Monthly Archives: November 2018

Head’s Blog – 30th November

We have had quite a quiet week in school, the calm before the is the Christmas period!  Mrs Griffiths has been working with KS2 in preparation for their Greek Celebration Assembly which is taking place on Friday 7th November at 9:15.  They will then be working on a wreath which will be displayed at Taurus crafts.  We are in desperate need of white and silver wool for poms poms if anyone has some that they would like to donate.

 

Roger Dury worked with Willow again to ensure that their story telling skills are ready to present their Shadow Puppet productions.  All details have been text to parents and we hope to see you all there.

 

Our Celebrations

Head’s Blog – 23rd November

Once again you have been extremely generous with your donations for our Christmas Fayre which has been fully organised by Friends.  These will form hampers and other prizes for the squash or alcohol stall.

 

Safeguarding

As part of our on-going CPD, I have attended a training session which makes us aware of current issues within education.  One area that awareness is being raised about is that of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and their impact on later life.  It was so powerful I wanted to share the link with people to watch.  The basic message is that we all have a responsibility to support children and a little bit of TLC can make a huge amount of difference.

 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YiMjTzCnbNQ

 

Shadow puppets – preparing for Coleford Christmas Festival (1st December 2018)

Greek inspired homework

Our Celebrations

Mrs Thomas was so excited this week when Environmental Health visited and awarded us with a 5 star hygiene rating.  It is something that she has been waiting for for years but it couldn’t be achieved until the kitchen has been refurbished. Now that is in place, Mrs Thomas was able to demonstrate that all of her paperwork was perfect too.

 

Head’s Blog- 16th November 2018

Following the receipt of 600 bulbs, Oak class spent their welly walk planting so that we will have a beautiful display of flowers in the garden.  Photographs of the planting will follow – I forgot to bring them home! Unfortunately this meant that we were unable to distribute the Christmas Fayre flyers, fortunately a fabulous parent has volunteered to do this. Thank you.

Health and Safety

All children who were in school on Thursday have been taught how to use our play equipment safely.  They need to hold on with both hands and only have one person on a piece at a time.  I was hoping to post a video but unfortunately this couldn’t happen.  If you are unsure how to keep your children safe on the equipment then please ask.  We are happy for your children to use the equipment before and after school but please be aware that it is your responsibility that they do this safely before 8:40 a.m. and after 3:15 p.m.

 

Light box Puppet shows

All pupils have been making puppets for their light box puppet shows which they will be sharing at Coleford Baptist Chapel on Saturday 1st December at approximately 3:00 p.m. then participating in the parade.  The children have worked really hard today doing the preparations, and will be perfecting their performances next week. Roger Dury, Kirsti and Kate said how creative our children were especially Willow in their story writing and how they collaborated well as a team. This was lovely to hear as these are things that we have been working on with our new curriculum.

Poppy has written a brief summary of her morning:

This morning we planned our story for the puppet show. Our theme was a bird called diamond and an explorer who was trying to turn on the Northern Lights.  Then, Toby and I made our puppet theatre. My favourite part was making the puppets and seeing the start and finish.

 

As you can see the children are all “spotty” for Children in Need. Thank you for all of your donations.

 

Complaints

We do our very best to resolve all issues that parents come to talk to us about to the best of our ability; ideally with all parties happy with the resolution. Sometimes this doesn’t happen but we have a set procedure and policy in place to ensure that there is transparency in the way that we act.  The full complaints policy can be found in the policies section of the website. The one element that I would like to point out is that complaints need to be from a named person, not an anonymous collective.

 

More Greek independent learning

Our Celebrations

 

Head’s Blog – 9th November

Thank you so much for your generosity. We have had a thank you from Forest Food bank who have said that we have donated 42.05 kg of food.  This was enough to provide about 100 meals for people in our local community who may otherwise have gone hungry.

Teams4u came and collected the show boxes that were put together by members of our community.  I spoke to the children this week about inclusivity and explained that it didn’t matter if you bought in one item to go in the box or a whole box full.  We were really impressed by the amount of donations we had for such a small school.  Thank you for supporting such a worthy cause and being a Collabomera!

 

 

Earlier in the year I requested some bulbs for our garden.  A huge box with other resources arrived this week.  It had over 600 bulbs to plant into our garden! KS1 are going to do this on Wednesday with Mrs Griffiths and Mr Gazzard is coming in to give us a helping hand and advice on the best places to plant them.

Remembrance

We have received lots of positive comments from the local community about poppies outside of our school.  We have now added to the display in St. Peter’s church with our own home-made poppies, they look stunning.  We will be meeting at the memorial hall to lay a wreath at 10:20 a.m. on Sunday 11th November. Everyone is welcome to join us.

Greek shields

Our Celebrations

Head’s Blog – 2nd November 2018

What a change in the weather this week.  I hope that you all had a wonderful week’s break from the the school run last week and enjoyed the lovely weather that we had.   I was so pleased to see 20% of our pupils attending the commemoration of Private Mile’s Victoria Cross.  It was a truly emotional experience and one that I hope the children will remember forever.  Their singing was wonderful and the fellow attendees were truly impressed.  Thank you to Mrs Griffiths for taking the time to come and lead the singing.

 

With Remembrance in mind, we have been spending some time thinking about the end of the Great War and have made some poppies which will be displayed in St. Peter’s Church, Clearwell.  This is one of the reasons we have made the decision to attend the Remembrance service at Clearwell  as opposed to Coleford Clock Tower.  We have also put 11 large poppies outside the school as a mark of respect to those who lost their lives in any war.

 

 

New play equipment

We have used some of our Sports Premium funding to install this apparatus.  Please encourage your children to use it safely and sensibly.  I am hoping that we can add to it, it is just where we can put it.

 

Craft club

Once again pupils have been learning new skills at craft club with Mavis.  They were weaving ivy to create wreaths, the finished products were stunning.

 

Independent learning activities

Once again we have been overwhelmed with the work produced at home linked to out topic of the Greeks, whether it is something where they have collaborated with a family member or completed it independently.

Our Celebrations