Prudhoe West News
our online newsletter for parents, carers and the community
Welcome
If you want to refer back to a previous newsletter, click on 'Summer 2021' or 'Spring 2021' above (if on a laptop/PC) , or the three lines top left if on a mobile device, then pick the week you want.
upcoming events
Science Week!
British Science Week is from 11th - 20th March this year and the topic is growth. We will be celebrating in school with lots of different activities which include:
Year 3 & 4 will be having Life Cycles Live Lessons with the National Farmers Union
Whole school will be taking part in a poster activity
Years 1&2 - Fantastic minibeasts and where to find them
A parent will be telling Years 2, 3 and 4 all about his job making robots!
EYFS will be adopting a Hedgehog called Wibbly!
Other activities still to come!
comic relief
We will be celebrating Red Nose Day on Friday 18th March 2022. Watch out for further information!
CHUF Day!
Children will be involved in a range of ‘heart’ themed activities throughout the day for which they will be sponsored; from continuous CPR led by NLighten for 5 hours, a sponsored jog, and a whole school keep fit session led by Gayle! Due to the nature of CPR and us not wanting to allow children to do this incorrectly, our youngest children in Early Years will not participate in this part, but they will join in with everything else, keeping their own hearts healthy.
Parents to pay sponsorship money and £1 donation for non uniform via school gateway, there are two separate payment options!
World Book Day!
Thursday 3rd March 2022 we will be celebrating World Book Day.
Children are invited to come to school dressed as a character from their favourite book - this is a great opportunity to wear the Alice in Wonderland costumes again, so please don't feel you need to make something new.
All children will receive a £1 voucher to spend on a book of their choice.
We will be celebrating Red Nose Day on Friday 18th March 2022. Watch out for further information!
WE WANT YOUR CRISP PACKETS!
We are Prudhoe West Little Leaders and we are writing to ask you help us with a project we want our school to do. This project will help the environment and help homeless people. It is called the Crisp Packet Project.
Crisp packets are not currently recyclable in home recycling bins but we have found a way to put them to good use. They can be used to make warm blankets and sleeping bags for homeless people. We think this is a brilliant idea.
A crisp packet takes 80 years to decompose. Each blanket puts 44 crisp packets to good use instead!
How you can help?
When you have a packet of crisps, keep the packet. Maybe find a box at home you can collect all your crisp packets in. The best crisp packets to use are most Walkers brands or anything that is fairly soft and has foil inside.
If you have time, open the bottom, cut them down the side and give them a wash. (But don’t worry if you don’t have the time or energy for this, we will do it for you if that’s the case!) Here’s how to cut them... but it is fairly obvious!: https://youtu.be/sh3RDMjhZcQ
Bring the crisp packets into school and put them in the collection box.
Tell as many people that you know about this and ask them to collect their crisp packets to add to your collection.
If you work somewhere that would have space for a crisp packet collection box, ask them to set one up so we collect even more crisp packets! Any box will do and we can give you a poster to put on it if you ask.
What happens next?
When we have lots of crisp packets (at least 8kg to be exact) we send them off to the Crisp Packet Project. They very cleverly iron them together and make them into blankets. Because they have foil in, they’re really good at keeping people warm.
If we could get any volunteer grown ups, they could even use our bags to make some blankets of our own to give out. This is how that works: https://youtu.be/0G8sV7v5tBc
We really want to make this a big thing for Prudhoe West. It costs nothing and can really help the environment and some people who sadly don’t have warm homes to live in. Please help us make sure everyone in Prudhoe knows about the Prudhoe West Crisp Packet Project!
We will start collecting from Monday 17th January 2022.
Thank you very much for helping us!
From - The Little Leaders
FUNDRAISE AND RECYCLE
Some of you may have noticed that we now have a clothing bank collection point! It is situated in the main car park just outside of the school gates.
We are working with Fundraise and Recycle Ltd who are a local North East based company to collect all your unwanted and unloved clothing, bags, shoes(pairs) and toys for collection and distribution. This fits in perfectly with our sustainability goals by encouraging recycling.
We would love it if you contributed!
what has your child been learning in school?
rAINBOW rOOM
This week we have been listening to 'The Three Billy Goats Gruff' story. We have been acting out the story in the garden by one of our adults being the troll and we were all taking it in turns to cross the bridge pretending to be the goats.
NURSERY
This week in Nursery, we continued our learning about The Three Billy Goats Gruff. We worked as a class to create our own sensory story map using sand, oats, wooden logs, mint, parsley and spinach. We each added to the story by drawing, sticking and commenting on the events in sequence.
After we finished, we were able to retell the whole story in detail!
Reception
In topic we drew settings pictures (Elliott attached), we are doing the story of the Little Red Hen so have been growing wheat to support (picture attached) and in Maths we have been learning about 1 more/1 fewer (picture attached) and there is also one of whole class doing Safer Internet Day activities.
YEAR 1
Year 1 thoroughly enjoyed the start to their science topic 'seasons'. They had lots of fun making wind toys out of tissue paper and rain gauges using plastic bottles to create their weather station. They also explored thermometers and how to use them properly. The children are going to be collecting data for all the seasons.
YEAR 2
We focused on the power of words and how they can change our day! We discussed how it felt when someone complimented us, showed us respect or used kind words when talking about us! We then taped some paper to our backs and spent 5 minutes walking around the room writing positive words about each other anonymously. We then took off our paper and spent time reading what our friends thought of us. I will never forget the smiles and look of pride on the children’s faces reading these words! I’ve kept my sheet above my desk to cheer me up on those rainy days, and I’m hoping the children will cling onto those words when things seem tough
Spreading kindness is something we are brilliant at at Prudhoe West and I’m so proud of Year 2 this afternoon
Year 3
Year 3 have had their own version of the Great Pottery Throwdown this week. We have examined examples of Roman pottery styles and designed our pots, thinking carefully about what we want to use them for and who we would make them for. It was hard work but they have worked out beautifully. We can't wait to decorate them next week
Year 4
Last week in year 4 we continued our collage work in art. Using the Battle of Marathon as an inspiration we created black and white collages adding a small amount of colour.
SKILLS BUILDER
An Introduction to Skills Builder Homezone
Here is a video link giving a brief guide on how to use the Homezone.
https://skillsbuilderpartnership.wistia.com/medias/tr64a4abmo
In school we have selected the 'Getting Started' level of experience to begin with. Below is an example of one of the weekly challenges.
NEWCASTlE EAGLES BASKETBALL
FAMILY EVENT + CHEERLEADING BOOTCAMP FOR YEARs 1-4
Those of you who have been with us for a while will know that, in normal times, we have traditionally always has a school family night out at Newcastle Eagles Basketball with our choir singing in the interval and after the show and a cheerleading squad performing throughout the match. This has always been a great opportunity for our whole school community to come together on a Friday night, away from school, and have fun, regardless of whether children wanted to perform or not.
Obviously we haven't done it for a while, and choir being part of this is not yet an option (Mrs Falcus is due back very soon though!) however, we have come up with a bit of a plan we hope you'll want to join in with!
The date of the event will be Friday 4th March 2022.
The venue is the Vertu Newcastle Eagle Arena on Scotswood Road.
The times: from 6.30pm - around 9.00pm (when the game ends)
For all Prudhoe West families:
We are offering discounted tickets for the game when tickets are bought through school. These will be priced at £8 adults and £5 children. We have as many tickets as we can sell, so invite all your friends and family along too. It genuinely is a brilliant night out, with food/drinks available and games throughout! Families would need to sort their own transport to and from the Arena on the night.
For children who fancy performing on the night:
We will be holding a cheerleading 'Bootcamp' on Thursday 3rd March from 1pm - 4.30/5pm run by a cheerleading/dance coach. All children (boys and girls) from Year 1-4 are welcome to attend. At the bootcamp the children will learn their cheerleading routines for the night, when they will get to perform 3/4 times. The don't need any dance/cheerleading experience - everyone is welcome.
We are not charging for the bootcamp (as we are covering the cost through our Sports Premium) but parents would need to buy their child a ticket (£5) for the game so that they had a seat.
Children would travel to and from the Arena with parents/carers, and would remain their responsibility throughout, except when performing. A parent/carer must stay throughout (though you may be able to arrange for another parent to take/look after your child privately if you are able to attend but your child still wants to).
Children would need a plain black t-shirt/vest top and black leggings/shorts (please contact us if you don't have these things as we have lots of shorts available at the moment) to wear, but would be provided with the rest of their costume and props.
We hope you will be as up for this event as we are, and to get as many of our children performing as we can.
All tickets need to be paid for by Friday 18th February via the app.
Please let us know by completing THIS FORM asap.
SAFER INTERNET DAY
Our Online Safety Ambassadors did a fantastic job running the workshops on Safer Internet Day. The workshops were based around reading screenshots online of unkind behaviour and the advice they would give to help. They all did a great job!
FUNDED CHILDCARE
If you have a child who is 2 years old then you may be entitled to 15 hours funded childcare. Please call or email the office with the following information and we can check the system.
Child's Name
Child's DOB
Parent's DOB
Parent's Surname
Parent's National Insurance Number
Funding would then start on the term after your child's second birthday.
free school meals
Dont forget to apply for Free School Meals!
Even if your child is in Reception to Year 2 and in receipt of Universal Free School Meals (because of thir age!) you may still be eligible. This will also entitle you to a food voucher in the February half term holidays which will be sent out later this week.
You can apply by clicking here.
dont forget
Our website contains all the forms and information you may need from school. This includes
External Afterschool Clubs
In addition to Shining Stars Kids Club, there are also other clubs available. They are as follows:
GAYLE SMITH GYMNASTICS
Contact Gayle on Facebook - GS Gymnastics or
07852 531844
Seiken Ryu karate
Contact Peter for further details at on 07912 533164
Seiken Ryu karate
Prudhoe West Pupils Only
EVERY FRIDAY 3.00pm - 4.00pm
Open to children in Y1
Contact instructor Wayne Bond on 07787145497
EASYFUNDRAISING - support us at no cost to you
Did you know that whenever you buy anything online – from your weekly shop to your annual holiday – you could be raising free donations for Prudhoe West PTA with Easyfundraising?
There are over 4,000 shops and sites on board ready to make a donation – including eBay, Argos, John Lewis, ASOS, Booking.com and M&S – and it won’t cost you a penny extra to help us raise funds.
All you need to do is:
1. Go to https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/prudhoewestpta/?utm_campaign=raise-more and join for free.
2. Every time you shop online, go to easyfundraising first to find the site you want and start shopping.
3. After you’ve checked out, the retailer will make a donation to Prudhoe West PTA at no extra cost to you whatsoever!
There are no catches or hidden charges and Prudhoe West PTA will be really grateful for your donations.
AMAZON SMILE
If shopping on Amazon, please also support the school by accessing amazon via smile.amazon.co.uk
The first time you log on, search for 'Prudhoe West' (Prudhoe West First School Parent Teacher Association) and select us as your organisation to support, then shop via the smile.amazon.co.uk link rather than the main amazon site. Again there is no difference to you, but this will support the school. Please share these links via your socials and with friends and family.
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