Dear Parent,

Thank you to those parents who attended the Focus Group on Friday. It was a very helpful discussion. I hope to hold another group meeting after half term.

Congratulations to the winners of the Nursery Contact Details Draw- Nasra Ibrahim and Annabel Carrington! They each won a £5.00 gift card. These blue cards are really important to us in our day to day running of the school so if you change your phone number at any point during the year, please let the office know.

The Tesco Farm to Fork visits are continuing this week with Class 1/2DJ’s visit on Tuesday and Class 1/2E’s visit on Friday. (The date for Class 1/2 DJ’s visit was changed from the Diary Dates sheet because of a later appointment change.) These visits have proved to be very popular and help children to have a better understanding of the food on their plate.

Also on Tuesday, PC Amy Williams, the Schools’ Liaison Officer, will be visiting to talk to Year 3 pupils about Bullying and to Year 4 pupils about Internet Danger.

This visit is part of the regular programme of police visits that occur throughout the year. If you would like to see one of the sessions that your child is attending, please let me know.

The actor and drama coach Jamie Jarvis joins the Year 5 pupils on Wednesday afternoon for their second Chartist Drama session. They are preparing for their re-enactment of the Chartist March down Stow Hill which took place 175 years ago. They will be walking down Stow Hill on Tuesday 4th November from 1.00pm and will be performing in Westgate Square.

Our Harvest Festival service will be held on Thursday morning in the top hall at 9.15am. All classes are performing an item and you are welcome to join us if you would like to. It would be lovely if you were able to send in vegetables, tinned or packet foods ready for this service. All food collected will go to The Raven House Trust which is an organisation which distributes food to the hungry and homeless of Newport. Tesco Extra on Newport Road have again promised to bake
our harvest loaf for us and we will share this with children after the service.

After the Harvest Festival, the first of the Family Learning Literacy courses will run. The normal time will be 9.00-11.00am and during the sessions, your child will join you for some literacy activities. This first course will last for six weeks and will be mainly for parents of Reception children but if you have a child in Year 1 and you were unable to attend last year, you would be welcome to join to find out about literacy activities that you can do at home to help your child. These sessions will be led by Mrs Carrie John, who is a teacher with Newport’s Family Learning Service, and who has worked with us in the past. (A separate letter is coming out.) Family Learning courses planned for the rest of the school year are below and letters will be sent out about these courses.

Reception/Year 1- Numeracy (6 weeks)-Thursday 27th November (4th Dec, 11th Dec, then 8th, 15th, and 22nd January 2015)

Nursery-Language and Play (3 weeks)- Friday 9.15-11.15am or 1.00-3.00pm (14th, 21st Nov and 5th Dec)/Second course for ‘Rising Three ‘ parents Friday 16th, 23rd and 30th Jan 2015)

Year 2/3 Numeracy- Thursday 29th Jan, 5th Feb, 12th Feb, 26th Feb, 5th March and 12th March.

Also, Thursday 19th and 26th March-Special projects.
The MEND Healthy Eating course for children and parents, which is run by a dietician, is running on a Thursday evening in the Nursery from 3.30-5.00pm. Although these courses are attended mainly by children from other schools, children from our school are able to attend, so, if you are interested in this, please contact me.

Applications to High School

If your child is in Year 6, then last week you will have received a booklet and an information letter about applications to high school. You are able to make your secondary applications on-line until 12 noon on 1st December.

You can access the form on the Newport website using the following link:
http://www.newport.gov.uk/stellent/groups/public/documents/form/cont728582.pdf

Parental Consultations

These consultations will be held on Tuesday 21st October (3.45-7.30pm) and Wednesday 22nd October (3.45-5.30pm) for parents whose children are in full-time school. Nursery Consultations will be held on Tuesday 4th and Wednesday 5th November during the school day. We will allocate appointments to all parents and we take every care to help you with these appointments by giving you some choice.

Please complete and return the attached form for School Parental Consultations by Friday 10th October so that appointments can be confirmed with you next week. Appointments will be allocated on a first come, first served basis.

Photographer

A reminder that the school photographer will be in on Thursday 16th October to take photographs of all the children in school and nursery. There is no obligation to buy any of these photos. If you would like a photograph taken of a younger brother or sister still at home, then please arrive at 8.45am to join a queue.

Bonus Ball

Congratulations to our winner this week- Mrs Lord, our school cook!

Yours sincerely,

H Vaughan
Headteacher