Good afternoon 

This Friday we have the Scholastic book fair visiting Olton. The books will be available for a whole week where children will have the opportunity to explore new reading. This is an exciting opportunity for the children, as we now have the school libraries up and running which the children have shown great enjoyment in visiting. 

As you are aware from the letter, books and stationery will be available for the children. All fair materials can be found on our website under the Free Digital Resource Pack banner: https://bookfairs.scholastic.co.uk/free_resources

The  wish list below allows pupils to select their books as well as parents/carers to make payment from home.

https://images.scholastic.co.uk/assets/a/07/10/secondary-book-fair-wish-lists-scholastic-2034061.pdf

Dear Parents/Carers,

Following the Government announcement over the weekend and the precautionary steps that are being taken in relation to the new variant, we wanted to write to update you about some measures that we are taking in school to keep our whole community safe.

We want life in school to continue to be as normal as possible for the children as they have really benefitted from being back in normal routines that are no longer affected as much by COVID. However, we have to ensure the safety of everyone and following the DfE guidance that face coverings should be worn in communal areas in all settings by staff and visitors, unless exempt, from Tuesday 30th November, we would ask that all parents wear a mask when entering the school building e.g. to give a message to the office or to meet with a teacher and would encourage parents to wear a mask at pick up and drop off as although you are outside, there can be large numbers of parents together.

In light of the new information that was shared over the weekend, we have made the very difficult decision to change our Christmas plays and nativities to be recorded performances which we will share with you via our school YouTube channel in the last week of term. Although we had very much hoped that we could go ahead with the performances in person, the number of parents we needed to accommodate given the size of our school and the proximity to Christmas and the family celebrations that you will want to enjoy this year, we felt this was the safest option.

We understand that new announcements in relation to COVID can cause alarm and worry but please be assured that we will continue to follow Government and DfE guidance. In addition, based on our local information and context will put in place measures within our school setting that are necessary.

Please be reminded that if your child displays any of the main COVID symptoms: high temperature, persistent dry cough, loss of taste or smell you must keep them off school until they have had a negative PCR test or completed the necessary period of isolation.

Thank you for your continued support.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Chamberlain   Mrs Gray

Head Teacher      Deputy Head Teacher

Dear Parents and Carers,

Thank you for your overwhelming support this week when we have finally opened up our school on to one site.  The children and their teachers were delighted to walk into their new building.  Thank you for supporting us as we modify some of the entrance and exit routes to and from school and we hope that you agree that the changes we made yesterday improved the way we accessed the site. 

Please can I respectfully ask that parents and carers do not arrive too early before their collection time as we need to be mindful about the number of visitors we have on site and until the blinds arrive for the classrooms, it can be a little distracting for the children when they see their parents outside.  Please can we ask that you wait away from the classroom windows as much as possible to help us to prepare for the end of the day.  Also please continue to be respectful to our neighbours on Lyndon Road regarding parking at drop off and collection times.  We continue to work closely with our community Policing Team to enforce considerate, safe parking.  Many of you will have noticed our new Walking Bus which is available for pupils in Year 1 to 6 and we still have a few spaces left. For more information please contact the school office.   During drop off and collection times parents can park at the Lyndon pub to walk and collect their child to further reduce traffic collection.

For pupils arriving late after their soft start (KS2 after 8.40 am and KS1 after 8.50am) must be signed in by a parent/carer in the main school office to further support our safeguarding protocols. 

From next week, we resume our weekly Newsletter.

Best Wishes

Mr L Chamberlain          Mrs E Gray

Head Teacher                  Deputy Head Teacher

Good Afternoon Everyone!

I hope that you have had a lovely half term. Things have been very exciting in school and I would like to thank all of the team for their hard work, sorting, unpacking and getting our new school ready for our children tomorrow. All children will arrive at school using the new main entrance - this is for Reception, Year 1 to Year 6 children - see first picture where I will be standing in the morning to meet and greet all of our children.  Please note for children in Year 3 to 6, this is a new entrance, a little bit further along the road. Children in Year 3 to 6 will be directed up the main path where they will go into the Junior block and will be greeted by a member of the team. For children in Year 1, Year 2, and Reception, Mrs Gray will be visible to direct you to your new classrooms. Parents in the new block can walk their child up to their cloakroom door, where a member of staff will be available to welcome your child into school.

To ease congestion around the new block whilst we are getting used to the new systems and routines, we have a one way system for families on the Infant playground - staff will be highly visible to guide and help us all to be familiar and understand the routes.

At the end of the day, families who are collecting from Year 3 to 6 at 3.00pm can use the familiar KS2 pedestrian path and will be directed to the Junior playground. For collection of Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 children at 3.10pm, please use the new main entrance pathway and you will be directed around the site. If you have both a child in Year 2 and either Year 1 or Reception, please drop off or collect your Year 2 child first of all.

For those of us with children attending the Nursery, there is a new entrance which has a double wooden gate slightly further along Lyndon Road for you to access Nursery at the start and end of the day. (See photo)

We understand that there is a lot of new changes for some of our children and our families but we aim to be as helpful as possible and hopefully by the end of the day tomorrow, we will feel much more confident with our new routines. As with any new routine, we will keep it under review to ensure it works for all of us and keeps everyone safe.

A gentle reminder that for Year 3 to 6, our soft start is between 8.30am and 8.40am. For Reception to Year 2, our soft start is between 8.40am and 8.50am. Nursery starting time is from 8.30am or 12.30pm. Pupils who are late after this time will need to be brought into the new main reception area with their parent to sign in.

Looking forward to seeing you all tomorrow morning!

Best Wishes

Mr L Chamberlain                   Mrs E Gray

Head Teacher                          Deputy Head Teacher

Wednesday 3rd November 2021

Good evening everyone, first of all, it has been absolutely wonderful to welcome all of our children and families onto one site and so lovely to see the joy and excitement of our children when they saw our new school- we are all very proud of the new building. As with any move, there are so many things to get used to- particularly moving around and navigating your way to particular areas and new classes and I very much appreciate your understanding and patience over the next few days.

After school, we have been evaluating drop-off and collection from the new site today and have made a few changes for tomorrow which we hope will make things a little easier based upon our experience today. In the morning, we shall continue using our new main entrance but to ease congestion we shall also open up the narrow pedestrian gate ( alongside St Margaret's Nursery) so KS2 children can get into their part of the building quickly and not have to use the main entrance. Of course families with KS1 and KS2 can still use the main entrance if they wish to. We will have an additional member of staff on the KS2 pedestrian gate by St Margaret's Nursery in the morning.

For our children in 3B (Mrs Bell) and 3L (Mrs Lewis) at home time (3.00pm) these classes will now be collected from their classroom doors instead of the junior playground. This will ease some congestion from the junior playground at home time. 3BW will continue to be collected from the main junior playground.

Thank you for your understanding as we refine routines around school and for your overwhelmingly positive feedback today. We shall have plenty of our team wearing hi-vis jackets tomorrow to help guide you around the site and to hopefully make drop-off and collection times even smoother.

Best wishes, Mr Chamberlain and Mrs Gray.