Dear Parent/Carer,
It was lovely to see such good attendance at the first of our Family Learning sessions with Mrs Couch this term last Thursday.

The Diary Dates sheet accompanies this newsletter and the dates of future Family Learning sessions are shown on it in green. (Apologies for the delay while we waited for dates to be confirmed.) Please let me know if you think that there would be anything that you would like to see covered in Family Learning or other parent courses in the summer term.

A paper copy of the Diary Dates sheet will also be sent home.

This Week
This is a fairly quiet week and, apart from some local walks in the area, children are busy with their class activities.

Clubs have started well and it was lovely to have Mrs Peterson and Mrs Kemp, from Bethesda Church in Rogerstone, with us again to start Discovery Club again last Wednesday.

It’s great also to have Newport Live coaches running a Football Club on a Friday after school.

Rights of the Child
Every fortnight we look at different rights of the Child, from the United Nations Convention on Human Rights.

At the start of term our focus rights were:
Article 7 – I have a right to a name and to belong to a country
Article 8 – I have a right to an identity
For the next fortnight, our focus right is:
Article 13 – I have the right to find out and share information

Questionnaire
Thank you very for completing our Behaviour for Learning questionnaire. We held a meeting last Thursday and were able to review the questionnaire together. However, we plan to hold a follow up meeting on Friday 3rd February at 2.30pm because I know that some parents found a Thursday meeting time tricky. This next meeting will be a chance to discuss the behaviour work that we are doing and also an opportunity for you to provide us with some opinions about our curriculum. We will share a summary at that meeting and also share notes with parents so that you are aware of discussion, even if you couldn’t attend.

Stow Hill Pantry
This will be open again on Thursday from 3.15-4.00pm in the Family Room near the Nursery entrance. Please bring your second token with you.

If you would like to access the pantry, please contact the school for tokens. We are running a four-week token system and very much want to support you if you are struggling. We hope also that we can help you to contact other agencies for help.

Thank you to some parents who have volunteered to help sort and organize the food as it is delivered.

Industrial Action
You will be aware that members of the National Education Union have voted in favour of strike action next Wednesday. This means that many members of that union will not be attending work in schools across the UK.

At present I am unable to confirm the numbers of teaching staff in our school who will be taking strike action, but I anticipate that there will be disruption for several classes and there will be some class closures because of this.

In making any decision about class closures, all schools will do everything they can to minimize disruption for families and will follow clear guidance from Newport City Council about staffing ratios, pupil and staff numbers and health and safety issues.

The proposed dates for industrial action by the NEU are:
Wednesday 1st February
Tuesday 14th February
Wednesday 15th March
Thursday 16th March

The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) of which I am a member, has voted in favour of action short of strike, which means amongst other things, that there will be a number of actions and meetings that they will not do after 3.30pm.

We have received information from Newport City Council about the current situation and will be receiving more in the next day or so. As soon as I am in a position to provide you with more information I will do, so that you are fully informed about the situation next week.

Very kind regards,
H L Vaughan
Headteacher