We can't believe we are now into December!  2025 has flown by.  This week we started our Christmas concerts and year 6 kicked us on on Thursday with two performances of their story - Twas the Night Before Christmas.  Year 5 continued with their performances on Friday with their rendition of How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  We  loved seeing all the children perform and are always amazed by our quickly the children learn their words and the songs.  

Next week we can't wait to see years 1, 2, 3 and 4 perform for their parents.  

Thank you to our amazing staff for putting together the Christmas performances, thank you to the PTA and volunteers who help with the refreshments and raffle ticket sales, and finally, thank you to parents and carers for your support.  

Year 6 Christmas Concert

Year 5 Christmas Concert

Choir Performances

What a fantastic way to kick off the festive period with a performance of our school choir at the Bridgend Christmas Lights event last Saturday. We are so proud of the children. Zack Frank was amazed to see so many children in the choir! Thank you to parents for bringing children along to the event and thank you to Bridgend Town Council for inviting us.

Finally, thank you Miss Ellett for inspiring so many children to be part of our wonderful choir.

What a lovely morning we had on Wednesday with some members of our school choir singing for residents of Ty Penybont. The children sang beautifully and were delighted to see Father Christmas too! Thank you Ty Penybont. 

Christmas Tree Donations - Thank You!

Once again, we are delighted with the generosity of local businesses and our parents following our call for help to fund a Christmas tree this year. We are delighted to be able to display two real Christmas trees in school. 

We hope you have enjoyed the Christmas trees we have on display we think they look fantastic.  We could not provide these without the generous donations we have received. Diolch!

Christmas Dinner

Don't forget it's Christmas Dinner Day on Thursday, 11th December.  We have 346 meals ordered for our children and we are so grateful to our amazing catering team for prepping, cooking and serving these meals.   Thank you! We can't wait for Christmas Dinner Day.

Christmas Concerts

Children are getting ready to prepare for their Christmas concerts and we are looking forward to seeing the children on the stage in the main hall.  Tickets need to be ordered as numbers are limited in the main hall.  Tickets are £2 each and payment can be made in cash on the door.   The PTA will have raffle tickets for sale on the door too and refreshments are available in the hall for a donation.

Nursery

• Monday 15th December 9.30am and Monday 15th December 2pm

Reception

• Tuesday 16th December 9.30am and Tuesday 16th December 2pm

Year 1

• Friday 12th December 9.30am and Friday 12th December 2pm

Year 2

• Wednesday 10th December 2pm and Thursday 11th December 9.30am

Year 3

• Tuesday 9th December 9.30am and Tuesday 9th December 2pm

Year 4

• Monday 8th December 9.30am and Monday 8th December 2pm

Community Food Pantry

The food pantry has been restocked this week and will be restocked every week on a Monday. We invite parents and carers to pop in and fill a bag with 15 items for £5.  The food pantry is available to everyone and we hope that you can make use of the items.  Why not pop in and take a look at the type of items available in the pantry.

Community Room

We invite parents and carers to make use of our Community Room and enjoy a cuppa and a chat.  Why not call in after the morning school run or before the pick up and get together with other parents and enjoy a cuppa. We hope you can enjoy this warm space to get together with friends or meet new people.

School Savings Club 

Bridgend School Savings would like to wish all our savers a Merry Christmas. Seeing all the children enjoying saving their pennies and pounds each week continues to remind us how important the savings club is. I also want to thank all the staff, children, and families who support our weekly savings clubs. The last week for our savings club will be next week (week commencing 8th December).

As we approach the holidays, we would like to offer children the chance to withdraw from their savings. Your child does not need to withdraw any of their savings, as we will welcome all our savings clubs back in January. If they want to withdraw any money, the easiest way is to arrange an online Bank Transfer. This can be done at any time, including over the school holidays, and usually takes less than 48 hours.

To make a withdrawal, the trustee/guardian can follow this link to complete an online request:

https://bridgendschoolsavings.com/download-forms/school-withdrawal-form/.

If you are unsure about any details, including Balance, please enter “Don’t Know”. To withdraw the entire balance, please enter “Full”.

If you have any questions or need more information, please visit our website, www.bridgendschoolsavings.com. The website has an extensive FAQ section and a ‘contact us’ page, and all our forms are available to fill out online.

Merry Christmas!

Damian Faulkner

School Partnerships

Contact details - Have any details changed?

Please ensure we have up to date contact details for you to make sure you keep up to date with school news and we are able to contact you during the school day if required.  You can either email us with change of details (ask@oldcastleprimary.co.uk) or complete the change of details form.   We will use email and our School App to send messages to parents about activities or events.

Attendance

We are committed to promoting good attendance at school and have a target of whole school attendance of 95%.  This week's attendance was 91.8%.  For more information on the importance of good attendance and how we manage attendance as a school, please look at our website.  Attendance | Oldcastle Primary School 

Nut Free School

Please can we remind parents that we strive to be a nut free school as we have a number of pupils who have a severe allergy to nuts.  

This includes nut products such as peanut butter and nutella. 

• September - Respect and Responsibility 

• October - Compassion and Hope 

• November - Friendship and Forgiveness 

• December - Understanding and Patience

• January - Determination and Perseverance

• February - Honesty and Trust 

• March -Learning and Effort 

• April - Community and Service 

• May - Co-operation and being a good citizen within society

• June- Showing Gratitude and Care and Generosity

• July - Taking and managing risks 

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

We love to hear about all of the exciting achievements of our pupils during out of school activities. Please share any successes with us at ask@oldcastleprimary.co.uk and include a photograph and details of the achievement to be included in future newsletters. 

Tennis Success

Rafferty from year 4 and Jonah from year 3 had fantastic achievements last weekend in their Tennis club awards. Rafferty received a trophy for winning the 10 and Under Junior Club Championship, and Jonah was selected as the Head Coach Players' Pick for his age group.   Well done boys we are very proud of your achievements. 

Toddler Group

Toddler Group have been very busy this week creating Christmas crafts. Toddler Group runs every Wednesday morning 9am to 11am. Babies and Toddlers all welcome. £2 per session and includes a cuppa. Next week the Toddler Group will be enjoying their Christmas party!

Toddler Group

Nolton Church Christmas Tree Festival

• 4th to 16th December - various Christmas concerts

• 10th December - Toddlers Christmas Party

• 11th December - Christmas Dinner Day

• 17th December - Nursery and Reception Christmas Show

• 17th December - Years 1 to 6 to the Pantomime

• 20th December to 6th January - Christmas Holiday

• 5th January - INSET Day

• 6th January - Back to School

• 8th, 15th, 22nd, 29th January and 5th February - Year 6 Swimming

• 12th, 19th February, 5th, 12th and 19th March - Year 5 Swimming

• 16th to 20th February - Half Term

Inset Days for 2025 / 2026

The inset days for 2025 / 26 have been approved by school governors and these are as follows:

• Monday 1st September 2025 

• Friday 21st November 2025

• Monday 5th January 2026

• Friday 13th March 2026

• Friday 22nd May 2026

• Monday 20th July 2026

Health and Wellbeing / PE Days for 2025/26

PE will take place on the following day for each year group.  Children should attend school in their PE kit on their allocated day.

• Nursery - Thursday

• Reception - Monday

• Year 1 - Tuesday

• Year 2 - Thursday

• Year 3 - Wednesday

• Year 4 - Monday

• Year 5 - Tuesday

• Year 6 - Friday

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 01443743665

More information on Safeguarding at Oldcastle can be found on our website.