Category Archives: Character Development

Head’s Blog 30th June 2023

This week has been all about community – our school and village.

Head’s Blog 26th May 2023

What a fabulous sunny and warm week it has been. It finally feels like spring has arrived and that summer is on its way.

Go to this Sway

Head’s Blog 21st April 2023

Welcome to our new look blog for the Summer Term. Each class is taking responsibility for its own section and will use it as an opportunity to share learning and celebrate our School Values…

Go to this Sway

Head’s Blog – 16th December 2022

After the snowfall at the beginning of the week and the freezing temperatures experienced all week it is a surprise that we have managed to get into school! A huge Thank you to Mrs Peters who came into school on Monday and cleared safe passage ways into and around school. As she said, she certainly earned a mince pie or two!

Mrs Peters and Mrs Ridgway, along with all of the pupils in Oak class have worked really hard to put together a fabulous Nativity performance. I was really overwhelmed how the children knew all of their words to the songs and their lines. Our vision of creating children who can communicate confidentially is certainly working as the performance was spectacular. Four year olds knowing what to say on a stage to a full audience is just amazing. Thank you to all of them and to our families who came to watch.

After the Nativity, we all made our way to the church for refreshments, to “buy” the children’s Christmas crafts and for the carol service and Christingle. The hot drinks and cake, all organised my Jane and Domme Geloso (thank you so much) were most welcomed as the church was as cold inside as the minus temperatures outside! Years 3 and 4 children went onto perform ‘Twas the Night before Christmas, Norah played her Tenor Horn and years 5 and 6 told us all about Christmas traditions from around the world. This culminated in them leading our Christingle service. As is tradition at Clearwell we sing Away in a Manger, accapella, in candlelight. It is always a magnificent site and sounds fabulous. Lots of children have been awarded a “Developing who we are badge”

Thank you so much to everyone who came, the feedback has been lovely. We also managed to raise over £700 (Including raffle tickets sales) which all goes into school funds to provide a range of things for our children, including iPads and adventures.

A huge thank you to everyone who donated food for our reverse advent calendar. All of this food has gone to the Forest Food bank to support members of our community who need it.

Our Celebrations

Today we celebrated more ‘Developing who we are’ badge winners and a number of children read out some poetry in Worship. We have so many confident communicators in our school.

Head’s Blog – 9th December 2022

Christmas has well and truly arrived at Clearwell. Our first adventure was to the castle for our annual singing to members of the community as well as have a party and meet Father Christmas. This year, Coleford Fire Brigade provided the transport for Father Christmas in their Billy Float. Thank you so much. As you can see from the photographs, the children were so excited, especially with the “snow”. I wonder if we will get the real thing this weekend?!

Thank you Father Christmas, Matt and Kat

We have started making the items for our Christmas Bazaar that will be taking place on Wednesday 14th December. The itinerary is as follows:

1:15 Oak class perform the Nativity in the Memorial Hall, all parents welcome

1:45 Refreshments and children’s craft sale at the church. Raffle tickets for sale.

2:15 KS2 Christmas performance and carols, leading straight onto our candle-lit Christingle, all welcome including members of our community. We will draw the raffle and give out the prizes. Children will be free to go home after this is all completed.

Here are a selection of images from the week of being creative, parents will be able to make a donation in exchange for the items. They will all be labelled so you know which item belongs to which child!

It was our Christmas dinner and annual visit to Clearwell Caves today. Mrs Thomas, Mrs Knight and Mrs Edey have done a fabulous job preparing, cooking and serving us. We absolutely loved our food and are all really grateful for the work that they put in today and everyday. Children never go home hungry from Clearwell!

We will be singing carols at Clearwell’s Christmas Fayre in the village hall on Saturday at 2:00 pm if you would like to come along.

Years 3 and 4 have been out and about having an adventure in Clearwell conducting their Geography field work where they were look at physical and man-made features within our local community. Being out and about brings everything to life, more so than a book, that is why we like having adventures!

Our Celebrations

We have lots of celebrations this week as we did our end of term awards and rewards. Children were able to spend their dojos which they have earned for reading and other good learning behaviours. In addition to this, all children who have over 97% attendance went into a prize draw for cinema tickets and the lucky winner was Reggie; his brother was happy!

Head’s Award – Macey, Christi Angel – Freya, Top Learner (English) – Macey

These children have all received Developing who we are badges this week. They are truly being inspired to take responsibility for their own learning and character development. One girl played her tenor horn to us in Worship, she will get her badge next week!

Head’s Blog – 2nd December 2022

Despite the weather outside being freezing and foggy, we have been having a wonderful time in school. Reception children have been reading the Gingerbread man and have completed a host of activities surrounding this. It culminated in them baking Gingerbread men to take home. Mrs Ridgway was too engrossed to take photographs during the process but she took some of the finished products, thank you. There is also a sample of their writing where they have been using Fred talk to write CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words. I am so impressed with the outcomes.

I love Fridays at Clearwell and not because it is nearly the weekend! It is the day that we celebrate the successes from the week with just a couple of children from each class highlighted (to be honest we struggle to pick one as there are always so many to choose from!); also because children get to share things that they are proud of. A bit like a whole school show and tell. Today, Amelia shared her trophies from Baton Twirling and a number of other children shared things that they created having been inspired by their learning in school. Oak class have been learning about poetry this week and two of the children performed their poems that they have written at home. I will translate them as they have been written by a Y2, completely independent. I wish I had recorded them performing them.

Matilda: I put my hand on the sky, feel the rhythm of the cloud. I put my hand on the bridge, feel the rhythm of the train. I put my hand on the window, feel the rhythm of the rain. I put my hand on the petal feel the rhythm of the plant.

Francesco: Yesterday I saw a dark, dark figure. A dark, dark figure it was. It turned out it wasn’t there.

We also had a few children showing off other creative things, including a home for a penguin. This project was a collaboration!

We use our iPads a lot in school for a whole range of activities, one being Stop Frame Animation. One of our Y6 children asked his dad to help him make some stands for them after I said that they would be useful. We love the outcomes. A huge thank you to our Y6 and his dad, Richard.

Our Celebrations

Christi-Angels: Maci and Roman. Top Learner: Florence – mathematician. Maci also received Developing who we are badges.

Head’s Blog – 25th November 2022

We have been showing our courageous advocacy this week with with children bringing in a number of shoe boxes for Teams4u. Keith and Sandy Jones collect them from us every year and arrange them to be send to different countries according to need. We have also had children starting to bring in food items for families in our community that need a bit of support at this expensive time of year. If you are able to donate then please do bring them into our reception. Children also brought in a range of different bottles for our school raffle. Tickets have been sent home with children and if members of our community would like to buy them then please contact admin@clearwell.gloucs.sch.uk and we can arrange payment. Thank you.

As part of our vision, we encourage children to be creative. Our year 3 and 4 children have been making their own paint using spices as part of their Stone Age art.

We need to say a huge thank you to Mr and Mrs Davies (they have children in Reception and Year 4) who after finding out that our CD player had broken bought us a sound system to use. This was as a thank you for supporting their children to settle into school life. We cannot thank them enough for their generosity and cannot wait to use it.

Our Celebrations

Head’s Blog – 18th November 2022

The weather is starting to cool off now so our Reception children have been learning about what it means to hibernate. They have been creative and made their own hedgehogs and their habitats. They are going to keep an eye out for hedgehogs at home and help them to survive the winter.

Today has been Children in Need day, so we have been learning about what this charity is about and the huge range of children that are supported by them. We came in a range of clothes, some of which were spotty and lots of families donated. As a school we raised over £60, so thank you very much. We encourage our children to be advocates of change, whether this is through donating to charities or making a difference to someone or something in another way.

As part of our “Developing who we are” offer, we gave out our first badge (they are being made, very enthusiastically, by our year 6 children. Eevee was the very first recipient of a silver badge for her talent (Creative part of our vision) of writing and performing a poem as part of our Remembrance service last week. Lots more will be awarded over the next few weeks as we encourage children to take a lead in their personal development and show us what they have been successful in achieving.

Our Celebrations

Ten of our Y5 and 6 children participated in a National Maths Challenge this week, many achieving the Bronze award. Zach was highly successful and achieved Gold and has the opportunity to do the Bonus Round in the summer months. We are really proud of all of these children for seeing themselves as mathematicians.

Head’s Blog – 14th October 2022

There is definitely an Autumnal feel in the air as we move towards our final week of term one. I cannot believe how quickly this term has passed us by. Mrs Griffiths and Oak class have been out on their Welly Walk, enjoying the sunshine and looking at lichen. They have been investigating how it can vary from tree to tree. Below you will also see the tree that the children observe every week to look at seasonal changes. As they pause, they start with a prayer/thank you for this special tree.

We have been lucky enough to have Andy Seed, a local author, in this week to talk to KS2 about flora and fauna in the Forest of Dean. The children really enjoyed his presentation and have been inspired to write their own poetry.

The whole school have had the privilege of going to the Forest of Dean gymnastics centre for one of the PE sessions this term. They get specialised coaching from staff from the centre, alongside our teachers too. Using the equipment means that the children have the opportunity to see what is available to them in our local area and a number of our children have gone on to be members of a squad at the gym following our sessions. Lots more join other gymnastics clubs. We love to inspire our children in all aspects of their life.

As part of our Developing Who we are offer, the children have designed the images for each of the badges that they are able to earn for trying to be the best version of themselves that they can be. Below is a link to the booklet which contains the images.

http://www.clearwellprimaryschool.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Developing-who-we-are.pdf

Our Celebrations

Macey was a Top Learner for her reading this week.

Head’s Blog – 7th October 2022

We have had a great week celebrating and encouraging children to develop who they are and be the best that they can be. We have appointed two Head students who always lead by example within school. The school council have had their second meeting and have been feeding back to their classes with information gained as well as bringing in ideas from their class. This week the focus was on our new personal/character development programme ”Developing who we are”. We have built this programme to enable children to challenge themselves in line with our curriculum vision. This includes being creative, adventurous, confident communicators and life-long learners. Next week the children will be entering a competition to design a logo for each badge. The children’s book will be issued after half term.

Science in years 3 and 4 has been hands-on again. To support learning how fossils are formed the children used different types of bread and jelly worms as a quick investigation. The scientific explanation will be reinforced in coming lessons, in line with Rosenshine’s principles of instruction. This helps children to retain information into their long term memory.