06.03.2026

Head of School message 💬

Dear Families,

Due to the way that the half term has fallen, this newsletter is summing up three jam-packed weeks! It has been a pleasure to see so much going on across the school, both in the classrooms, out on the school grounds and outside of school on trips and visits!

The links at the top should help you to navigate between all of the different items in the newsletter this week.  You will notice that we are still recruiting for new governors. This is a brilliant opportunity to become more involved at Roselands and support our school. After the last couple of rounds of recruitment we were thrilled to appoint Becky Langman and Danielle White, who are fantastic additions to our team of Governors.  Please feel free to share the poster at the bottom with other members of our community.

I wanted to share a quick update regarding our school attendance this term. Thank you for all your efforts in getting children into school consistently; your partnership is vital in ensuring every child has the best opportunity to learn and thrive. We are currently tracking just above the Local Authority average, and while we are slightly below the national figure, we are encouraged by the progress we are making.

It has been wonderful to see the children becoming much more aware of the importance of attendance. We have been chatting with them each week about why being in class matters, and today we launched the competition in our weekly Celebration Assembly as we reward the best-attending houses!  We understand that life can sometimes present challenges that make punctuality or attendance difficult. If you would like to chat about how you can support your child’s attendance, please feel free to pop in and see our Attendance Lead, Helen Braund. We are always happy to work together to find solutions and support your family.

Lastly, a little plea for any spare wellies that you may have at home! If you have any that you are happy to donate to school, we are hoping to build up a small supply to support us with our outdoor activities, such as gardening and trips. Please pop them into the school office. Thank you!

Mrs Pippa Bastock

The Roselands Way 🌟

We are continuing our exciting journey with our Roselands Way, which explicitly teaches the routines that help our school run efficiently and happily. Our next focus for the next two weeks is "The Smooth Start."

We are shifting our focus to the crucial moment when children enter the classroom. By tightening up these transitions, we can ensure that every child is "switched on" and ready for learning straight away.

World Book Day and the School Disco 📚🪩🕺

Thursday was a busy day at Roselands! It has been a joy to see the school buzzing with excitement as we celebrated World Book Day together.

The festivities kicked off in style with our ‘Vocabulary Parade,’ where the children truly outdid themselves with their creative outfits - the level of innovation on display was incredible! Throughout the day, children:

• Explored new books at our busy Book Swap (thank you for your generous donations).

• Got hands-on with creativity during a wonderful art session led by Mrs Chapman, where the children worked on some truly inspired pieces.

• Took part in a 'Guess the Staff Member' competition, guessing which staff members face was hidden by a book!

• Met with their buddy class to share some stories together

Seeing the children so genuinely enthusiastic about books is exactly what this celebration is all about. Thank you to all our families for your incredible support in sourcing costumes and fostering a love for reading at home - it really makes a difference. Thank you to Miss Drohan for organising this wonderful day!

To cap off the celebrations, we turned up the music for our World Book Day Disco! It was the perfect way to let off some steam and celebrate our shared love of stories.

We want to extend a huge, heartfelt thank you to our Parent Staff Association (PSA). The amount of time and effort you invested behind the scenes to make this event happen for the children did not go unnoticed - thank you for everything you do to create such special school memories.

We are also deeply grateful to the members of staff who stayed behind after a long day to supervise, dance, and ensure the children had a safe and fantastic time. Your dedication is truly appreciated.

Science Day

What a day it has been! We are so proud to report that our Science Day was an absolute triumph.

Our theme of “Curiosity and Questioning” truly came to life across the school. It was inspiring to watch our children step into the shoes of real scientists, exploring, wondering, and discovering through hands-on learning.

Throughout the day, classrooms were buzzing with energy as children tackled practical investigations. It was wonderful to witness:

• The "Aha!" moments: Children asking deep questions and testing their ideas in real-time.

• Collaboration: Seeing children work together to solve complex challenges and experiments.

• Pure Engagement: The joy of discovery as they applied scientific thinking to the world around them.

From high-energy experiments to creative problem-solving, today was an engaging and memorable experience that we hope has sparked a lifelong passion for inquiry in our children. A huge thank you to everyone who helped make this day of discovery a success and to Mr Dore for organising it!

Our Reception children carried out lots of exciting investigations, including testing different ways to melt ice to rescue animals trapped inside, exploring push and pull forces through play, and experimenting with magnets to see what they attract. To finish the day, they even became mini food scientists by making their very own ice cream! It has been a fantastic day of exploring, questioning and learning through fun experiments .

Year 1 and 2 children began by investigating how boats float, working together to design and build their own boats before testing them on the water. Once they discovered their boats could float, the challenge became even more exciting - how many marbles could each boat carry before sinking? The children carefully added marbles one by one, cheering on their designs as they went. Some of our strongest boats managed to hold over 100 marbles (great counting children) before finally sinking! 

Year 3 and 4 have been carrying out fun experiments linked to their enquiry questions. They tested boat designs to see if boats float and how many passengers they can hold, investigated whether toast really lands butter side down and whether the thickness of the bread affects the results. The children have also designed and flew paper aeroplanes to discover which design works best. The children made predictions, tested their ideas, and shared their discoveries with great enthusiasm. 

Year 5 and 6 were very fortunate to take part in a fascinating workshop with Mrs Wojak and Mr Paddon all about our bodies! They looked at how the heart and lungs work and even tested our own heart rate and breathing rates to understand why these change after exercise. A huge thank you to them both for giving up their time and sharing their knowledge with our Year 5 and 6 children. 

Space Dome 🌙

🚀✨ Last week, the Year 5 and 6 children were thrilled to welcome the Space Odyssey Dome for a fantastic start to their new Science topic!

They took part in a 70-minute interactive session where they learned all about 🌙 the phases of the moon, ⭐ star constellations, and enjoyed an animated journey through 🪐 the planets in our solar system.

Afterwards, Simon Ould led a brilliant Q&A session, answering lots of thoughtful space-related questions from the children. They even discovered that a partial solar eclipse will take place on 12th August this year - the children were very excited! 🌞🌑

A huge thank you to Simon for visiting us and helping us begin the half term in such an exciting way.

Catch Us if You Can 🍪

This week, our Reception classes traded their pencils for rolling pins as we brought our Talk for Writing story to life! After reading all about the Gingerbread Man, we decided to see if we could bake a batch that actually stayed in the oven. Beyond the floury handprints and the sticky tables, this week has been all  about pride. Every child walked out of the classroom carefully carrying a ginger-scented masterpiece they made all by themselves. We are so impressed with their patience and turn-taking skills around the baking table!

The Gingerbread Man might have run away in the story, but these ones are definitely heading home as a well-deserved snack!

Recent sports fixtures 🏅

We are thrilled to share that our children have been incredibly busy over the last few weeks, participating in a fantastic variety of sports trips and matches. We are immensely grateful to the staff who generously give their time - often outside of school hours - to organise and attend these events, creating such valuable opportunities for our children.

Upon their return, the staff have consistently shared how impressed they are with how our children represent Roselands. Whether competing or cheering from the sidelines, our pupils have truly demonstrated our core values of ambition, resilience, independence, and collaboration. A huge well done to all our children for representing our school so brilliantly!

Numbers Day 🔢

Before the half-term break, we celebrated Numbers Day in style with our ‘Dressed Up for Digits’ theme! It was a fantastic opportunity to showcase our genuine love for Maths here at Roselands. We were blown away by the creativity of the number-themed outfits, and the classrooms were buzzing with energy as the children dove into hands-on number activities. It was a wonderful day of learning, laughter, and a celebration of all things numerical!

Pizza making! 🍕

Looking back to before the half-term break, our Year 3 and 4 pupils enjoyed a truly delicious highlight: a hands-on pizza-making workshop! We were delighted to welcome Donna from Caterlink to the school, who expertly guided the children through the art of pizza crafting.

It was a wonderful lesson in culinary creativity, with students learning the techniques behind the perfect dough and experimenting with a variety of toppings to create their own unique masterpieces. As an added creative flourish, the children also designed and decorated their own custom pizza boxes to carry their creations home. It was fantastic to see such focus, fun, and new skills being developed in the kitchen - and we certainly hope they tasted as good as they looked!

Key dates for this year 📆