Editor's choice March 2007

Cool Cats

by Alex Vannelli

Tindal Primary School held a ‘Cool Cats campaign week’ to boost
the attendance and improve punctuality of the schools young
children; the week was arranged into a timetable with activities in
the morning and afternoon. These activities were set out to teach
the children that going to school and being punctual are great fun,
so much fun most children were getting to the school several hours
earlier to make sure they got involved. The Cool Cat campaign
week was held at Tindal School not because of bad attendance at
the school but because most primary schools have chosen to hold
these weeks to help the children.

The activities included coloring competitions, pancake races,
attendance and punctuality circle time, quizzes and more. Pupil
Watch came on Thursday and brought two officers that agreed to
dress up in the cool cat costume. The Pupil Watch teams are
supervised by a uniformed police officer; the officer has the power
to collect any child that is unauthorized to be out of school. The
week ended with a celebration day, the community police and
educational social workers presented the children with their awards.
The whole school community came together and got involved in
making this possible which included parents, school governors and
staff. Central TV also came to record a circle time session to inform
the public of what was going on and how it helped. Tindal School
surprised and impressed the Cool Cats when they performed their
own Cool Cats song that they had written.

Head Teacher Susan Skillett said “The week was a brilliant and fun
way to get the message across to the children and taught them that
attending school and being punctual to all lessons and assemblies is
not only compulsory but also great fun.” She went on to say “The
cool cats week definitely showed a vast improvement, the kids
enjoyed it very much and I would like the Cool Cats team to come
every term as their educational value was noticed by the staff and
relished by the kids.”

The children when asked about the week said “It was fun because
there were competitions and prizes and we were greeted at the
school gates with stickers”, Sammy Mohammed. “The cool cat
week was helpful as when you grow up you have to learn skills and
this helped us learn these skills”, Sophina Khatun.