CITY OF COVENTRY
Coundon Primary School
Forfield Road
Coventry
CV6 1FQ
Telephone: 024 7659 2559
Fax: 024 7659 0996
Email: coundon.primary@coundon.coventry.sch.uk
Headteacher: Mrs Jayne Ellis, B Ed (Hons) NPQH
Friday 13th June 2014
Dear Parents
Moving Coundon Forward
Firstly, I would like to thank you for the welcome I have had at Coundon. It has been lovely to get
to know some of you. I really do hope that we continue to work well together. Your children are
polite, well-mannered and well behaved and together with a hard working school staff I really do
believe we can make the rapid improvements necessary to make Coundon the fantastic school that
it should be. Please feel free to speak to me about low level concerns on the playground. If you
have more serious concerns please make an appointment and we will discuss them.
Staffing
My priority over the last half term has been to ensure that we have a full complement of staff for
September. We have spent a great deal of time recruiting new, high quality staff, observing them
teach before the interview process, and I am very pleased to announce that we will have four new
teachers in September to join the existing hard-working team. All staff have new job descriptions
and we have changed the management structure of the school to ensure that communication and
effective teaching are the highest priority.
Head teacher: Jayne Ellis
Deputy Head KS1: Mrs Grace Bradford
Deputy Head KS2: Mrs N Maude
Phase Leaders:
EYFS (Nursery and Reception): Miss Danielle Jack
KS1 (Years 1 and 2: Mrs Amanda Sweet
Lower KS2 (Years 3 and 4): Miss Ceri Reynolds
Upper KS2 (Years 5 and 6): Mr Alex Scott
Mrs Neale is leaving the school as she has been appointed as Deputy Head at another school in
Coventry, and Miss Osman has been appointed as a Year group Leader at a local Private School.
We wish them both good luck and would like to congratulate them on their promotions.
New teaching staff in September:- Mr Alex Scott, a highly experienced teacher, will be teaching in Year 6 and will have
responsibility for Phase Leader in Upper KS2 and leader of the new science curriculum.
 Mr Gurj Mahal: another highly experienced teacher will work alongside Mr Scott in Y6, he
will lead the new Computing curriculum throughput the school.
 Mr Christopher Ossleton will work in KS2
 Mr Adam Donagh: will join the Reception Team.
New Curriculum
From September 2014 all Primary Schools in England have a new curriculum. We are currently in
the process of designing this curriculum to try to make it as exciting and engaging as possible for
the children; matching up the good aspects of our current curriculum with the new requirements.
The standards are raised in this new curriculum and the level of work for children at each year
group is pitched at a higher level. A teacher training day will be used to train staff appropriately.
SEND
The Government has also changed the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Code of Practice
from September 2014. This requires significant action from school prior to its implementation. We
will meet with parents of children with SEND over the next two weeks and put information onto
the website according to guidelines. Time on teacher training days will also be used to update staff.
School Dinners
Most of you are probably also aware that all children in Reception, Years 1 and 2 are now entitled
to a free school dinner from September. Our canteen will be extended during the summer holiday
to help us cater for the volume of children that will now require a school meal and we are
considering the best arrangements for managing the time it will take to enable them all to have a
significant amount of time to eat their meal, without impacting on teaching and learning time. We
will keep you updated with the arrangements as soon as they are finalised.
The School Environment
Alongside ongoing building work we also have a lot of work to do to improve the whole school
environment, I am sure that you will agree that it looks untidy at the moment and we need to
ensure that the environment is conducive to learning and engages the children in their learning in
an orderly, but creative manner.
Establishing Expectations and getting to know people
I have spent a great deal of time this term working alongside staff and children to set expectations
for the future. My biggest regret at the moment is that, as yet, I do not know the children very well
and they are the people that I work for. I very, very much look forward to getting to know them
better and seeking their opinions on what they would like to see happening in their school.
Teacher Days
It has been recommended by the Local Authority that we take an extra teacher day at the start of
next year. The building is due to be completed and handed over to the school on Tuesday 2nd
September, and we will need to spend this day setting up the classrooms and improving the
environment for the whole school over the first two days back- to ensure that we are fully ready to
get on with things when the children come back. On Wednesday 3rd we will be holding a whole
school improvement day attended by all staff and Governors to fully establish the main priorities
for the coming year and the actions we need to take to get there. Children will therefore not
return to school until Thursday 4th September. We apologise for any inconvenience that this
may cause but strongly believe that the long term gains will outweigh the initial inconvenience.
I will continue to keep you updated with regard to school improvement priorities. We are currently
also looking at establishing a new website to help to keep you fully informed of all aspects of
school life. It is an exciting time and I believe that the next year will be successful for Coundon.
Yours sincerely
Jayne Ellis - Headteacher