Cherry Orchard Primary Academy Newsletter

March 2021 - Issue 9

Principal's Welcome

"As we came to the end of the first week, it's been lovely to see all the children back in school with happy smiling faces. As before, the children have astounded us with their resilience and determination to meet the challenges of another change in their lives, with enthusiasm. The sound of their laughter and chatter is once again resounding down the corridors and in the playground and staff are thrilled to be teaching face to face again instead of delivering lessons on screen. We look forward to supporting all the children settle back happily into their school routines over the next three weeks."

Julie Forsythe - Principal

Edible Garden and Outside Learning Area

You may have seen activity in the Woodland Area of our outside space; work on the edible garden began in earnest this week, with landscaping and excavation for the planters and trees taking place. Hopefully this will be completed in the next couple of weeks, ready for our outside Rotunda Building to be erected in May. Four exciting trim trail stations will also be added, to compliment this outdoor learning and activity space, by the Summer. This will provide an additional interactive, physical and learning environment for our children ready for next year. We are excited to have this opportunity through a grant from Ebbsfleet Development Corporation.

School News & Updates

KS1 /KS2 - Years 1 - 5

Catch-up Interventions

In line with government guidelines, we are continuing to roll out our small group interventions over the next few weeks in KS1 and KS2, designed to ensure that all children are able to achieve their full potential and that any gaps in learning are identified and filled as quickly as possible. These will take place over the remainder of Term 4 and throughout Term 5 either before or after the main school day.

Collection and drop-off will be via the main school gate or side gate due to Covid restrictions and children will be escorted out to the gate by an adult.

Parents Consultations

These will take place virtually in the first week of Term 5 and you will receive further information before the end of this term, to enable you to book a slot, remotely, to speak with your class teacher. This will give the teachers a chance to see how your child has settled back into school and give you an update on how they are responding to teaching, interventions or where there are some gaps in their learning that you can help to support.

Disabled Parking Bays

Please only park in the parking bays provided if you are displaying a blue badge. Some of our disabled adults/children are having difficulty parking at pick up or drop off. Thank you for your cooperation.

Plants & Foliage

When you are waiting to collect children inside and outside the school grounds, please make sure your younger children are not playing on the plants decorating the front of the school and the edge of the playground.

EYFS - Nursery & Reception

Welcome Back

It has been lovely to see all of the children back at school over the last week and hear about all of their adventures and learning at home.
Now that we are back in the classroom, please don't forget to continue to use Tapestry for messages and to add photos of any out of school activities that the children would like to share with their friends.

Outdoor Play

Reception have been enjoying some new outdoor play equipment since returning to school, doing lots of measuring, pouring, transporting and experimenting with water!

Lost Property

A reminder to parents that there are lots of our lovely school jumpers and cardigans unclaimed in the lost property basket. Please make sure all items of uniform are clearly labelled with your child's name so that these can be returned to them.

Bikes & Scooters

Whilst we encourage children to ride bikes to school, please make sure your child dismounts and pushes their bike or scooter to the bike shed to avoid any accidents in the playground with small children or bumping into other adults. Thank-you

Red Nose Day

Next Friday 19 March is Red Nose Day and the teachers are busy planning lots of fun activities for the children to take part in during the school day. This year, the official Red Nose Day theme is Toy Story, so the children can dress up as their favourite character, superhero or in red and bring in a toy. Visit our Just Giving Fund Raising page to donate.

Please see this letter recently sent to parents for further details

Give Now

Primary Years Programme IB Learner Profiles

Monday Assembly on IB Learner Profile

Every Monday, teachers introduce the particular quality from the IB Learner Profile that we are considering for that week. Currently these assemblies are being recorded and shown in class as we cannot have the children altogether in the hall). As they are being recorded at the moment, we thought it would be nice to share these with parents so they could understand and discuss with their children at home. The assemblies will be available to view every Monday afternoon via your child's Google Classroom.

IB Theme for w/b 15 March

World Book Day - The Masked Reader

Staff at Cherry Orchard were determined to find ways of replicating our usual events and learning in the classroom in a virtual way - so lockdown did not stop the children and staff from having great fun on World Book Day!

Creating their own version of the popular TV programme, teachers took part in a ‘Masked Reader’ competition. Staff disguised themselves with animal emojis and recorded themselves reading extracts from their favourite books and the children were challenged to correctly identify who the reader was. Mrs. Newton turned out to be the easiest to guess, as although she used a dinosaur animal emoji to disguise her face, she forgot to alter her voice!

Children took part in a range of other activities throughout the day at home, including painting potatoes as their favourite book characters, dressing up and sending in photos of themselves reading in lots of funny places - including the bathtub and hanging upside down! Click on the slide deck for the full slide show and the answers are revealed below.

View the full Masked Reader Slide Deck here

Revealed

National Online Safety

We are now a fully certified NOS School!

Signpost for Parents

If parents have not yet signed up yet for a National Online Safety account please do so by clicking on our unique school link here. You will be able to access up to date online safety information and watch a range of informative webinars. You will also be able to find out all of the important safety information regarding apps like TikTok as well as teaching your child to look out for 'fake news' and other important, topical current events.

Once you have signed up - can we signpost you to please watch the short video entitled "Online Bullying Explained". This video explains what online bullying is and signs to watch out for.

COPA celebrate reading success

Well done to all these children who have read for the most amount of minutes this week!

Year 1 Lara

Year 2 Sofia

Year 3 Jaqueline

Year 4 Swastika

Year 5 Juliana

Window into the Classroom for SRP

Class Sites are now embedded on the school website and are regularly updated by the class teachers to include latest work and learning as well as class newsletters. Please use this link to view your class site and class newsletter for Term 4.

This week we would draw your attention to the SRP Window into the Classroom site which has now been added to the SRP Page.

T5 After School Provsion

T5 Breakfast Club

T5 Activity Clubs

Term 5 Extended School News

Easter Holiday Club

We will not be able to offer any Holiday Club for the Easter Holidays at COPA, but please see opposite details of a local outside provider that will be offering clubs and activities throughout the holidays.

T5 Extended Schools Registration

Term 5 Breakfast Club and ASP is now open; the red buttons will take you to the usual registration form and these will be open until 9 am Tuesday 23 March, after which they will be closed for invoicing. Confirmation of your booked session will be by receipt of invoice. issued during week ending 26 March.

Activity Clubs

We are delighted to announce that we aim to slowly begin to re-open some of our Activity Clubs for Term 5. Our outdoor sports clubs will resume in Key Stage Bubbles on a first come first served basis to a maximum of 15 in each bubble. In addition, we will have a Gardening Club, which will be useful when our new outdoor learning centre and edible garden is constructed in early May. An outside provider will offer an after school Street Dancing Club on Fridays. ( see below)

Donate Here

Street Dancing Club

SLY Moves Dance Club returns to COPA in Term 5 and will be delivering street dancing sessions after school on the playground, on Fridays for Years 1 - 5 in Key Stage Bubbles. You will be able to sign up directly with the Dance Club and your child will receive a leaflet to register, after their taster session on the playground on Red Nose Day.

Children at COPA will again 'rock on the playground' as they did last year on Friday 19 March to celebrate the return of our outdoor activity clubs and raise some money for Red Nose Day. Please give generously on our Just Giving page, as the Dance Teacher has given her time free of charge.

Reminders

Only one adult please to drop off / pick up in the school playground
No dogs to come on to the playground
Bikes / scooters should be wheeled from the school gate - not ridden
Face Masks / Social distancing should be maintained at all times
Please do not park in the disabled bays if you do not display a blue badge

Diary Dates (click to expand)

Term 4 Start Monday 22.02.21 - return to remote learning

Return to school Monday 8.3.21

Red Nose Day Friday 19.3.21

Street Dancing Taster Friday 19.3.21

Term 4 End Thursday 1st April

Half Term Friday 2nd April - Monday 19th April

Term 5 Start Monday 19th April

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