Wales World Cup Game

Today, children were given the opportunity to watch Wales play Iran in the World Cup qualifier. The children loved cheering on Wales and supporting them in the game. Shame about the result.

House tokens

The collection of house tokens is going well this term. The boxes are looking really full

Parents Evening

We have now completed parents evenings for all year groups. We would welcome feedback from parents on the appointments please complete the form below:

Parents Evening Feedback

Parking around the school

This week we have been fortunate to receive the support of the local PCSO and Civil Enforement Officers in relation to parking around the school. We are continuing to work with the local authority to look at safe options for accessing the school on foot and we will keep parents updated on this progress. Please help us by parking a little bit further away and walking to school to collect / drop off children.

You will be aware of an icnident regarding a child at Oldcastle and a car that happened earlier this week. We are pleased to report that the child is ok and back in school.

Drain Works

The nursery / reception toilet works are progressing, and we are hopeful that these will be back in operation in the coming weeks. The works programme has been extended due to an issue identified with the external drains around the school. A recent drain survey has identified several areas that require urgent work, which will be completed in phases. We have been informed that this work is urgent and cannot wait until the school holidays.

The initial phase will involve construction work to replace the underground drain pipes in the nursery yard and as a result there will be new security / safety fencing installed to ensure the safety of our children and parents at drop-off and pick up times. We aim to keep disruption to a minimum, and we can only apologise for any inconvenience this essential work may cause. Access to the nursery door will remain the same at present. Miss Walters Reception class will continue to use the main reception side door whilst the work is taking place.

The health and safety of the pupils, parents and staff is paramount at all times. Thank you for your ongoing support and helping us with the revised access arrangements.

Spellings

Following parents'evening discussions, it became clear that many parents would like to work on spellings with their children at home. While homework is not common practice at Oldcastle, and there is no expectation to practise spellings at home, we appreciate our parents'wishes.

We have collated all of the words that children will be learning within school, based on the books they study within Literacy lessons. There are also a range of links to access to support your child when learning new words at the bottom of each document.

The lists can be found on our website under the class pages for years 3 to 6. Class Pages

Please let us know if we can offer any further support.

School access

Thank you to our parents and children for your understanding in regard of the closure of the St Marie Street entrance. We are working with the local authority and local residents to resolve the situation and hope to have the entrance back open as soon as possible.

Schools Cross Country - Years 3 to 6

The next Bridgend Schools’ Cross Country League will take place on Saturday 26th November and Oldcastle are currently doing extremely well in the league table!!

1. 4 races available to pupils in years 3 to 6

2. First race begins at 10am so arrive by 9.30am

3. No dogs or smoking (or heaven forbid smoking dogs)

The schedule of meets prior to Christmas is as follows:

• Saturday November 26^th – Brynteg Comprehensive School

• Saturday December 17^th – Porthcawl Comprehensive School

School Swimming

Swimming lessons are offered to children in years 4, 5 and 6 over the autumn term. Years 4 and 5 have completed their swimming lessons.

Year 6 will swim every afternoon for a period of one week on the following dates:

• 6Y - week beginning 28th November

• 6H - week beginning 5th December

Children will be required to bring a packed lunch on these days along with their swimming kit, towel and goggles. The bus will collect them from school and take them to Ynysawdre Pool and then bring them back to school in time for the end of the normal school day.

Christmas Concerts

We are delighted to inform parents that we will be inviting parents into school to watch your child's year group perform a Christmas concert. Each year group will perform the concert on two occasions and parents / carers may order two tickets for each performance.

The tickets are free of charge. Due to health and safety reasons, we are limited in the number of people we can seat in the main hall so numbers will be strictly monitored based around the applications received via this form.

Please click on the link below to book your free ticket to the appropriate year group concert. Each child is allocated a total of 4 tickets.

• Nursery Christmas Concert

• Reception Christmas Concert

• Year 1 Christmas Concert

• Year 2 Christmas Concert

• Year 3 Christmas Concert

• Year 4 Christmas Concert

• Year 5 Christmas Concert

• Year 6 Christmas Concert

Shine - Schools Emotional Well-being Service

On Wednesday 30th November at 9.15am Clare Blakemore, the Emotional Wellbeing Practitioner from the SHINE team will be offering an Emotional well-being workshop for parents. The session will last for approximately 1 hour. The workshop will include psychoeducation about what is emotional regulation, and how we can support children's emotional regulation. This will cover what to do when a child is emotionally dysregulated and more information about how to support a child who is struggling emotionally. During the session, there will be activities and discussions about practical ways to help your child. Resource packs will also be available to take away.

If you have any questions then please contact Miss Hodgson via email the ask email address.

PE Days

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

• Reception - Monday

• Year 1 - Tuesday

• Year 2 - Monday

• Year 3 - Tuesday

• Year 4 - Wednesday

• Year 5 - Thursday

• Year 6 - Wednesday

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.

PTA Christmas Cards

We have three unclaimed Christmas Card designs without a name on. If you think one of these is your child's please get in touch via ask@oldcastleprimary.co.uk

PTA Christmas Tree Fundraiser

Admissions to school

Please refer to the Bridgend Council website for details of applications to school, currently applications are open for children moving to secondary school and children moving from nursery to reception.

BCBC School Admissions

Contact details

We regularly email and send App messages to parents - please ensure we have up to date contact details for you to ensure you keep up to date with school news. You can either email us with change of details (ask@oldcastlprimary.co.uk) or complete the change of details form.

Enrichment

Friday afternoons are all about enrichment sessions. Children are excited about the different activities they take part in and always look forward to a Friday afternoon. What a busy Friday afternoon it was today!

Thrive Family Session

We launched a 6 week Family Thrive programme this week for parents and carers. The sessions provide parents with an introduction to the fundamentals of Thrive and how it works in practice. Parents can learn about the amazing growth of your child's brain through childgood and help support emotional development. This week was all about discovering the brain.

Language and Play

Nursery parents attended a Language and Play taster session this morning with Mrs Diehl. The parents and children had a lovely time reading the book 'Stick Man'. Another taster session will be run for nursery parents on Friday 2nd December - nursery parents please refer to the information emailed if you would like to attend.

Inset Days 2022 / 23

Inset days for this academic year are as follows:

• Monday 5th September 2022

• Monday 7th November 2022

• Tuesday 8th November 2022

• Friday 31st March 2023

• Friday 26th May 2023

• Monday 24th July 2023

Term Dates - all term dates are available to view on our website

• Autumn Term finishes on Friday 23rd December 2022.

12 Says of Christmas Challenge in Bridgend

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.

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