Four weeks into the new school year, and the autumn term is certainly gathering pace! It has been a busy few weeks across school, with pupils now well established in their new classes and fully immersed in their learning. It has been wonderful to see the progress already being made, as well as the enthusiasm children are showing for the many different experiences and opportunities on offer.

This week’s news is from Mrs Heath

Yesterday, the qualifying KS2 children were invited to The Bicester School to take part in the annual cross-country competition. We were very lucky to have such great running weather and the children had a fantastic morning. The children showed great resilience and courage and ran their best races.

Leo, in year 4, said “It’s a brave thing to race. You need confidence to run that far.”

We are very proud of all the children that took part.

Sharing Our Community’s Experiences

You may remember our invitation at the end of last term for members of our school community to come into school and share their talents, interests and experiences with the children. We would love to continue developing this opportunity this year.

In particular, if you or a family member have connections to another country or culture, we would be delighted to hear from you. Perhaps you could share a little about your family’s heritage, traditions, celebrations, language, music, food, stories or experiences. It could be something as simple as bringing in an object, sharing some photographs or talking to the children about something that is special to you and your family.

These experiences are a wonderful way of helping our children to learn about and appreciate the diverse world around them, while making use of the knowledge and experiences within our own school community.

If you think you might be able to come in and share something with the children, please contact the school office or speak to your child’s class teacher. We would be very happy to hear from you and can help you think about what you might share and how this could work in school.

Attendance

Regular attendance is one of the most important factors in helping children do well at school. Being in school every day helps children keep up with learning, build strong friendships, and develop good routines that will support them now and in the future.

The DFE attendance expectation is a minimum of 96%. This term so far, our whole-school attendance is 95.5%. Thank you to families who continue to prioritise attendance and punctuality - it really does make a difference.

We also keep a close eye on attendance in each class so we can offer support where needed:

Well done to Oak and Willow Class for achieving an amazing attendance of over 98% this week – Brilliant!

Please remember:

• Children should be in school every day unless they are genuinely unwell.
• Medical and dental appointments should be made outside of school hours wherever possible.
• If your child is struggling to attend for any reason, we are here to help - early conversations make a big difference.

Allergies - Nut Free School

We are still getting items in lunchboxes which contain nuts, we are a nut free school and have children in school with serious allergies please do not send your child in with items containing nuts, this includes chocolate spread, peanut butter and products containing a chocolate filling like Nutella or chocolate bars containing nuts. 

Reminder to Parents - Please ensure that packed lunches contain food which is cut appropriately we have seen an increase in grapes, cherry tomatoes, olives in lunch boxes which have not been cut which causes a choking hazard. Please follow this link for some information regarding the risk of choking and how to reduce the risk.

Secondary School Open Evenings

Thursday 1st October: The Cooper School

Wednesday 7th October: Whitelands Academy 

Thursday 8th October: The Bicester School

Saturday 10th October: Headington School

For more information about the Open Evenings please see the specific schools website.

Flu Vaccination offer for children aged 2 and 3 years - 

Your PTA trustees are:

Lucy Crawford (Yr 4)

Emma Austin (Yr 3 and 5)

Catherine Ravensward (Yr1 and Yr5)

Jill Bali (Yr 3 and 5)

Charlotte Noakes (Yr2 and 5)