Oldcastle Weekly Newsletter

Welcome to week 13 of the school year

Wow what a busy week we have had. Earlier in the week we were extremely disappointed to have to postpone some of our Carols in the Yard Christmas events. Due to the weather warning in place on Monday and the ongoing poor weather this week we unfortunately had to postpone our nursery / reception and years 3 and 4 concerts.

This year we took the opportunity to try and arrange an outdoor concert to allow us to come together to have an opportunity to celebrate Christmas. Organising an outdoor concert is always a risk as we are unable to control the weather.

To allow the concert to go ahead, we need to set up electrical equipment outside the canteen area, which includes an electric piano, amps, mics and also lights. Due to the rain it would not be safe for us to do this. The undercover space under the canteen would also not be enough cover for over 100 pupils so if it rains many children will be exposed and not be able to keep dry.

Making a decision to cancel a concert is hard when you are relying on the weather and we waited till the last minute to see if the weather would improve. Along with our COVID Risk assessment we need to ensure that we are not putting any pupils, parents and staff at risk.

Fortunately, we were able to proceed with our nursery / reception concert on Thursday morning and the children sang beautifully for their parents.

Years 1 and 2 concert was also able to proceed on Wednesday evening and thankfully the rain held off until the end of the concert. The children thoroughly enjoyed singing to their parents.

Thank you for your support at our carols on the yard. We are also extremely grateful to our PTA for decorating the yard with lovely Christmas tress and lights, and for providing refreshments for parents.

The following concerts are rearranged for Tuesday 14th December:

• Years 3 and 4 - 4.30pm

• Years 5 and 6 - 5.30pm

To keep everyone safe we will be operating strict Covid guidelines for the Carols on the Yard performances. We ask that only 2 adults per child attend. If siblings are pupils of Oldcastle they may also attend, but they must be supervised by parents and stay in the family group at all times. Families must socially distance and all adults will be required to wear a mask. We thank you for your help and support with this.

We will also be asking parents to wear a face mask.

The PTA will be selling hot drinks and mince pies, and these will be available from the canteen. The PTA will be asking for donations for drinks, sweets and cakes during the concert to avoid the handling of cash.

Please take time to refresh yourself with the current COVID Rules in place in Wales

Fully vaccinated and children between the ages of 5 to 17 years

• If someone in your household has symptoms or has tested positive for coronavirus and you are fully vaccinated or aged 5 to 17 you should self-isolate and take a PCR test.

• If your test is negative you can stop isolating.

If your child does have a PCR please let us know via our ask@oldcastleprimary.co.uk email address or by telephoning 01656 815790. Please also ensure you notify us of the result.

Covid Symptoms

• high temperature – this means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back (you do not need to measure your temperature)

• a new, continuous cough – this means coughing a lot for more than an hour, or 3 or more coughing episodes in 24 hours (if you usually have a cough, it may be worse than usual)

• a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste – this means you've noticed you cannot smell or taste anything, or things smell or taste different to normal

Reward Scheme

Earlier this week, we were delighted to announce in a virtual whole school assembly the number of tokens each house has collected this term. We were amazed at the number of tokens that had been collected across the school - a grand total of 13,288 tokens were given out to pupils throughout the school since 2nd November!!!!

Mrs Littlewood has been delighted to have breakfast with blue house pupils from nursery, reception and years 1 and 2 over the past three days, and is looking forward to hosting blue house children from years 3 and 4, and 5 and 6 next week!. That's a lot of breakfasts for Mrs Littlewood - she is still baffled why the junior leaders thought this would be such an exciting prospect for children but has thoroughly enjoyed sitting down with the children and enjoying a piece of toast.

Pantomime Visit - Years 1 to 6

Next week we are looking forward to visiting Porthcawl Pavilion on Wednesday to see the Aladdin production. Children who are attending may take a small bag of sweets and a carton of juice with them - please do not send your child in with a fizzy drink or chocolate. Please note that nuts should not be brought under any circumstances.

We wanted to reassure parents that we have created a full and robust risk assessment for the visit and have been liaising with the Pavilion to ensure the safety of our pupils and staff. Children will be travelling on buses in year groups of classes and a seating plan has been created to ensure that each class is seated away from children in other year groups.

Please note that children attending the pantomime will need to bring a packed lunch on Wednesday.

We will be leaving school promptly just after 9am so please ensure children arrive promptly on Wednesday. We cannot guarantee that children arriving after 9am will be able to come on the trip. We have very strict operational plans in place which mean we cannot mix year groups on buses.

Nursery and Reception Christmas Event

We are looking forward to welcoming the 'Littlest Christmas Elf Returns' production on Tuesday December 14th (PM) for our nursery and reception children. join in Santa’s workshop, meet elves, hear stories and dance along as the magic of Christmas is brought to life through charming puppetry and interactive drama.

The performance will take place in school and children should attend school as normal on the day. Children can wear Christmas jumpers if they wish.

Enrichment

Our enrichment sessions continued today with children talking part in rugby, recorder, forest school, gingerbread houses to name a few of the activity sessions.

Family Engagement - Mrs Lisa Diehl

We now have dates (see posters below) confirmed for the Nurture and NVR groups which are starting in January. We will also be holding a coffee morning and afternoon on Tuesday 11th January at 9.15am and Thursday 13th January at 2.15pm where there will be someone from The Early Help Team to answer any questions that you may have. We look forward to seeing you there!

Christmas Cards and Decorations

Do you want to spread some festive cheer? Do you want to spread some happiness within our community?

We would like the children of Oldcastle to create homemade Christmas cards and Christmas tree decorations to gift to the residents of Heathfields Care Home in Merthyr Mawr Road.

Your decorations should be small enough to hang on a Christmas tree and you could include well wishes and information about yourself inside the cards - maybe a joke or a funny story!

On the 16th December the School Choir will be singing carols for the residents in the garden of the care home and sharing cards and decorations for their Christmas tree will make their day!

Please hand Christmas cards and decorations in to the office. The deadline for receiving cards and decorations will be 14th December.

We can’t wait to see your creations and we’re sure the residents will love them too!

Reception Mr Trigg's Class

Mrs Parfitt, one of our PGCE trainee teachers, has been busy working with Mr Trigg’s Reception class. As part of this term's overarching concept of ‘Human Kind’ we looked at Paddington Bear. The Area of Learning and Experience focused on in this lesson was Expressive Arts. The children completed this activity through experiencing the art of Origami and their skills of following instructions. They all thoroughly enjoyed themselves and did an amazing job! Da iawn Reception.

Christmas Elf Day

The PTA are arranging an Elf Party Day for our children on Monday 13th December - we are so excited to learn about the event and we hope that Father Christmas will put in an appearance too!! Children will visit our very own grotto land and we hear that the PTA have arranged for it to snow on this day! We also hear that some naughty elves will be visiting and playing tricks on our staff and children and they will have to solve clues throughout the day. We can't wait to see what the PTA have planned on the 13th - we know from the Mad Hatters Tea Party last July that they like to go to town on the decorations when they plan an event!! We look forward to sharing photos with parents next week.

Children may wear a Christmas jumper or outfit on Monday.

Ty Cerrig Christmas Tree Farm

If you happen to be buying a Christmas Tree from Ty Cerrig please mention Oldcastle Primary School when you pay as the PTA will receive a percentage of the purchase price.

Admissions to Secondary School

Reminder - Secondary school admissions for pupils moving from junior/primary school (Year 6) to secondary school (Year 7) in September 2022 should be received by BCBC by Friday 21 January 2022 at 4pm.

More information available on www.bridgend.gov.uk

Christmas Cards

Please can we ask that children do not bring in Christmas cards for their friends this year. Due to Covid restrictions we are unable to accept Christmas cards and distribute to the rest of the class. Thank you for your support.

Safeguarding

In the event that you have a concern regarding a child please follow this procedure:

• During school hours please contact Mrs Ceri Littlewood, safeguarding lead at Oldcastle Primary School.

• Out of school hours please contact the out of hours Emergency Duty Team Tel No 01443849944

Diary Dates

Monday 13th December - Elf Party Day

Tuesday 14th December - Nursery and Reception Elf Christmas Performance

Tuesday 14th December - 4.30pm Carols on the Yard Years 3 and 4

Tuesday 14th December - 5.30pm Carols on the Yard Years 5 and 6

Wednesday 15th December - Years 1 to 6 Trip to the Pantomime

Friday 17th December - Last day of term

Tuesday 4th January - Back to school

Nut Free School

We have a number of children in school with a nut allergy and we ask parents to be mindful of this when sending in a packed lunch or snack. We strive to be a nut free and we hope you can support us in this.

P.E. Days

Children should wear P.E. kit to school on the day their class has a P.E. session.

• Nursery - Friday

• Reception - Wednesday

• Year 1 - Monday

• Year 2 - Thursday

• Year 3 - Monday

• Year 4 - Wednesday

• Year 5 - Tuesday

• Year 6 - Thursday

At Oldcastle, we are proud of each other and ourselves. We nurture all of our community so that we grow as confident, responsible and happy people. Oldcastle school is more than just learning.

• We try hard for each other

• We act responsibly

• We treat people how we’d like to be treated

• We work as a team

• We trust and respect each other

• We listen and learn together

• We share knowledge and experience

Together we make the difference

Together we shape innovative experiences

More information on our values and visions can be found on our website. Visions and Values