Dear Families,
Welcome back! We hope you had a lovely and restful half-term. It’s hard to believe we’re already heading into the final stretch of the academic year!
Our STEAM projects are now getting underway in Years 1 to 6. These exciting interdisciplinary projects bring together science, technology, engineering, art and maths to solve real-world problems. Each year group will be sharing their outcomes with you towards the end of term—watch this space!
Year 6 are now moving into an exciting phase of their final term at primary school. They’ll be focusing on creating personal portfolios that showcase their broad range of strengths, goals for the future, and all the things that make them who they are. At the same time, they’re also beginning to devise and create their end-of-year show. To kickstart the creative process, they’ll be heading to the West End on Wednesday evening to see WICKED—a brilliant way to get inspired!
A reminder that next Wednesday (11th June) is our final Visit Your Child in Class Morning of the year. We’ll meet in the bottom hall at 9am before heading up to classrooms. It’s a great opportunity to see your child in action and experience a snapshot of their learning. Afterwards, we’d love you to stay for a few minutes to share your feedback—your thoughts really help us shape different aspects of school life.
Eid Ul Adha begins this Friday evening, and we’d like to wish Eid Mubarak in advance to all our Muslim families who will be celebrating. One day of leave will be authorised for those that are celebrating – Please email [email protected] if your child is going to be absent for one day. We’ll be marking this special occasion in school next Tuesday 10th June.
All children are welcome to come in wearing their own celebratory clothes. There will be a special assembly where some of our Muslim children will share how they celebrated, and a special lunch will be served to mark the day.
Have a great week!
Matt
I am available in school from Monday to Wednesday – do get in touch ([email protected]) if you have any questions in the meantime.
As part of Refugee Week which is coming up soon, we will be taking donations for Southwark Day Care for Asylum Seekers.
The kind of items needed are shower gel, shampoo, deodorant etc. If you can donate any items like this then please leave them at the front desk for me.
Don’t forget have freshly-cooked weekly takeaway meals for any parent to collect from school on a Wednesday morning. If you would like to sign up for this, please email Chef Kam on [email protected] or Abbi on [email protected] to add your name. Read more about our link with the Caring Family Foundation who support us with this project further on in this issue.
We have a housing expert coming in once a month, specialising in supporting people in Temporary Accommodation or facing other housing challenges. If you would like an appointment for the next drop-in session, please let me know asap, so I can give you the self-referral form to complete – [email protected]
Keep an eye on my information page outlining advice from me about various issues that may concern you plus many opportunities that are available to you and your family here in Southwark, also check out the numerous opportunities in and around our area at the bottom of this page!
Fi
CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL OUR CORE VALUE CHAMPIONS FROM LAST WEEK!
NEWS – SSq Festival Returns for 2025!
Don’t miss out on the event of the year! Festival wristbands will be on sale from Thursday after school and via Arbor online. Expect LIVE MUSIC, FOOD & DRINK, FUN & GAMES plus new for 2025: Year 2’s Calm Zone.
A wristband entitles some free food/drink and games but please bring extra coins for other stalls.
If you know anyone who would be keen to sponsor part of this event or provide a prize for our raffle then please email Chris ([email protected])
NEWS – Ashley John-Baptiste visits SSq!
Before Half Term, BAFTA and children’s mental health charity Place2Be helped us to host a special visit from award-winning TV journalist, presenter and author Ashley John-Baptiste to share his inspirational story after we named a class after him.
Born in South London, Ashley John-Baptiste grew up in care in Southwark, just a few miles from our school. After Year 6 Teacher Netra read his memoir, Looked After: A Childhood in Care, to her class, the teacher was so inspired by Ashley’s story of resilience and success that she named her class after him.
You can read more about his visit here.
NEWS – Goodbye Pat!
Before Half Term we said a fond farewell to Pat who has been a valued member of the SSq team for many years. More recently in Year 6, Pat has been an integral member of our community and will be sorely missed as she moves away to be closer to her family. We said goodbye with an Irish song from Year 6 and heartfelt messages from the children and staff.
NEWS – Mental Health Awareness week inspires children to grow!
Before Half Term, we celebrated Mental Health Awareness Week with the theme ‘There is Power in Community’. Children in classes are working together as a community to help a strawberry plant grow and flourish – do ask your children about it.
NEWS – Caring Family Foundation visits SSq!
Before Half Term, some of the JLT took part in a special event with Felix Foods and The Caring Family Foundation (TCFF) to celebrate TCFF providing 1 million meals to communities across the country.
Mrs Caring came in and spoke at length with the JLT who showed extraordinary compassion, respect and responsibility. She was very impressed with their maturity. We are extremely grateful for all the work and support that both TCFF and Felix Foods offer to SSq.
If you would like to sign up for this scheme then please email Chef Kam on [email protected] or Abbi on [email protected] to add your name.
NEWS – Tesco Victory for Edible Rotherhithe!
Edible Rotherhithe have been awarded a £500 grant for their after school salad clubs by Groundwork UK and Tesco. There will be a visit to the clubs by Staff from Tesco's head office and Groundwork to see the clubs in action coming up soon.
Well done and thank you for all the hard work you do for our school community Edible Rotherhithe.
NEWS – A message from Marcia
The judge has been in touch and is hoping to come in on Monday 16th June in the afternoon to judge the Summer Flower Competition.
Children are reminded to bring in their entries labelled with their name and class and age.
Please provide drainage for the pot – a small saucer would do.
Foundation Week @SSq
Year 1 have been learning the name of the continents and oceans and locating them on maps. They received postcards from animals from every continent describing the weather and important landmarks and animals found there. They then went into the playground and drew a giant map of the continents and oceans and added labels. Well done Year 1!
STILL WANTED – Multilingual Story Books
We are still looking to build up our collection of multilingual story books. Do you have any books at home in your own language that you would be willing to donate to the school? If so please leave them in the office. Thank you!
After School Clubs Update:
4:30pm clubs resumed this week for the last half term of this academic year. No need to resign your child up as they were originally signed up for the whole of the summer term.
The last day of 4:30pm clubs for this half term is Thursday 24th July – the day before we break up for the summer.
Here’s to a great half term of clubs!
Music Update – Instrumental Lessons – KS2:
Lessons will resume again this week in preparation for the SSq Festival on Wednesday 29th June. We hope to see as many performers on stage as possible!
There are still spaces across most of the instrument lessons (Drums, Guitar, Violin and Keyboard) If you are keen for your child to have a lesson then please email Maxx ([email protected]) or Chris ([email protected]) ASAP.
Key Dates including next academic year
Please see our updated Key Dates summary for the rest of 2025 PLUS next academic year.
Attendance Last Week
Well done to Year 4 Soanes Class who had 99.2% attendance last week. Keep it up folks!
Please contact us daily if your child is off ill or for another reason.
Email [email protected] or phone 0207 7033049 (option 1)
MENU for next week:
Week beginning Monday 9th June (Week 1 Menu)
THIS WEEK AT THE WALWORTH LIVING ROOM:
Follow @pembrokehouse on Instagram to stay up to date with everything happening at The Walworth Living Room – just over the road from us at SSq! Also, discover more from Pembroke House and the Walworth Living Room here!
We have been made aware of the Cayr Charity and their project Pink Stitch – a workshop series focused on using creativity to explore and process health experiences. See the flyer below for more information.
If this is something you relate to and if you’d like to surround yourself with women who’ve been on a similar journey , share your story, engage with your experience in a more creative way and be a part of something special, register your interest here .
