Dear Parents and Carers,

Kind regards

Mrs D Hudson

Headteacher

There will be an opportunity for you to drop into school on Friday 15^th September between 9.00 a.m. and 9.30 a.m., if you have not already had the opportunity to meet your child’s teacher. Ms McGivney, our Acting SENCo will also be available in the library to say “Hello”. This is, an opportunity to put a ‘face to the name’ rather than a time for in-depth conversation. If necessary, please arrange a further time for a more detailed conversation by speaking directly to the member of staff or getting in touch through Class Dojo or email.

In response to feedback from parents, our autumn consultation evening will be later in the term so that there is not such a long gap between the autumn parents evening and the spring meetings. However we thought it valuable to have an earlier opportunity to connect with staff.

Routine Reminders’

 You can contact your child's class teacher in any of the following ways...

• Reception and Key Stage 1 – quick messages can be passed on to the class teacher at the classroom door.
• Key Stage 2 - Mrs Hudson and Mrs Hadley are available on the playground before school and will pass on messages.
• Teachers can be contacted via their e-mail addresses which can found on the staff page on the ‘Our School’ tab of the website or through ClassDojo. Please use these routes to share any concerns you may have or matters which are more detailed.
• Messages can be left with the office staff, who will ensure that the class teacher is informed. This particularly applies to medical appointments or notifying us of an absence.

• Attendance – our preferred method for receiving messages about absence is through emailed (attendance @ridge.dudley.sch.uk). It is important that the office staff receive the message but you may wish to copy in the class teacher. To avoid undue safeguarding concerns, please message before 8.50 a.m. Please make sure that you include your child’s name, class and the precise reason that they are absent. If they are unwell, please tell us the symptoms they are experiencing (e.g. high temperature or tummy ache) so that we can look out for patterns and possible outbreaks of an illness.

• Sometimes parents and carers are unavoidably delayed at the end of the day. If you know that you are going to be late, please phone the school office so that arrangements to look after your child can be made. Please also let the office know if you have arranged for another parent to collect your child.

• All money brought in to school for school activities needs to be sent into school in a sealed envelope with the child’s name, class, amount and purpose clearly written on the front. This should be posted in the secure posting box outside the school office or handed to the teacher. No money is to be left in bags in the classroom or cloakroom.

• PE – children should come to school in their PE kit and school jumper or cardigan on the days that PE is timetabled. Please make sure that children have the correct kit (eg plain polo-shirt and not any other leisure ware) and have a PE Hoodie, or tracksuit top in their PE bag in school to change in to for the lesson.

• Children invariably lose things and we aim to reunite any lost property with the owner as soon as possible. Obviously this is made so much easier when uniform and other belongings are clearly labelled.

• Our Uniform Swap Shop is available for pre-loved uniform. The location of this has changed and it can now be found in the breakout area in the school bungalow.

• We may send home important information including details of any minor accidents via your child. To make sure that you receive this information please can we ask that you check their school bag on a daily basis (even if they are in year 6!)

• Children need to bring a water bottle to school each day to keep hydrated in the classroom. However this must be filled with water, only - no squash, fruit juice or other flavoured drinks. They can however have these drinks as part of their lunch. As a Health promoting school, fresh fruit is the only snack allowed at breaktimes and lunch boxes should not contain chocolate bars. ( a chocolate coated biscuit - e.g. a kitkat - is acceptable)

• We have a number of children in school with potentially life threatening allergies. It is vital that no nut products are brought in to school.

If you need to request leave of absence, please ask for a form from the school office. You will be aware that we are unable to authorise leave unless there are ‘exceptional circumstances’. Please be honest about your reasons for any request. There have been occasions where children have been reported ill but have been on holiday. We usually know because they want to tell us or their friends all about their trip!  If you are not up front with us, the children may be put in the difficult position of having to tell lies, which goes against everything we teach children about the importance of honesty.

Lateness – punctuality is an important part of attendance. All children should be in their classrooms by 8.50 a.m. Those arriving after this time will be recorded as late. Please see our Attendance Policy for further information about what this means.

This Weeks attendance 

Whole School - 97.69%

Year 1 – 97.41%

Year 2 – 97.62%

Year 3 – 100.03%

Year 4 – 96.88%

Year 5 – 94.17%

Year 6 – 100.00%

Well done Years 3 & 6!

At the start of this new year please can we take the opportunity to remind you about parking in Gregory Road. You will know that this is a constant issue for both school and local residents and so for everyone’s safety and to ensure that we maintain good relationships with the residents, please note the following.

• Please avoid double parking along the length of Gregory Road and obstructing the driveways of our neighbours. (Marked out with the white I-------I)
• Do not park on the yellow’ Keep Clear Zig Zags’ or in the turning circle in Gregory Road.
• Please do not park or turn round in the school car park.
• Whenever possible please take the opportunity to walk to school.

Please see the attached information from West Midlands Police - https://theridge.sch.life/page/detail/parking-on-gregory-road 

Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility. Mrs Hudson is the Designated Safeguarding Lead and any concerns should be shared with her or the Deputy Safeguarding Leads – Mrs Hadley, Miss Beddoes and Mrs Gledhill.  Where child protection concerns are raised, the school has a statutory duty to refer these concerns to children’s social care.

In response to the survey at the end of term, nearly a quarter of respondents disagreed with the statement that The Ridge makes me aware of what my child will be learning during the year. We would like to take this opportunity to signpost you to the school website where there is lots on information about the curriculum, including the curriculum sequence by year group. In addition please look out for the termly Class Dojo video messages, where teachers share a curriculum overview for the coming term. This term’s video will be uploaded before the end of next week.

We have introduced a new Behaviour Policy, which can be found on the school website. This covers what we traditionally think of as school behaviour (how children interact with each other, following rules and conduct on the playground etc.) but also covers behaviours for learning (e.g. expectations about always trying hard, becoming an independent learner etc.) The new policy incorporates our Anti-Bullying Policy.

We recognise that the starting point for this is the fact that most of our children demonstrate fantastic behaviour and we want them to have a sense of pride in themselves and their school. However, we also know that sometimes, children make mistakes and need guiding, practice and explicit instruction.

Our new policy is accompanied by a Behaviour Curriculum which will be taught to the children. The Behaviour Curriculum clearly sets out the schools expectations for our routines, such as walking around school and what it means to be polite, for example.

One of our school rules has changed.

• Be Ready
• Be Respectful
• Be Responsible (which obviously incorporates being safe)

Please familiarise yourself with the policy. Over the coming months, we shall be reviewing how it is implemented and would welcome your comments.

You will have no doubt heard about the concerns about Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete (RAAC) which was used in the building of some schools and other public buildings. Dudley MBC who are the responsible body for our school have reassured us that they carried out a desktop survey, with colleagues, at the beginning of the year for all of their maintained schools and can state that none of these schools have RAAC roofing systems.

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