Dear North Tawton Families,
Burns Night In assembly on Monday I shared Burns Night traditions with KS1 and KS2. Robert Burns was a Scottish poet, and each year on his birthday (25th January) many Scots will eat haggis, listen to bagpipe music, recite poetry and have a good time. I have Scottish family who mark this event each year with their friends. The children heard my step mum speak in Gaelic and my dad say a traditional Burns Night prayer. Name Stories It has been great hearing children’s name stories this week. If you haven’t already, please do share these with children. Update on Squirrel section for North Tawton Scout Group from Rowena Ford Plans to open the section for the summer term are progressing well and we are now ready to open a waiting list for children who will be 4 or 5 at the start of April this year. The section will meet on a Thursday between 5 and 6pm at North Tawton Rugby club and we have a great first term planned including stream dipping and strawberry picking plus a visit to the Mid Devon Scout Camp our Beavers, Cubs and Scouts will be attending in June. However, we still need at least one additional Leader plus a number of section helpers, the more that we have, the more flexible we can be to allow for sickness, work commitments etc. Without adult leaders and helpers we cannot open the section and make the fantastic world of Scouting available to this younger age group. We would particularly welcome the involvement of grandparents and other adults, to be able to give the children a wider range of activities and experiences. In the same way that both girls and boys are welcome to become squirrels, we would like to have both men and women as leaders and helpers If you are interested in your child being placed on the waiting list and / or interested in becoming a leader or section helper, please contact Rowena Ford either by phone (01837 82019) or email ([email protected]) February Half Term Ocra have activities during the February half term holiday. Please see here for more details. https://ocrasport.org.uk/holidays/ Dates for the Diary Friday 4th Feb at 9.30am FONTS meeting Friday 11th Dress to Impress – details to follow! Friday 11th – 13th February North Tawton Art Weekend Saturday 12th February 10am – 2pm Gardening Day Monday 14th February – St Valentine’s Day doughnuts – make sure you get your orders in Friday 18th February 2pm - On Line assembly for families and last day of term Monday 28th February – return to school Sad News As you know, this week we heard the sad news that our nursery administrator Debbie Reed passed away. I did not have the pleasure of working with her, but I have heard what a fabulous colleague and friend she was. I told the children on Wednesday in assembly and I was moved by how thoughtful and considerate the children were. Thank you for your kind words, as you know many staff have known her a long time and will miss her sorely. Funeral arrangements will be published locally. FONTS update
😋 Krispy Kreme Doughnut Sale 😋 Don't forget to pre-order your boxes of doughnuts by Tuesday 1st February, £10 for 12. Individual doughnuts will be available for sale on Monday 14th February after school for £1 per doughnut. Let’s make some dough for the school!! All money raised will go towards new cookers and cooking equipment for the children in school. The next FONTS meeting will be held via Zoom on Friday 4th February at 9.30am. A link and Agenda will be emailed to the FONTS email list. If you would like to join the meeting and are not a recipient of our usual FONTS emails please email us on [email protected] for the link. Everyone welcome, please join us and share ideas for raising money for our school 😊 Bag2school...coming soon. Now is the time to have a de-clutter of those wardrobes. This is a free fundraising collection service for all your good quality unwanted items, such as clothing, bags, shoes, bedding, curtains, towels etc. Please see bag2school.com for further info on what is accepted. Collection dates TBC. This year FONTS will also be offering a doorstep collection of bags for those who cannot get to the drop off point at school. The more bags we get, the more money the school gets 😊 Thank you for your continued support FONTS committee Email [email protected] Or message FONTS on Class Dojo Dear North Tawton Families Another week draws to an end! I’m happy to report we have had no further cases of Covid, so on Monday, God willing, our school staff and children should be out of isolation and well. I sincerely hope none of us get the virus over the weekend. Fingers crossed. We are continuing our measures in school, including staff wearing face masks in communal areas, and ask that you continue to also wear face masks at drop off and collection. Thank you! Thank you Thank you for the contributions of warm, waterproof clothes for forest school, wool and thread, and for the offers of help at our gardening day! All offers of help and donations of craft and outdoor resources will be gratefully received! Martin Luther King. Jr In assembly this week we learnt about the great peace activist Martin Luther King, Jr as it was the celebration of his birthday. Children then found out more about him in class and why he is remembered. We played the Stevie Wonder Happy Birthday video which you can see here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anWx36QPmco Names This week, Year 4 have been finding out about Hindu baby naming traditions. The children were keen to find out and share their own naming story. This is a lovely discussion for all children and families to have at home. Who chose their name? Why? Does the name have a special meaning? You can google origins and meanings of names to find out more. My name ‘Tara’ has Irish roots and is also the name of a Hindu Goddess! My mum liked the name when she saw it was the name of the house in the film Gone with the Wind and my days liked the Avengers actress Tara King! (Ask your grandparents!) Do have a discussion at home, I will be encouraging children to share their stories! Teacher Training Do you, or do you know someone who is interested in teaching? Do see out teacher training opportunities here Dates for the Diary
Thursday 27th January 6pm Y6 SATs Meeting Friday 4th Feb at 9.30am FONTS meeting Saturday 12th February 10am – 2pm Gardening Day Monday 14th February – St Valentine’s Day – watch this space for something special! Friday 18th February 2pm - On Line assembly for families and last day of term Monday 28th February – return to school With very best wishes for the weekend, Tara Penny Dear North Tawton Families, This week in assembly we have been thinking about what North Tawton might look like in the future. Please discuss this at home, our children have wonderful ideas, even if some are a bit wild, for example making all the houses out of sweets! Increased public transport and additional amenities while retaining the rural look and feel of the town was a common theme. Some children considered environmental issues and thought of ways to reduce pollution while others focused on the look of the town with colourful houses and more trees. Please encourage your children to discuss this and create their own pictures for the North Tawton Art Weekend. If you live in North Tawton, please display your entries in your window 11 – 13th February, if not, bring them to school and we will display them here. I have received two already! Winners and runners up will be displayed in the Ruth Smith Gallery! Covid Update
Please see the latest Covid isolation guidance emailed and on our website Covid Update 14.1.22 Clubs It is fabulous that so many children have joined our one or more of our clubs after school. If your children haven’t, please consider this as a way for them to pursue interests, gain new skills and hobbies, and make friendships across the year groups. It’s also an extra hour for you! Clubs cost £1 per session and are free to those in receipt of Pupil Premium. We will have some more opportunities next term. Donations to school We would really appreciate any donations of the following -
Gardening Day Miss Prince and I are planning a volunteer gardening day on Saturday 12th February, 10 – 2pm We would love a team of volunteers to help us
We would need you to bring your own tools but we will provide refreshments. Please email me if you are able to come. [email protected] Local Environmental meeting Did any of our family members attend the North Tawton environmental meeting on Wednesday? Please let me know as I would love to make contact with the group. With very best wishes for the weekend, Tara Penny There is a vacancy for one Parent governor to join the Local Stakeholder Board at Three Hares.
Local governors are a vital part of the Dartmoor Multi Academy Trust’s connection with schools and community, and Parents are an important voice within the governance structure. To qualify as a Parent governor, you must have at least one child on the roll at any school within the Three Hares hub, and must be eligible under the national governing body rules. Nominations are now open, until close of business on Friday 27th January 2022. All nominations will then be put forward to a parent vote, which will take place electronically. The nomination form must be completed in full, and can be obtained by emailing the Clerk to Governors: [email protected] For an informal chat about the role of parent governor and the responsibilities of the local stakeholder board, please contact the Chair Emma Neath: [email protected] or the Clerk to Governors: [email protected] Thank you for your interest, and we look forward to receiving your applications Dear North Tawton families, Welcome back, and a very Happy New Year to all of our North Tawton families. The weather has certainly turned with a very cold and wet start to the new year. Please do make sure children have waterproof coats as we do go outside, even in the drizzle! Please do make sure children wrap up warm with vests, and warm socks or tights. It’s cold in classrooms with the windows open so warm jumpers are encouraged, even if not school colours. Covid Update Two children and one member of our staff had Covid over Christmas – all are on the mend and are back or due back next week. Unfortunately three children have tested positive and are away today from Reception, Year 5 and Year 2. The reporting and isolating guidance has changed, please keep an eye on emails and the school website updates. https://www.ntcps.co.uk/covid19.html We continue our measures as outlined in my email this week. EYFS Veranda Our covered outdoor area is finished! We are so excited about it! A huge thank you to FONTS who raised money over a number of years to help fund this project. We have started using it already, but will have an official grand opening very soon… Clubs
Clubs are filling up so please see which ones are still available. As in the Autumn Term, clubs are 3.30 – 4.30. They cost £1 per session, and are free for pupils who have free school meals. We limit the numbers so we have staff to child ratios and resources. Some are specifically for particular age groups or children. This term we have: Construction Club, Girls Football and Fitness, STEM, Sewing, Netball, Story Club, Yoga & Mindfulness, Gardening and Saints Sports. We will have new clubs each term. Home Discussion This week in assembly, we talked about the Roman God Janus who looks backwards and forwards. We looked back at highlights and achievements from 2021 and made new year resolutions for 2022 You may want to discuss this at home. What were your family highlights of 2021? What family resolutions can you make together for 2022? Flu Immunisations Please check your email regarding flu immunisations taking place at school on the 14th January. Have a lovely weekend All the best Tara Penny Welcome back everyone! Please see Covid Update emailed yesterday.
The Spring term clubs are now live, please book on in the normal way. Dear North Tawton Families, It was a pleasure to take part in the beautiful candle lit service at St Peter’s church last Sunday. Do come along to the Christingle Service on Sunday 19th December at 11am and the Christmas service on Christmas Eve at 4pm, you will be welcomed. I look forward to working more closely with the church over the coming year as well as lots of other local community groups. This week has been a wonderful week of arts, crafts, singing, performing and of course learning about the really important messages of Christmas. Do see the class blogs and Dojo for photos and videos of our Christmas lunch, carol singing, Y6 Christingle service, our nativity and our class parties. Wreaths Congratulations to everyone who took part in the wreath decorating competition. The wreaths looked absolutely stunning and it was a shame to take them down and send them back home! Our 2021 winners are: Nursery - Poppy Jones for her cotton wool snowman with twig arms! Reception Class - George Sheepy for his bright and cheery holly design. Year 1 - Henry Forsey for his traditional design, with delicious smelling oranges. Year 2 - Ned Jones for his Christmas train wreath, with clever peg train track. Year 3 - Ralph Clatworthy Edwards for his intricate festive drawings. Year 4 - Jessica Reynolds for her wintery snow globe design. Year 5 - Rebecca Sims for her unique halo mobile design, with crocheted icicles. Year 6 - Oliver Horn for his illuminated prickly holly creation. Ouch! A big thank you to FONTS for organising this and to RL Taylor for providing the prizes. Curriculum developments
This term the teaching staff have had meetings and training to adopt a new curriculum called Real PE for Physical Education, and the Voices Foundation for music. Both of these will enhance our current work and give us more resources and opportunities for our pupils. We are also developing our Forest School with Miss Prince leading us in safety and innovation. We really look forward to using our outdoor spaces in the Spring for lots of risk taking and problem solving adventures. Coach Edwards and Coach Stronge from Saints Southwest have been teaching the classes sports skills this Autumn term. Read more about Saints Southwest here Saints Southwest Newsletter During our INSET day (In service training day) on Tuesday 4th January, the staff will be working on line from 8am developing our Base Curriculum with staff across the Trust. Covid This Autumn, 29 of our children have had to isolate as they have contracted Covid – this is 16% of the school population. Many parents and older siblings have also had the virus over the past three months. We have also had a lot of absence due to children waiting for test results as well as other illnesses. This obviously has an impact on school life and much more so on family life. Thank you to all parents who have kept in touch with us regarding this. A particular acknowledgement to all of you who have been ill yourselves, or needed to take time off to look after your children or, as has been for many families, both. I am sure looking after poorly children while you are not well yourself has been no mean feat. We have also had nine members of staff off this Autumn with Covid. Our staff team have really pulled together by taking on additional break and lunch duties, working extra hours, covering each other’s responsibilities and supporting one another. I am so pleased that we have managed to stay open this term (many schools across the country have closed classes, year groups and entire schools) A huge ‘thank you’ to the staff for their hard work going the extra mile each and every day for our children, this really is a fantastic team. I hope we will not have so much disruption in the new year, but with the new variant, we do need to continue our measures. I will be in touch before we start back to school with an update. Please do let me know by email if any you or any of your children contract the virus over the holiday as I will have to consider this for the new term arrangements. Farewell This week we said a fond farewell to Sarah Dennis and thank her for her outstanding work here. She will be missed. Clubs We hope to be able to hold clubs in January, We will let you know at the start of the term what our Covid contingency plan looks like. If we are able to, clubs will start the week beginning 10th January. Back by popular demand: Netball and Saints Sports. Introducing a construction club for our youngest children; mindfulness where children can have some quiet time doing yoga, visualisations and mindfulness coloring; gardening, girls football, science and sewing. We will open bookings on the first day back, if covid contingency plans allow. Looking forward to 2022 We look forward to our new Early Years outdoor classroom being completed in early January. We will have a grand opening with ribbon cutting! Our older children will start their swimming tuition at the pool in Okehampton. We are planning lots of trips out to support our curriculum, developing our forest area and working with Devon Wildlife Trust. With very best wishes for a merry Christmas, I do hope you and your families have a safe healthy festive holiday. I look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday 5th January. Don't forget the North Tawton Elf Hunt! Merry Christmas to you all! Tara Penny Principal FONTS update (Sorry it’s a long one, but it’s all very important 😊 )
Thank you to everyone for your support in 2021. We’ve not been able to do some of the things we would have liked to but this hasn’t stopped the Friends of North Tawton School raising money for our children. The most recent events we’ve had have been very successful. In total you’ve raised over £800! All of this money raised goes straight to FONTS and is spent providing extra curricular activities such as trips and outings, as well as purchasing much needed resources that children will all benefit from. We have plans to purchase some exciting new resources in January! The most recent non uniform day enabled FONTS to gift each class with an amount of funding to plan their treat day for the end of term. We’re sure you’ll all agree, they thoroughly deserve it! Philippa Sims has been very busy recycling last years Christmas cards into wonderful Christmas tags, gift boxes and cards. She was given a target of £65 from the school for Christmas Performance resources and, unsurprisingly, Philippa has exceeded this amount and raised £73 (going up daily) for the school. Thank you Philippa, that’s amazing, and thank you to the Merry Go Round for kindly having a basket by their till. P.S we all know where to take our Christmas cards when we take them down! It’s the last day on Friday and if you’re wondering what to do over the festive period why not spend some family time going on The Great Christmas Elf Hunt. Santa has lost ten cheeky elves and we’ve heard they’re hiding in North Tawton!! Pop to the Post Office and pick up a sheet of clues for £1 and see if you can find them all. Once you’ve found each elf’s hiding place write it on your sheet and return it to the Post Office (in the decorated box) by Friday 7th January. Three winners will be chosen at random and announced on this day. Happy Hunting! 🎄 Don’t forget Santa Claus is coming to Town this Saturday from 4.30pm 🎅 Listen out for the Christmas music 🎶 Merry Christmas 🎄 and Happy New Year 🥳 from FONTS FONTS committee Email [email protected] Or message FONTS on Class Dojo |
Categories |