Week beginning 10th December 2018

Week Beginning Monday 10th December

Coming up this week…

We start the week with Breakfast with Santa. Those who have purchased tickets should join us in the hall for an 8:00am start. The children can look forward to a healthy breakfast, some festive music and some very special visitors including the man in red who may even have a present or 2 in his sack!

Monday: your child will be asked by their class teacher to make their Christmas dinner selection. There will be two choices red (meat) or green (vegetarian) plus a variety of desserts. Every child, regardless of their lunch choice, will receive a Christmas cracker on the day. Also on Monday, the children in Rainforest and Safari will be delighting their audience with a wonderful Christmas production in the hall from 1:45pm. Tissues at the ready for what we are sure will be a great event. Monday is the last afterschool Infant choir session of the year, as is Tuesday for the Junior Choir.

Tuesday: it is the children in Year one who have the chance to perform to everybody. The performance of ‘Hey Ewe!’ will begin at 1:45pm in the school hall. If you have a child in this year group, please do come along to support the children performing in this Christmas production.

Wednesday: the children in Year 4 will take part in their last Soundstart session of 2018. Please ensure instruments are all in school. A few children in Year 4 will be decorating a Christmas tree at All Saints Church for their Christmas tree festival which takes place on Saturday 15th December if you wish to attend.

Thursday: the school council will be meeting for their 5th meeting of the year on Thursday 13th at an earlier start time of 12:10 in the ICT suite. The children will be taken to the dinner hall for lunch following the meeting. Thursday also gives the children in Year 2 the opportunity to shine on stage as they present their version of Angel Express. This will begin at 1:45am in the school hall and we look forward to seeing our Year 2 families there…be prepared to be wowed!

Friday: some older members of the junior choir will be performing carols at one of our local residential homes for the elderly, Hill House. They will be accompanied by Miss Slade and Mrs Yates where they will sing some carols and Christmas songs, bringing joy to the elderly!

Finally, some reminders:
I am afraid we have received complaints again from local residents regarding the inconsiderate parking of some of our families. The police will be attending the school in the New Year and issuing tickets to parents who park inappropriately. Please can we appeal to you to be courteous towards our neighbours and avoid blocking driveways which causes a huge amount of frustration and damages our relationships with our neighbours.  We know this is only a small minority of you and thank those of you who respect the law with regards to this matter.

Dogs are not permitted in the school playground unless they are a working dog. Some children are frightened and for this reason we ask that they remain outside of the school premises please.

It is the time of the year when we have a post box in school for children who wish to send Christmas cards. To ensure your cards get to the right people please can we ask that on the envelope you write the child’s first name and class number. If there is more than one child in the class with the same name, you may wish to also include the first letter of their surname e.g. Sally J. Class 1.
 
Filming Performances – please see the letter attached.
 
Finally, we are collecting for the Salvation Army who are extremely generous at this time of year in helping others. If you would like to make a donation, the items they are hoping to collect include: collection of Christmas biscuits; Jaffa cakes and chocolate fingers and savoury items; crisps, nibbles, toiletries; shower gel etc. Any donations would be gratefully received by the 14th December latest please.
 
Thank you. See you all tomorrow!
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Dear Parents and Carers
Re: Videos and Photos during school performances.

After much thought and deliberation with the Chair of Governors, we have agreed to permit photos or videos to be taken during school events. However, there needs to be certain rules.

There are many reasons why taking photos or videos can be problematic. This includes the following under the GDPR rules:
*confidentiality,
*religious beliefs,
*children who may be within the care system whereby sharing their image on social media may present a direct risk to them and their safety.

We must make it clear that there may be performances whereby we still need to ask you not to take photographs or videos due to any of the above reasons; however we will ensure you have the opportunity to take photos of your child on stage after the performance.

As you may be aware, the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) came into force in May 2018. This Law amongst many things, states that schools need to get permission from parents to use photos and videos on social media and websites. We have completed this task but parents do not have the permission from other parents (should their child be in the photo or video) to put photos or videos of their children on social media. Therein lays the problem. The Hayes would be in breach of the Law if a parent puts on social media a photo or video of their child with another child who they have not had permission from. This would be the parent’s responsibility who took the photo, however, the school would be penalised and in some cases heavy fines have been given. This is the reason why many schools in Croydon have banned the taking of photos and videos during performances or events.

Despite this, the Data Protection Act is clear and states that photos or videos can be taken for personal use as they are not covered by the Act, but only for personal use. We understand the importance of family memories and are therefore prepared to take an informed risk and trust that you will abide by the below statement taken from the ICO’s (Information Commission Office) website https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/schools/photos/ :

The Data Protection Act is unlikely to apply in most cases where photographs or videos are taken in schools and other educational institutions. If photos are taken for personal use they are not covered by the Act.

This means that you can take photos and videos but they are for YOUR personal use (a family photo album, or a video on the TV) and of your children. Under no circumstances can these be shared on Social Media (ie: Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, etc).

If we discover that you have shared any images or videos, we will be forced to stop any photography and videoing from parents at any future events. This is an informed risk we have decided to take because we know how special memories are but I cannot emphasise how important it is that they cannot be shared publically. I ask you all as parents to also be vigilant here, if you see a photo/video of a school event go on social media, please tell the adult to take the photo off or come into school and we will deal with it. We do not want to stop this because of the small minority. I want to add, any photo or video that is on the school website or Twitter site, the school has permission for.

We are aware that Class 12 were not allowed to take photos or videos of their assembly, this was before the above was reviewed. If we can get permission from all parents to video it, we will do this for you all.

Here’s to a very exciting final fortnight before the holiday season starts.