St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School – Bishop Thornton
Newsletter 2 – Spring 2 – Week 4
www.bishopthorntonrc.n-yorks.sch.uk
Follow us on Twitter: @stjosephscpsbt
Admissions
An ‘Open Afternoon’ is planned for Thursday 24th April, as we currently have spaces available in every year group,
if you know of a parent who is looking for a school place for their children, please tell them about us!
‘100 Club’
We’re asking each family to help recruit as many new members as possible to the ‘100 Club’ and help us meet our
commitment to the Diocese in payment for the 10% of building costs. Your help and support in being part of the
‘100 Club’ is much appreciated by everyone at St Joseph’s!
Fountains Football Tournament
Well done to our KS2 footballers who had a successful tournament on Tuesday. After comprehensively beating
several larger schools, we narrowly missed out on a semi-final place on goal difference. Well done everyone!
Crucial Crew
Thank you to those parents who generously provided transport to and from Deverell Barracks in Ripon. The
‘Crucial Crew’ afternoon gave our older children the opportunity to consider issues of citizenship as well as work
alongside a range of service providers ranging from North Yorkshire Court and Magistrate Service to ASDA. The
behaviour of our pupils was excellent and a credit to the school. Well done Year 5 and 6!
Stray Fm
Our reports and voiceovers can be heard today at 2pm and on Saturday at 12noon. Thank you to Stray FM for
visiting school and working with our children.
Cake Decorating Evening
A huge ‘Thank you’ to Sam Smith and Jo Lambert for organising the cake decorating evening and the cheese and
wine supper. A fun night and a great way to raise funds for school. Thank you to everyone who made the evening
such a success!
Grand Summer Raffle
Letters are available from the porch that you can use to request prizes for our grand summer raffle. Please let me
know if you are able to donate a prize for the raffle that will be drawn at our summer fayre on Sunday 13 th July.
North Yorkshire County Cross-Country Finals
Well done to William for his 11th place in the county age group finals at Catterick. This is a fantastic achievement
and given a field of over 100 finalists, William deserves our heartiest congratulations!
Harlow Carr
Polite reminder – if you haven’t yet made a contribution towards the forthcoming visit to Harlow Carr, we would
really appreciate it if contributions were received by the end of next week. Thank you.
Dates
th
Wednesday 26 March – Harlow Carr visit – ‘Dying and Weaving’ workshop
Thursday 27th March – Fundraising Meeting (3.30pm) in school
Friday 28th March – Mother’s Day Shop (10.30am) Gifts available for children to buy (£2) / Mother’s Day Lunch
Saturday 29th March – Lenten Lunch and cemetery tidy
Sunday 30th March – Children’s Mass in church (Mother’s Day)
Wednesday 2nd April – ‘Roll Back the Stone’ performed by KS2 at St Robert’s Catholic Church in Harrogate
Friday 4th April – Break up for Easter
Friday 25th April – Family Bingo and Pizza Night (7pm)
Friday 18th July – End of year BBQ
Please note changes to curriculum swimming provision are outlined overleaf!
St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School
Colber Lane
Bishop Thornton
Harrogate
HG3 3JR
01423 770083
admin@bishopthorntonrc.n-yorks.sch.uk
Dear Parent / Guardian,
Curriculum Swimming Lessons at St Joseph’s
As you may be aware, school has subsidised the cost of swimming lessons for our children in Key Stage 2 for some
years. The requested contribution of £4.00 per week does not reflect the increasing cost of coach hire, tuition and
associated costs.
The National Curriculum expectation in swimming is that children can swim 25m unaided in a variety of water
conditions by the end of Year 6. Some of our children achieved this by the end of Year 3 and have continued to
swim during Key Stage 2.
In order to better serve our children’s swimming development and to reduce the substantial financial burden on
our families, we are proposing to not send those Year 5 and 6 pupils swimming in the summer term who can
already swim 25m unaided. We will continue to send our Year 3 and 4 pupils swimming for the duration of the
summer term.
We have based this decision on guidance from swimming coaches and after careful consideration of the increased
financial commitment required to continue having swimming lessons for all pupils in Key Stage 2 for a term and a
half every year for 4 years. Several replies to our recent parental questionnaire made comment of the ongoing
cost of swimming lessons and quality of tuition in large groups for children who could already swim proficiently.
In addition to amending our swimming provision in the summer term, we will not be having swimming lessons in
the forthcoming autumn term. Our swimming provision will focus on summer term lessons for those children in
Year 3 and 4, being taught in smaller groups with an improved pupil: teacher ratio.
Those children in Year 5 and 6 who can already swim 25m unaided will remain at school, and together with the
Year 5 and 6 children from Bishop Thornton Church of England Primary School, will take part in additional
curriculum teaching and coaching in an exciting variety of sports and activities.
I can assure you that our commitment to swimming tuition remains and our children who require additional
support in order to learn to swim effectively and safely will continue in smaller classes and with a reduction in the
financial cost to both parents and school.
Yours sincerely
Andrew Bastable
Acting - Headteacher