From the Head

From the Head of Pre-Prep

Dear Parents,

I hope you have found the English and Phonics workshops useful this week. Please don’t worry if you haven’t been able to attend Reception, Year 1 or Year 2’s presentation. The slides we use are available on request.

I attended a Safeguarding Conference in London on Tuesday. It is always good to make sure we are up to date with our information, technology and policies around Keeping Children Safe in Education. If ever you are unsure about a child’s welfare, please don’t hesitate to pass on your concerns to me or any of the teachers.

Your children have been busy making Christmas cards this week. Yes, it’s too early, however it is part of a process which enables you to buy Christmas cards and wrapping paper created by your child. This is run by the P & F who then plough the profit from the sales back into the school, which this year is helping to buy our lovely new train in the Pre-Prep Garden. Thank you, parents!

Thank you to Leena and Kai’s mummy who came in to assembly this week to talk to us about growing up in Japan. I love the idea of the children helping to clean their schools each day! If any of you would like to come and share your experiences of growing up in another country I would love to hear from you.

Next week we have a series of Maths workshops. Reception parents on Monday, Year 1 parents on Tuesday and Year 2 parents on Wednesday. These will all be at 8.45am and will finish by 9.30am. Coffee will be available in the Pre-Prep Dining Room from 8.30am.

On Friday the children will be celebrating with a Harvest Festival assembly. Please bring in any donations of food or toiletries to our Reception by Friday morning at the latest. All donations will be collected by the Swanley Foodbank on Friday morning after our assembly. Please see the list of items that the foodbank would particularly like this year further down the newsletter.

Overheard in Pre-Prep: 

Child: "My dad’s favourite food is gummy bears!"

Have a good weekend,

Zerrin Leech

Harvest Festival Collection Information 

Prep collection

Friday 3rd October only 

As part of our annual Harvest Festival collection for Swanley Foodbank, we would like to let Prep parents know that we will be collecting donations for the foodbank next Friday 3^rd October. Due to storage issues, we are unable to take donations before Friday.

If your child is in Year 4 and on the trip that day, please send the donation in with a sibling. If there are no siblings, we will be able to hold a small amount from the Thursday, but only please if all other avenues for bringing it in on Friday have been exhausted. 

ALL donations can be left on the tables outside the main entrance to the Prep building. They should not be taken up to classrooms. 

Foodbanks operate across the UK and offer a lifeline to many, many families in need. Although called a foodbank, they accept donations of more than foodstuffs. Below is a list of items that they are currently running short of and also items that they request are not donated as they either have too many/ much or they cannot accept them and would have to dispose of them.

Pre-Prep collection

Monday 29th September - Friday 3rd October

Pre-Prep are welcoming Harvest Festival donations from Monday 29th September until the morning of Friday 3rd October when they will be collected by the foodbank. Any extra plastic bags that you can bring in to help with transporting the items will also be much appreciated.

Pupil Ski Trip 2026 space available

A fantastic opportunity has come up for a child to join the Pupil Ski Trip in Easter, 2026, to Montgenevre. 

This trip is open to anyone currently in Years 5 to 8, whether you are an absolute beginner who would like to give it a go or someone who is very at home on the slopes and enjoys fast-paced fun. 

A link to the original letter that was distributed in May can be found here. If your child is interested, please let me know ASAP as I will have to give the place on a first come, first served basis. 

As we are now much further on since the original invitation, the place would need to be secured with the first two instalments being paid together before October half term. The third and final instalment will be invoiced over October half term. 

Do please get in touch if you would like any more information, but I would recommend having the conversation with your child as soon as possible. If you already have a child booked onto the Ski Trip and know of another child who missed out before the summer, do encourage them to have a think about it.

I look forward to hearing from you. 

Mr Wiseman, Deputy Head (Pastoral)

Pupil absences and exclusion periods

When reporting a pupil's absence due to illness, we kindly ask that you include specific details about the nature of the illness. This information is vital in helping us safeguard members of the St Michael's community who are immunosuppressed and therefore are more vulnerable to infections.

If your child has a temperature they must not be sent back to school until they are 24 hours fever free without the need for medication. Any child with vomiting or diarrhoea must be kept home for 48 hours after the last bout. This is to limit the spread of illness in school as much as possible.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

Abby Carlton, School Nurse

Wear yellow for World Mental Health Day (Prep)

To mark World Mental Health Day on Monday 13th October, we are asking Prep children to wear a yellow accessory to school with their normal uniform to raise awareness about mental health and wellbeing. There is no charity donation required for this. 

Thank you in advance for your support!

St Michael’s Senior Schools Fair 2025

Please see the email sent to parents last week for details of our Senior Schools Fair taking place on Wednesday 15^th October.

Our Senior Schools Fair is open to the entire St Michael’s community. It is a valuable opportunity for you to meet representatives from a large variety of senior schools to identify which you are interested in exploring further with your child. We are pleased to be welcoming over 30 senior schools to host stands at the event which include a mixture of independent (day and boarding), state and grammar schools.

Our Senior Schools Fair takes place every three years and therefore we would encourage that parents of children from all year groups attend this event and take up this invaluable opportunity.

We are delighted to share the list of senior schools who will be attending the event:

European Day of Languages

On this special day, we celebrated language learning and linguistic diversity, like many other schools across Europe. To mark the occasion, pupils were invited to wear an accessory and to speak other languages, as did their teachers. We ate food from all over Europe, did quizzes, played games, learnt the alphabet in international sign language and listened to a famous song in 21 languages. We had a lot of multilingual fun!

Juliette Poracchia, Head of Languages

St Michael's U9s impress in Somerhill Football Tournament

St Michael’s U9 boys showed great determination and teamwork at the Somerhill Football Tournament last Saturday, taking on six strong teams in a series of back-to-back matches.

The team worked hard throughout the day, earning several well-deserved wins. One of the standout performances was a 1-0 victory over Hilden Grange where the boys showed focus and resilience.

Their toughest challenge was against Bickley Park School, the eventual tournament winners. It was a close and hard-fought match, with St Michael’s challenging them all the way before narrowly losing 1-0.

Every player contributed to our runner-up position and the team should take pride in their effort, attitude and the progress they have made. It was a valuable experience and they will carry the lessons forward into future matches. Well done, boys!

Team: George B, Reis N, Raphael O, Danny S, Arthur G, Jude S, Daniel L and Rafferty R.

Joffie Shea (Sports Coach)

A wonderful Open Morning

We were delighted to welcome prospective families to St Michael’s today for Open Morning.

There was an incredible buzz and sense of St Michael’s pride around the school as our pupils, Years 7 and 8 tour guides and staff showcased who we are and what we do best. Our guests were in awe of the pupils, lessons and atmosphere they experienced during their tours and many commented on the sense of warmth and belonging that they felt.

With families registering their children as far into the future as 2028, we loved meeting many future members of the St Michael’s family today. 

Thank you to the members of our Parents and Friends and International Club who attended the event.

Big Litter Pick

St Michael's Eco Club invites members of the St Michael's community to take part in our Big Litter Pick this year. Don't forget, you can borrow litter pickers from the Pre-Prep and Prep Offices during term time!

Helena helps out!

Well done to Helena in Year 2 who spent last weekend taking part in St Michael's Big Litter Pick, helping to pick up litter around her local neighbourhood.

Thank you for making a difference to our local environment and wildlife, Helena! 

Please visit our Learning Development Parent Guides page for a collection of valuable resources for parents, focusing on Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). Here you'll find a variety of courses and information designed to support you and your child. Whether you're looking for educational materials, support groups or expert advice, these resources aim to provide the guidance and assistance that you need. We will update the resources each week so please keep checking this page. 

P & F Fun Run bring St Michael's families together

St Michael’s first P & F Fun Run took place last Saturday: it was a fantastic morning full of energy and smiles. Both children and parents ran the 2km and 800m cross-country courses around our beautiful grounds. The atmosphere was wonderful, from our fastest finishers proudly earning their medals to our youngest runners in Nursery crossing the line with huge smiles on their faces. 

Thank you so much to all of the teacher and parent volunteers — and of course to everyone who ran!

St Michael's Parents and Friends Association

P & F Christmas Wreath Workshop

P & F Christmas Fair Farmers' Market

A welcome from your International Club Co-Chairs

Hello and a warm welcome to the new academic year at St Michael’s from the International Club!

We are Yuliya Folland and Urszula Wiszniewska, the current Co-Chairs of the International Club. If you happen to bump into us at school and would like to find out more about the Club, don’t be shy - do stop us for a chat!

Last Friday 19th September, we held our first Coffee Morning of the year at the Pre-Prep Dining Hall. It was lovely to catch up with our regular members after a long summer break. It was also a great pleasure to welcome a few new members representing quite an array of different countries - South Africa, Latvia, India, America and Bulgaria! 

For those wondering what the International Club is - we are a parent run support group for those who come to Britain as non-British citizens or British citizens who have lived abroad. We are very friendly and inclusive, so, really, parents of all nationalities are welcome to join us! It’s also a great space for new parents to ask any questions in an informal environment (whether school or local life related) and amongst like minded parents that come from a range of year groups. We also encourage our parents to speak to our children during school assemblies about their cultures and experiences of living abroad. Throughout the year we organise a number of social events such as walks, Coffee Mornings, evening drinks, cooking workshops, picnics etc. and we always welcome your ideas to keep our repertoire interesting and engaging. Being part of the International Club is very flexible - you can join our WhatsApp group (see QR code below) or keep an eye on the upcoming events via the school newsletter or Classlist, you can attend one event per year or all of them - that’s entirely entirely up to you! 

For any questions (or ideas!) please contact us via Classlist or via an email on intclubstm@gmail.com 

Pre-Prep discover Japan with the International Club!

On Tuesday, St Michael's parent Aya Isobe-Walker treated our Pre-Prep children to a special cultural assembly where they learnt all about Japan.

The session offered a fun and fascinating introduction to Japanese life and culture. The children explored Japan’s geography, discovered the famous high-speed Shinkansen (bullet train), and got a glimpse into the daily life of Japanese school children. Aya also shared insights into traditional celebrations such as New Year and Children’s Day, sparking lots of curiosity and excitement.

There was plenty of enthusiasm when the topic turned to food! Many children recognised Japanese dishes they had tried before or were eager to taste. Aya shared a list of the top five favourite dishes amongst Japanese children—and to everyone’s delight, chips made the list! It seems our pupils agreed with their Japanese peers on that one.

The children also learnt that some everyday items at home—like cars, cameras and game consoles—might have originated in Japan. The session wrapped up with a mini language lesson as the children practised saying "Arigatou" (ありがとう) — which means "Thank you" in Japanese.

We extend a big arigatou to Aya for sharing her time and culture with us. It was a memorable and enriching experience for everyone involved!

The International Club

Players of the Match - week commencing 22nd September 2025

Otford Solar System Model

Follow us on social media!

Make sure you are following St Michael’s social media channels for important updates and content throughout the year.