Welcome back to school following the Easter break.  We hope you all had a lovely holiday despite the wet weather!  We are now in our summer term and are looking forward to lots of exciting learning and activities throughout this new term.

Barney had a lovely Easter holiday but was pleased to be back in school seeing pupils and staff!

School Attendance

Attendance at school is important. Our whole school target for attendance is 95%.  This week's attendance was 95.9%.

Change to recycling law in Wales

From 6th April there is a change to the recycling law in Wales.  All workplaces in Wales must separate their waste for recycling.  As a result of the law change we now have a new waste regime in school.

Children will be encouraged to place their fruit waste in the food bins in allocated areas and there will be no bins on the yard - please help us by taking your rubbish home.  Our eco committee will be helping to get the message across to children.  Children who have sandwiches will be encouraged to take their waste home with them in their lunch box.

Wellbeing Team Competition

During assembly today our wellbeing team informed the whole school of the changes and how we can all help by putting rubbish in the right container and taking home sandwich waste.   Well done to all the team for standing up in assembly to deliver the presentation to the whole school.

Mrs Jury and the Wellbeing Team launched a competition to all the children and asked them to create a poster that can be displayed around the school reminding pupils and staff of the new  recycling bins we have in school.  Children have two weeks to develop posters and these can be drawn or prepared on a computer.  All we ask if that the poster is colourful and contains all the correct information.  You can remind your child of the presentation by clicking here. - Recycling Presentation.  Closing date is 26th April.

School Website

Don't forget our school website is regularly updated and contains lots of information about our school.  Please take a look www.oldcastleprimary.co.uk

Universal Free School Meals

Pupils in nursery to year 4 qualify for universal free school meals, a welsh government initiative to provide free school meals to all primary school children by 2024.  Year 5 and 6 pupils will begin receiving universal free school meals from September 2024.

We have updated our website with the school meal menu for this term - please click here.

Community Room

We will shortly be launching our Community Room to parents and carers.  We aim to offer the opportunity for parents and carers to come into school and get together with other parents and carers whilst enjoying a cuppa.  The Community Room will also store our food pantry food and we hope that more parents will benefit from the food pantry.  From next week we will be offering parents the opportunity to visit the food pantry and select the items that will be of most use to them.  Our food is delivered by Baobab Bach on a Tuesday lunchtime so please pop in anytime from Tuesday pick up if you would be interested in selecting 15 / 20 items for £5.  If you can bring a bag for life we would very much appreciate this! 

Year 6 End of Term Production

Over the last term we announced all our cast members in the year 6 end of term production.  All children in year 6 play an important part in the production and aside from the main cast members we have  children developing the stage design, sound and lighting, social media, costume design and so much more.

We look forward to sharing details with you over the next few months as the children prepare for their exciting production.

Annie Whole Cast Production video

Throughout the year we will implement the following values each month.

• September - Determination and Perseverance

• October - Respect and Responsibility

• November - Friendship and forgiveness 

• December - Compassion and Hope  / Understanding and Patience

• January - Community and Service 

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

• March - Learning and Effort

• April - Showing gratitude

• May - Care and Generosity

• June - Honesty and trust

• July - Taking and managing risks

Fantastic clay modelling Shae!  

This week in Nursery

We are all glad to be back in school after the Easter break, for our last term in Nursery. This week we have been learning about germs and the importance of washing our  hands.  We have also been practising our numbers skills, by counting and matching numbers.  We have also found some wriggly worms and woodlouse!

For enrichment, year 1 are doing a Dragon Eye project. The children will be making dragon eyes using clay, but they have done some sketching this afternoon and we are  so impressed! 

Rugby Success

A fabulous game of rugby this afternoon against Nantymoel in glorious sunshine on a somewhat muddy Newbridge Fields.  A good win for Oldcastle. Seren y Gem went to Jackson who scored a hat trick of tries. 

Netball Success

Well done to all the year 5 and 6 children who represented the school in the netball games this afternoon against Nantymoel.  Everyone played really well in the sunshine.  The results were as follows:

• Game 1 - Year 6 10-5 Player of the match Nieve

• Game 2 - Year 6 8-0 Player of the Match - Esmay

• Game 3 - Year 5 4-4 Player of the Match - Abigail

Swimming Success

Well done to Fara, Anwen and Lottie who competed in the National Swimming Championships last weekend.  The girls took part in a variety of swim events throughout the day which they all thoroughly enjoyed.  Well done girls and special congratulations to Lottie for gaining a bronze medal in the 50 m flipper race.

Baby and Toddler Group

Don't forget  we run a baby and toddler group every Wednesday morning during term time from 9am to 11am.  Baby and Toddler Group 

We love seeing the babies and toddlers coming each week to the Toddler Group - over the last couple of weeks the children and parents have been very creative!

CAMHS SHINE team 

The SHINE team have provided some information for parents. Please scan the QR code on the poster below or follow the link to You Tube. 

https://youtu.be/V-yxJIHbCXs?si=Js49_iAxdCfA0_2U 

Information from Public Health Wales

We have been asked to share the following information with parents regarding the measles vaccine.  Measles, Mumps and Rubella (MMR) - Public Health Wales (nhs.wales) 

Inset Days 2023/24

Inset Days have been approved by Governors for 2023/24 and they are as follows:

• Monday 4th September 2023

• Friday 22nd December 2023

• Monday 19th February 2024

• Friday 22nd March 2024

• Monday 3rd June 2024

• Monday 22nd July 2024

P.E. lessons this term will take place on the following days.  Children attending school should wear their P.E. kit to school on the day of their lesson.

• Nursery - Thursday

• Reception -  Thursday

• Year 1 - Wednesday

• Year 2 - Monday

• Year 3 - Thursday

• Year 4 - Tuesday

• Year 5 - Wednesday

• Year 6 - Monday

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

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. 

Contact details

Please ensure we have up to date contact details for you to ensure 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.