Dear Parent/Carer,
Congratulations
Class 3/4M did a great Class Assembly about their work this year. It was lovely to hear so many interesting facts! It was also lovely to see so many parents and grand parents who had come to support them. Thank you.
Green Day
Thank you for supporting the Eco Team Green Day on Friday! We had some lovely plants donated and also raised £94.00. The Eco Team will be deciding what they want to buy with the money and they will let you know. They are working hard to get the Platinum Award and will be assessed later in the term.
Road Crossing App
Junior children have been working with Dr Catherine Purcell, from the University of South Wales, to help with the development of a road traffic crossing app. She and her team of researchers have visited us regularly over the past year and half and today to they came to trial the final completed version. It was great to be able to see the finished product! We are really enjoying being part of this project.
Milittlepad
The coding sessiosn for classes 5/6P and 5/6W continue to run on a Monday. There are two more sessions left. (I need to check about the one owing)
Cricket
Boys who took part in the Kwik Cricket Festival at the International Sports Village at Spytty Park last Tuesday were a credit to the school! Well done to everyone and also to Callum Davies, who was Man of the Match!
The Girls’ Festival is on Wednesday.
We have two more after school Cricket Workshops left. They are this Wednesday and next. I’m really grateful to Newport Cricket Club for the opportunity they have provided to us with this coaching.
Father’s Day Sale
Our Father’s Day Sale will start tomorrow at breaktime. Items are priced from 50p to £2.00.
Thank you if you have sent in, or made, items to sell. (We are still accepting donations.) Thank you also to Mrs Kidd and Mrs Martin who have been busy wrapping up the gifts to sell in their own time.
All money raised will go towards buying additional ICT equipment.
Dementia Awareness Day
We are running a cake sale and Dementia Awareness Day on Thursday. Staff are baking cakes which we will be selling at 50p each to raise funds for the Alzheimer’s Society Children will also have a class discussion, appropriate to their age, about Dementia, which affects several families in our school community. Newport is a Dementia Friendly City and we would like to become a Dementia Friendly School.
If you would like to bake a dozen cakes for us, please let the office know so that we can include them in our numbers.
Attendance and Punctuality
The current school attendance and punctuality levels were discussed in our meeting last week with the Principal Education Officer, Val Davies, and the Assistant Head of Education, Martin Dacey. We confirmed that we will now issue Fixed Penalty Notices when nesessary. Our Education Welfare Officer, Sue Haigh, will be visiting the school more regularly and she will also visit more families in order to help raise attendance.
As a school, we are doing every single thing we possibly can to increase attendance, and Newport City Council are aware of that.
The fact remains, however, that the attendance levels of individual pupils have to improve.
I also know that the vast majority of our parents support us in every way with this and I’d like to thank you for that.
Parent Forum
We’d like to try a different way of consulting with parents about school because the format and timing of Parent Focus Group sessions may not have been the most convenient for everyone.
We’d like to establish a Parent Forum, meeting once a term, and there are a number of ways that we could run this. If you think that you would be interested in finding out more, please complete and return the attached sheet to let us know your preferred times to meet. If necessary, we will run two sessions, one in school time, and one after school. Your opinions are very important to us and can help us to shape our strategy for the year ahead.
INSET Day
There is an INSET Day on Friday and school and Nursery will be closed for the day. The focus of the INSET day will be the new curriculum based on the Welsh Government’s Successful Futures document (which we have already begun to work on).
Bonus Ball
There is a rollover this week.
Yours sincerely,
H L Vaughan
Headteacher