped to buy, along with
support from the R&A and a grant from the Lottery fund. The staff have asked us to
further develop the school grounds by buying wood to construct seats around some
of the trees so that the children have somewhere to sit at breaktime or to work
outside. We'd also like to invite enthusiastic and able members to come and help
build the seats on 15th May. If you don’t feel your talents are best placed for this
task we are looking for volunteers to come along that morning (from 10am) to do a
general maintenance job of the trees and shrubbery.
Art Mural
Pupils are going to be working with Mr George Finley, one of our neighbours and a
local artist, to paint a mural on an ECO theme in the walled playground (“the bumpy”
as it is known to the pupils). Pupils have already started thinking about what they
want on the mural and each class has taken a different ECO theme. We hope to
have the mural completed by the end of May.
School lunches
The cost of a school lunch will be going up next Thursday 1st April to £1.65 per day.
Please note this increase when paying school lunches next week.
Diary Dates
Thursday 1st April – school closes for holidays at 3.05pm
Monday 19th April – school reopens at 9am
Friday 23rd April –Lawhead’s Got Talent final at 7pm
Saturday 24th April -Scottish Cross Country Championships for P6-7 runners at
Kirkcaldy High School
Wednesday 28th April – school photographer
Monday 3rd May – school closed for holiday
Thursday 6th May – PLP discussions 6-8pm *
Tuesday 11th May - PLP discussions 3.30-4.30pm *
Wednesday 12th May – PLP discussions 6-8pm *
Friday 21st May – Lawhead Masters – applications to be in for 30th April
*Information regarding the PLP discussions will come home via pupils in the first
week of the new term
We hope everyone has an enjoyable time as a family during the forthcoming
holiday