Dear Parents & Carers,

We hope you’ve had a good week.  School life has been busy – I can’t believe we are almost at half term!

I wanted to let you know about a few new faces that you may be seeing around school in the coming weeks.  Mrs Sue Evans will be joining our lovely administration team and will be focusing on pupil attendance, she will be in the office every week day morning.  In addition, after half term we will be saying farewell to Mrs Louise Jones, our Parent Support Adviser.  Louise has worked at the school for many, many years and is leaving to pursue her passion of fitness and personal training.  She will be missed greatly and I am sure that you will share our very best wishes for her new adventure.  Mrs Rozina Begum will be replacing her in the Parent Support Adviser role and will bring to Linden many years of experience working with families as a Family Support Worker within the Children’s Service Department. You may already have seen our new Premises Supervisor, Mr Stephen Lowe, please give him a wave and a smile!

I would like to thank those of you who have generously donated to our food bank collection – donations can still be left in the box outside of the office up until next Friday.

I hope that you all have a lovely weekend.

Best wishes
Lucy Collins

The Stars of the Week for week ending 1st October:

The Stars of the Week for week ending 8th October:

Reception

Although it seems a long time ago, Reception celebrated their first full week in school by having a little party. We iced biscuits, made sandwiches, danced and had milkshake. Mrs Collins even gave us all our very own Linden Bear as a present, because what party isn’t complete with a present? The children and staff had a wonderful time and look forward to the rest of the year.

Class 9 

Class 9 are working hard to get their names on the Times Table Rockstars Hall of Fame. First 3 boys from class 9 are already on the board

Year 6

Our Year 6s showing they are Pedal Ready and know how to check their bike using their ABCs 

Year 6 

Also, in DT we have been having a Dragon’s Den style competition. The children had a great time designing, making, advertising and pitching their toys to a panel of adults. We definitely have some entrepreneurs of the future in Year 6! 

STEM Activity Club

STEM club had a great time on Monday looking at how sugar dissolves using skittles and some water. We tried water of different temperatures to see if this changed the speed in which the sugar dissolved. This is a great experiment that you can try at home just using a plate, skittles and water of different temperatures. 

Thank you so much to all the children that took part in the Heroes Stamp Design Competition.

An incredible 606,049 entries were received from children across the UK, with an amazing 7,479 schools taking part.

Congratulations to all the children, as their designs contributed towards a GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS™ title for the largest postage stamp design competition!

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “It is of great credit to the children of this country that in world record breaking numbers they picked up their paintbrushes, pens and paints and paid artistic tribute to the heroes of our coronavirus response. Their brilliant efforts represent the collective gratitude of the nation to everyone who went above and beyond during the pandemic. Congratulations to all those who have made it to the next round and thank you to everyone who has taken part.”

Simon Thompson, Royal Mail CEO, said: “We would like to thank all of the 606,049 children who submitted such brilliant designs to the competition. We have been humbled by the sheer volume of entries. And to have achieved a Guinness World Records title in the process shows how much the UK’s children value those heroes who have kept the nation moving during such a difficult period. To the 120 Regional Finalists - Well Done! We are really looking forward to seeing the winning eight designs!”

From 120 regional finalists, a special panel of judges will now determine the winning 24 regional designs and these will be announced in November.

From these 24 entries, eight winning images will be chosen as official Royal Mail stamps. They will then appear on millions of items of mail across the UK when they are issued in the Spring of 2022.

Please note, all entries apart from the 120 regional finalists, have now been securely shredded and recycled.

Thank you once again for taking part and congratulations on being part of a GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS™ title!

Many thanks,

iChild Heroes Stamp Design Competition Team

Linden Boys Football team faced St Peters at home this week and the fixture did not disappoint. After seeing the woodwork hit several times the points were shared in a 1-1 draw.  Well done to all those involved, special mention to Alfie for keeping us in the game. The Linden boys put a massive shift in and we're really proud of them! 

Linden Girls Football team played their second ever match together Widden. After a very close first half, Linden managed to score just before half time, and continued their scoring streak after the break. A special well done to Ava who scored a hat-trick.

A reminder that Harvest celebrations will be taking place during the week commencing Monday 18th October.  

There is a donations box by the doors of the main school office should you wish to support Gloucester Feed the Hungry.

If you are able to support, these are the items that are desperately needed: 

Tinned Ready Meals
Tinned Cold Meat (e.g. ham / corned beef)
Tinned Fish
Tinned Potatoes
Long Life Fruit Juice (not chilled)
Long Life Milk (not chilled)
Instant Mashed Potato
Squash
Soup
Dry Pasta & Spaghetti

Donations can be made between Monday 4th October and Friday 15th October.

Safeguarding

Another reminder that when you request entry via the buzzer at the black gate, do not let other adults or children through.  This is to safeguard all children.  Please advise any adults that they will need to buzz for access themselves.  

Milk

Please check with your child if they still wish to have their milk, as we have a large surplus each day.

Lost Property Reminder

A reminder that every Thursday, the lost property will be placed outside by the school office for you to look through for those missing jumpers.

Year 3 and Year 5 Swimming

Please see below a message from Swimwell Teaching Services about the swimming lessons:

"Good afternoon,

Thankyou for your continued understanding regarding the pool closure.

Unfortunately we still haven't received the full report from Ribston and without this we are unable to give any sort of time frame for a return date to lessons. 

With this in mind we have decided to postpone all school swimming lessons until after the October half term. 

As soon as I have any more updates I will let you know and any questions just let me know.

Kind regards 
Swimwell Teaching Services"

When the situation at Swimwell is clearer we will look at solutions regarding payments already received.   We are reluctant to book an alternative until we have further information as this would incur further cost to parents i.e. coaches.

As soon as we have more news, we will be in touch with you

Year 6 

A letter came home with your child regarding secondary school choices.  You will need to make your choices by the closing date of 31st October.

Current EYFS Parents

We are aware due to Covid you missed out on visiting the school and may be keen to come and visit us and keen to see where your child is learning.

Therefore, we would love to welcome you to look around our school.   On Friday 22^nd October you are invited to come in at 2.30pm where Mrs Pope, Miss Whitfield and our head boy and head girl will take you on a brief tour of our school. We will be starting in EYFS and our indoor/out areas and finishing on our MUGA.  As the school will still be fully operational we are unable to accept pushchairs on the tour. If you have a baby we recommend you carry them for this short tour.

Once we have finished we will go back into Class 1 and 2 where you will be able to take your child home for the half term. 

We will holding stay and play sessions in the last week of each term, specific dates will be communicated closer to the time. More information regarding stay and play sessions will be shared in due course.

EYFS Visit Booking Form

Prospective Reception Parents

Hello everyone, and welcome to any parents with children that have recently started at the school.  We are a small team, and are always looking for people who might be able to help with our events and fundraising activities.  Please do get in touch if this is something that might interest you. 

We are very excited to announce some upcoming activities and events. 

Dress Down Day

The children will be able to wear their own clothes on Friday 22^nd October to celebrate the end of term, in return for a suggested donation of £1, or whatever you are able.  In line with the time of year, it’s an Autumn theme, so they might like to wear something orange, red, green, brown or black, but it’s not compulsory.

Christmas Cards

We are delighted that this project is running again this year.  More detail will follow soon, but the designs will come home before the end of term, with orders placed online and the Artwork forms to come back to school straight after half term.

Class Coin Challenge         

This is a new idea for this year and we are very excited about it.  Each class will have a bottle in which to collect coins that the children bring in.  There will be a reward for the winning class.  All coins will be welcome, 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p or even £1 or £2 coins.  The final details are being worked out and more information will follow nearer the time.  The challenge will run straight after half term, from Tuesday 2^nd to Friday 26^th November so start collecting the coins ready.

Gloucester Feed The Hungry

We are delighted to be supporting the Christmas collection for this wonderful local charity again this year.  Look out for more information coming soon.

We have had so much planned for your children for October, and there is more to come!  Bookings will open on the SZapp on Monday 11th October, for the fortnight either side of half term.  Take a look at the first week below for some spooky goings on: 

And as a PDF:  Wraparound Care Autumn Term Plan 2021

We meet:          Tuesday term time only 

Time:                Start 5.45pm  Finish 6.45pm

Meeting place:    St Luke's Church Hall Stroud Rd, opposite Rosebank Surgery.

If you would like more information, please contact Kim Budding  01452 539716  mobile 07906484451 evenings only.  

At the moment Guiding rules say Rainbows still have to wear masks during meeting times, if your daughter needs to take the mask off for a couple of minutes she can. 

Linden Primary Breaks the Rules!

We will be joining in with Children in Need on Friday 19th November - on this day children may choose to break any or all of the following rules, each rule break costs 10p:

1. Wearing non school uniform (including pyjamas) 
2. Wear nail varnish
3. Crazy hair including hair spraying colours
4. Squash in drinks bottles
5. Small chocolate bar for their snack

We do hope they will join in!