Assessment week shows fantastic efforts all round!

Assessment week and other learning news

The children have excelled this week at sheer hard work as our assessments took place in classes from Y1 to Y5. We look forward to sharing the results with you at the March parent consultations. Well done one and all for the effort and commitment you have all shown to your learning this week.

Alongside this there has been lots of learning continuing – with Y6 reviewing puberty and the lungs (not at the same time!). We were in for a real treat from Y5 who took to the hall to present their projects about climate change to another class. This showed some excellent presentation skills. I loved their ideas for audience participation as they adopted some of the teaching strategies we use regularly in school. Well done Y5 for some excellent oracy work – we’re proud of you!

And around the rest of school there have been fossils created in Y3, crafting in early years, and Y4 have been reviewing pollution. The highlight of the week was definitely the special lunch Chef Lynn made for us on Tuesday – for the Chinese, or Lunar New Year as it’s now known.

COVID Update

Our risk assessment is now under review ready for the new half term. We intend to review lunchtimes, the use of the hall, outdoor playtime restrictions and arrival and departure arrangements. With Covid rates reducing we are hopeful that we can ease some of the current limitations. We were so excited this week that on one day there were only two children absent with Covid and no staff! We hope this continues.

Kindness Awards for volunteers!

A huge thank you to the volunteers who ably care for our pig and chickens at the weekend. This weekend we were once again visited by stormy, gale force winds and Kara Page and Jo Ross took extra care and attention to get things in place. We couldn’t believe you were on the rota again – as you managed to be on when Storm Arwen visited in November as well. Thank you so much for caring for our animals and helping to repair the mess left from the storm.

Assemblies

Our assemblies so far this half term have been taking place remotely as you can see from the photo in the middle. Now that we have far less Covid in our school community we are returning to the school hall for assemblies. The nature of coming together as a school community is a really big part of CVPS life and so we are looking forward to this. We do continue to maintain good airflow in the hall and we seat classes well apart from one another.

Attendance Policy

Our regular review of the school attendance policy has taken place and a copy has been sent out to families with this newsletter and will be posted onto the school website. Amy and the team are doing a great job of overseeing attendance and offering support when it’s needed. Please let Amy know if you would like a hand to support your child’s routines in the mornings – children often take reminders more readily from those who aren’t their parents and we want to celebrate the positive messages about the many successful attendees we have in school! We are looking forward to more opportunities for celebrating regular attendance and punctuality throughout the year so that great attendees don’t miss out as a result of necessary appointments for example.

Playground Leaders

This week we have appointed some playground leaders in each class to promote fun and active games at playtimes. The leaders will work together to organise playground games and activities for children in their class to participate in and encourage inclusion. They will also ensure all equipment is looked after and distributed / collected at playtimes. Staff will support leaders with their developing skills such as communication, fair play, organising groups / teams and the STEP principle (Space, Task, Equipment, People) We are excited to launch this initiative from Year 2 up to Year 6.

Our playground leaders are:
Year 2 – Henry Taylor, Anabelle Lister and Max Morrison
Year 3 – Lily Norman, Joshua Mitchell and Avraj Singh
Year 4 – Eden Makavu, Ryan Wells, Maddison Fyfe and Amelia Nicholson
Year 5 – Lucy Manson, Zara Wallace and Max Pearson
Year 6 – Fearne Piriz and Katie Russell

Paul’s Outdoor Idea

Last Wednesday we had the date 2.2.22 which mathematically is a palindromic number. The next won’t be until ……… well actually 22.2.22 is just around the corner!

This week I would like you to get out and about and spot pairs of things. Two pine cones, two birds, two hills, two squirrels or anything in pairs. Alternatively, you could make the number 2 out of leaves or twigs or anything natural you like.

Family Support Worker Amy’s Update

Are you an attendance HERO?

At CVPS, we love to celebrate the children that are Here, Everyday, Ready and On Time. We only have one more week at school before the half term holidays. So make sure you are here, everyday and ready on time to be celebrated during our achievement assembly. We would also like to support children to work towards their Attendance Hero status. I will be running Attendance Hero sessions for children to help encourage amazing attendance and perfect punctuality.

Since Year 3 have been doing an outstanding job with their attendance and punctuality this half term, I asked Lily and James to share some of their top tips with me. Lily said that she has an early alarm to get her up, she gets dressed straight away and has her breakfast. She has a super good routine that means she even has time to practise her times tables before school! James said he has a good routine too. He has an alarm at 7.15 am that plays one of his favourite songs. He shared that having a song he likes as his alarm makes it seem much easier to get up. Great tip!

Lyla’s funeral Monday the 7th February at 10am

We would like to offer the opportunity for our school community to bring in some flowers, a card or small teddy tributes to the bench at the front of school when they arrive on Monday morning. These will be taken to Lyla’s final resting place in the coming days and we will take a photograph of it for Lyla’s family. Lyla will come past the school gates around 10am on Monday morning and we will be there as a school team alongside the children in Y4 and Y5. Melissa Costello, Michael Mullaghan and myself will attend the funeral to represent the school and share some of our memories of this special little girl who we all miss so much. We have a bereavement counsellor on site to support the teaching teams across school on Monday but to be particularly on hand for those children in Y4 and Y5 who will undoubtedly feel emotional. We talked about the many different ways people grieve and how it’s fine to get on with things as normal and equally fine to be upset. We are expecting this to be a difficult day for the staff and children across Y3 to Y6 and we will be adapting our teaching input to accommodate appropriate activities in these classes. Please let us know if you feel your child may need extra support.

Achievement Awards

Kindness champions – Tilly Merrett, Freya Brady, Millie Mitchinson,
Oakley Taylor, Masie Morrison, Antonio Atzeni and Kevin Kilpatrick
AND the Ross and Page families
Swimmer of the week – Emily Taws-Bertram
Gold celebrations – YR – Amie Kaur, Y1 – Nadia Al Haj Moussa