Dear Parents and Carers,

Anti-Bullying Week – Odd Socks Day
We started the week with Odd Socks Day, the perfect way to launch Anti-Bullying Week. By wearing our odd socks, we celebrated individuality and all the things that make each of us unique. This year’s theme, Power for Good, encouraged children to think about kindness, friendship, and the importance of using their voices to stand up to bullying. During class collective worship, the children reflected thoughtfully on what it means to treat others with respect.

Remembrance Day
On Tuesday, Mr Oldfield led a special collective worship for children in Years 2–6, where pupils came together to pay their respects and learn why Remembrance Day continues to be such an important occasion for our country. I spent time with Reception and Year 1, helping them understand the significance of remembrance and why we wear poppies.
We were incredibly proud of the children’s exemplary behaviour as the whole school observed a minute’s silence.

Parent and Carer Meetings
Thank you to all the parents and carers who attended appointments with class teachers this week. It was lovely to welcome everyone into school, and we hope you found the meetings helpful and supportive in understanding how to continue supporting your child’s learning and development at home.

Basketball League
The basketball league continued on Tuesday with some fantastic performances, which Mr Oldfield had the pleasure of watching in person. The girls team won 5 games and drew 1. The boy’s team won 2, drew 2 and lost 1. Thank you once again to parents for supporting with transport—it is greatly appreciated.

Children in Need
After beginning the week with Odd Socks, we ended it with wonderful maths themed costumes for our second non-uniform day of the year.  The theme for Children in Need this year is ‘Challenge Yourself’. Throughout the week we have had a focus on maths challenges and it has been wonderful to see the great problem-solving skills demonstrated by all year groups. Our donations have raised £427.00 for  Children in Need. Thank you everyone for your kindness and generosity.

Parent and Foundation Governor Vacancies
Our Chair of Governors wrote to you earlier in the week as we are currently looking for a new Parent Governor and a new Foundation Governor. If you are interested please complete the google form below by 12 noon on Wednesday 26^th November. Thank you.

Parent/Governor Application/Nomination Form

Foundation Governor Application/Nomination Form

Wishing you all a wonderful weekend

Vikki Richardson

Term dates 2025-26:

• Term 2 Monday 3rd November 2025 to Friday 19th December 2025
• Term 3 Monday 5th January 2026 to Friday 13th February 2026 (Inset day Mon 5th Jan children not in school) 
• Term 4 Monday 23rd February 2026 to Thursday 2nd April 2026
• Term 5 Monday 20th April 2026 to Friday 22nd May 2026 (Academy day Fri 22nd May children not in school) 
• Term 6 Monday 1st June 2026 to Wednesday 22nd July 2026 (Inset days Mon 20th, Tues 21st and Academy day Weds 22nd July, children not in school) 

PTA Christmas Fair - Sunday 23rd November 12-3pm

By now, all your children should have received their raffle tickets. There are some wonderful prizes to be won, please encourage your family and friends to take part! If you need any more raffle tickets please ask at the school office who have lots of spare!

We will be asking for donations for the fair, these include:-

BOTTLES for the bottle tombola - anything in a bottle is good for this stall (wine, water, shampoo...)

Second Hand Toys & Books - please bring in good quality second hand toys and books for our second hand stall. We will also take Christmas pyjamas and Christmas jumpers. 

Lucky Jars for a tombola style stall - collect empty jars then fill them with sweets, treats, small toys then decorate in a festive way. No nuts OR unwrapped foods please.

A HUGE thanks to those who have ordered from our Amazon wish list, and to those who have offered to volunteer.

We will need volunteers on the morning of Friday 21st to sort through all the generous donations, if you'd like to help or if you have any question please email 

[email protected]

Please do volunteer for your class stall – contact your class rep for more information!

Thank you very much in advance for any help you can give! The Christmas Fair is one of our biggest fundraising events for the school, so please support us if you can.??

It has been another jam-packed week of learning in Reception. On Tuesday it was the 11^th of November so we learned about Remembrance Day and why we mark this day every year. We talked about why we wear poppies and listened to the story ‘Where the Poppies Now Grow’ by Hilary Robinson and Martin Impey. We enjoyed making our own poppies and using the loose parts to make poppy pictures.        

It was Anti-bullying week in school and the children really enjoyed listening to the story ‘How to be a Lion’ by Ed Vere. This initiated conversations around how to stay true to your values and speak up for yourself respectfully.

The phonics focus for this week was v, w, x and y – look out for the correct pronunciation of the phoneme ‘w’ and ‘y’ on the handout provided as it’s a bit tricky! We are so proud of how hard the children are using their phonemes to blend for reading – keep on practising!

We had a special focus in maths this week as our theme for Children in Need was ‘maths challenges’. Children were practising finding 4 and 5 and then trying to represent it using loose parts, Numicon tiles and counters on five and ten frames. Sharing stories in the provision with pictures of 4 and 5 for counting, subitising and grouping encouraged one to one correspondence and totalling. We loved the children’s ‘something mathematical’ themed outfits – very creative and certainly injected some enthusiasm into our maths learning!

In Maths, we practiced the language part, whole, add and equal to. We used Numicon and counters to show two parts adding together to make the whole number. We experimented with more than one way of making five with two different parts (2+3=5, 1+4=5) and then continued with other numbers up to 10. We loved being able to use our addition skills in some maths challenges for Children in Need too. 

In our RE lesson, we learned that a mosque is a special and sacred place of worship for Muslims. We listened to the call to prayer and then visited the Activity Hall to think about what it is like inside a mosque. We took off our shoes and washed our hands to show respect to God. We explored prayer mats, the Qur’an and prayer beads, and looked at pictures and information to help us understand how Muslims pray.

In computing, we have practised using our email addresses and passwords to login to the chrome books.  We then used the computer mouse to draw pictures on the Sketchpad website. It needed quite a lot of focus and coordination!

This week in Maths, our Year 2 children have been building their confidence with two-digit addition. Using a range of concrete materials such as base ten blocks and number lines, students explored how to add larger numbers in a hands-on and meaningful way. By physically grouping tens and ones, children were able to see how numbers combine and regroup, helping them understand place value and develop stronger number sense.

They worked both independently and in small groups, explaining their thinking and checking each other’s answers. We’re so proud of how students enthusiastically approached these new challenges!

This term in Geography, Year 3 are learning all about earthquakes. We began our new topic by exploring the Christchurch earthquake in New Zealand. Using atlases, the children located New Zealand on the map and discussed why the country experiences earthquakes. They also discovered how earthquakes are measured on the Richter scale and created their own maps to show the scale and distribution of earthquakes across the North and South Islands.

Year 3 have also been considering how earthquakes happen and what occurs when tectonic plates move. It’s been wonderful to see their enthusiasm, curiosity, and engagement with this topic — well done, Year 3!

This week in Year 4, the children have taken part in our assessment week, and we are extremely proud of their effort, focus, and positive attitude throughout. The pupils completed assessments in maths (covering both arithmetic and reasoning), spelling, reading, and grammar. These assessments are an important part of our teaching, as they help us to identify the areas where children are thriving and where they may need a little extra support. Their concentration and determination have been wonderful to see, and we are very pleased with how well everyone approached each task.

In our maths lessons, we have now moved fully into our new unit on multiplication and division. The children are developing their confidence in using different strategies to solve problems, and their growing recall of times tables is helping them to make great progress. Our daily times tables tests continue to support this learning, helping the children to build both speed and accuracy in their number work.

In history, we have continued our topic on the Romans, which the children have found fascinating. We explored the reasons behind the Roman invasion of Britain, learning about Julius Caesar’s failed attempts and the eventual success of Emperor Claudius. The class also enjoyed discovering the story of Boudica and how she raised an army to fight back against the Romans. In our most recent lesson, the children had great fun writing and performing their own stirring speeches, inspired by Boudica’s courage and determination.

This week in Computing, Year 5 have been exploring how we find information online — and how to tell if what we find is really true! We started by looking at different search engines such as Kiddle and DuckDuckGo. The children learned that while search engines help us find information quickly, they also collect data about what we search for. We discussed how different search engines handle our privacy and what kind of information they might keep.

Next, we turned our attention to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and how it can be used to create realistic – but sometimes misleading – content. 

The children had great fun deciding which clips were real and which were “fake news.” They discussed how AI and video editing can make things look believable even when they aren’t true.

We have loved completing our daily children in need maths challenges based on the topic of money! 

In art, we have been exploring composition and painting with acrylics for the very first time. The children were excited to use this new medium, experimenting with layering, and blending. Everyone was rightly proud of their finished work.

In PE lessons on Wednesday, our focus has continued to be on football. The class has been working hard to refine their skills in passing, defending, and attacking, and to use foot techniques such as inside hook, outside hook, drag and pass. We’ve also been talking about what makes a competent and confident footballer — not just physical skills, but communication and teamwork.

In Literacy, we have begun our new text, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Year 6 have thrown themselves into it with real gusto! The magical world of Narnia has captured everyone’s imagination, inspiring some wonderful descriptive writing.

We really enjoyed dressing up for Children in Need – we had different mathematical equipment, operations and many maths teachers – great to see.

Maths-tastic Charity Dress-Up Day!

Our Children in Need fundraiser really added up to a brilliant day! Pupils came to school in all sorts of mathematical costumes that were truly sum-thing special. We spotted walking calculators, a perfectly rolled die, colourful Rubik’s cubes, and even a delicious-looking slice of cherry π.

The creativity didn’t stop there—some children arrived as monarchs cleverly representing rulers, we had a beautifully constructed Venn diagram, and two brilliant female scientists who looked ready to solve any problem that didn’t quite add up.

Not to be outdone, our two Year 4 teachers turned up dressed as Roman Numerals—just in time for the six–seven craze (“Why was six scared of seven? Because seven eight nine!”), which had the whole school laughing.

Thank you to everyone who joined the fun and helped us raise money for such an important cause. Together, we proved that when our school community comes together, the results are always positive!