29th September

Volunteers

Many thanks to the volunteers (x2) who came today and kindly help sweep leaves, clear beds and cut back branches on the FP area. Super kind.

Next week…

Thursday 5^th October – Land Phase (Y1/2) Beach School

Thursday 5^th October – Y5/6 Girls’ Football Tournament

Friday 6^th October – Y5/6 Boys’ Football Tournament

Harvest Celebration

KS2 (Y3-6) will be visiting Murton Church for a harvest church visit at 9:15am on Monday 9th October. Andy Walker, the pastor, has said that KS2 parents are welcome to attend should they wish.

Building work nearly done!

We are nearly at the end of a major project that was supposed to be finished at the end of the Summer holidays. It’s involved knocking through cupboards in the KS2/Junior classrooms, turning the cupboards into cloakrooms and creating doorways onto the backfields. Now, every classroom have access to an outdoor space. We will over time develop the areas behind thee classrooms. The old cloakrooms have storage at the back of them and will be used as work spaces for groups of children.

PTA

What an awesome job the PTA do, however they are dwindling in numbers! If you would be willing to get involved, let me know and I’ll point you in the right direction.

Please don’t forget the Tesco community blue chip vote thingy as we’ve only a couple of weeks left. Please see below a list of stores taking part in the voting on your project.  Feel free to share this list of stores amongst your supporters and within your community.   

5482    De La Beche Swans Exp    SA1 3EZ
3241    Swansea Marina    SA1 3RA
6113    Swansea Sthlen Rd Exp    SA1 4AG
4673    Swanesa Mariner Exp    SA1 5BG
5732    Swansea Uplnds Cr Exp    SA2 0EY
5557    Sketty Swansea Exp    SA2 9BX
4612    Swansea Newton Rd Exp    SA3 4AS
2597    Gowerton Express    SA4 3EZ
3219    Swansea Extra    SA5 4BA
4781    Swansea Treboeth Exp    SA5 9EL

Admissions – Reception (Our school) or Year 7 (the Comp)

Letters have gone out regarding admissions for our Reception or for starting the Comp in Y7. It is really important to prioritise getting the application in during the given window. Any issues, please call our office for help!

Reading Recommendations

Thanks for the recommendations, I’ve added them onto the website. It made me smile to see that some of the recommendations are still books I loved reading as a child. Couldn’t get enough of Just William!

Use the link on the site to keep the recommendations coming. https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/literacy/

Events on…

If you know of any child friendly community events coming up. Let me know and I’ll try to put them on the messages. Please don’t use this to advertise for your business – I’ll get into grief!

https://museum.wales/swansea/whatson/12071/Childrens-Literature-Festival/

A number of authors are attending and workshops are on offer for all age groups - all free! 

22nd September

Term dates and INSET days

Please visit the school website to see term dates and INSET days. Have you subscribed to the school calendar yet? You’ll have the crucial dates. https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/diary/subscribe/

Coasteering Session

A massive thank you to @ripnrockwales for kindly doing a Coasteering session (for free!) for our Y6 children. Most have been now and had a great time, learning about beach safety and loving getting into the water. Anyone who is looking for a fun activity to do with work colleagues or friends, should get signed up! We'll get some photos soon onto our social media.  https://twitter.com/ripnrockwales

Parent Help Day – Friday 29^th September

Next Friday we plan to have a DIY help session in the afternoon. Quite a bit will be about tidying up outside area. We so appreciate when parents, and the community, help with this sort of thing. You can imagine it’s incredibly difficult to keep on top of. If you can come anytime from 1pm, we’ll meet at the main entrance of the school.  Bring a pair of gloves!

Reading Books

You will see a real emphasis this year on reading. Children will come home with books and comprehension tasks. Being able to read confidently is a gateway into learning about anything!  At the end of last year I suggested parents could give us book recommendations. Please give us your recommendations –

I’ve only had one recommendation so far! I’ve put it on the website. Come on, I know everyone has at least one or two books they think are great books for kids.

https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/literacy/

Road Safety

It’s always good to be reminded about road safety. Bishopston is a super busy road, please keep an eye on children coming in and out of school. We’ve had a couple of local residents ask us to remind parents not to park down private roads. We’ve also had a request to remind parents not to allow their children in the private parking behind the Coop.

Volunteers

Huge thanks to those of you who have kindly signed up to do some volunteering in the school. It’s lovely to see a few parents and grandparents involved and being so supportive.  We know everyone helps in different ways – thank you all!

Residential Trips

We have booked the residential trips for our Y5 and Y6s.

Y5 are going to Llain on the week beginning April 22^nd

Y6 are going to Llangrannog on the week beginning June 24^th

Please put the dates in the diary. The cost will be £295. We will shortly set up purses on ipay for deposits, the final payment will be for the end of March.

15th September

Office Job in the School

We’re all super gutted that Elise Bessant our office manager is stepping away from the role due to external circumstances. Elise has done an amazing job and is loved by us all. We need someone new. The LA have had the advert for two weeks but can’t seem to get it onto their website. We have put it on ours.

https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/jobs-in-the-school/

Please forward on to anyone you think would be interested. It’s such a crucial role in the school – an appointment we want to get right. Elise is happy to talk to anyone who is interested.  There is no doubt it needs someone who is: lovely, highly organized, calm under pressure and super confident using a range of computer software.

School Nurse

Please note information on the school nursing service on our website

https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/school-nursing-services/

Food Bank Collection

Each year we try to do a foodbank collection around the time of the Harvest Festival. Any donations that come into school will be distributed to those who have a need.

School Photos - CONSENT needed by 22^nd September- 26th September

School Photo day is 26^th September.  The consents must be completed by 22nd September please. This is for Roz and Kirsty to gather parents’ consent to take their child’s photos, and to collect the parents details to email you when the photos are ready to view and buy online.

https://schools.rozandkirsty.co.uk/add_consent/bishopston?pin=4379

No consent, no photo. Roz and Kirsty have to be really strict on this due to GDPR guidelines.

Just a reminder we do NOT invite preschoolers in for photos 

PTA

Huge thank you for all your support last year. We raised over £13,000 – click the link to see some of the things we purchased on our poster.

https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/what-weve-purchased-for-the-children/

Next week

Thursday 21^st and Friday 22^nd – Y6 Coasteering Session – big thanks to Dave and  Sally @ Rip N Rock who have kindly put this on for free for our Y6 children.

8th September 2023

Croeso! We hope everyone had a good Summer/Winter and are now raring to go again. It's been a lovely week in school. I'll try to keep you updated each week with these messages.

Important Dates

Please see attached important dates for the year. Listening to feedback from last year, parents asked us to update the school calendar on the website. We have done that. If you click on the link you’ll be able to subscribe to that calendar. If you follow the link to our school website, scrolls down and you can see a sheet of key dates you might want to print off for the fridge.

https://bishopstonprimaryschool.wales/key-diary-dates/

Curriculum Evening

After school next Wednesday there will be a curriculum evening in your child's class. The foundation classes will meet between 1530-1600, then key stage two classes between 1600-1630. Please make every effort to be there. It's an opportunity to meet your child's class teacher and a chance to get a quick understanding on what the focus and expectations will be for the year.

Booking Before school, Breakfast and After School Clubs

All clubs are now booked through ipay. Once you have registered you will need to go to accounts, select the child, the club and then the dates you wish to book them in then checkout. Once paid your child will be booked in and on the club register. Contact the office at  bessante11@hwbcymru.com or on 01792 232754 if you have any issues. Thank you.

Ipay

Please keep trying to sign into ipay - 70% have managed it. It's new to us too, this is a Swansea wide change.

Punctuality and Attendance

Please help us help your children! They need to be in school and on time. School starts at 0850, please do not be late!

Homework

We are always listening to parents feedback. Our attempt this year to get the balance right with homework is that In the foundation phase children will come home with home learning diaries and reading books.  Pupils in Y3-6 will have a homework book, it needs to come to school on Wednesday and will go home with them again on Wednesday. Each week they will have 1 online task. The school pays for subscriptions to excellent websites, please do encourage the children to do that homework. The children will also have 1 task to do in their books, again please, please encourage them to get into the habit of completing the task. It’s a very small amount compared to what they will have in the comp. It helps you to see what they are learning about and how they are doing. It helps us all to work together to improve the children’s learning.

Car Parking

Just to remind parents that we ask you to avoid driving up the school drive at ALL times. The drive is shut to everyone between 0830-0900, then again between 1500-1540. If you do ever have some need to drive into school, do not use the Foundation Phase (Infant) car park at all. It causes chaos with three ways of traffic trying to negotiate the drive and it’s dangerous if parents are allowing children to run from cars to breakfast club.  If the car parking situation gets worse, we will have to shut the drive permanently to parents, everyone will need to walk from the village.

PTA

Please make every effort to get blue tokens into the Tesco boxes in the stores listed below. We can receive up to £1,500. At the moment the other two projects are above us. Unless we make a concerted effort we'll lose out on this. We want  to raise money to put towards the Foundation Phase playground climbing frame and slide.

The project with the highest number of votes across your region will receive £1,500 (or the amount that was requested up to this value), the second placed project £1,000 (or the amount that was requested up to this value), and the third placed project £500.  To re-iterate, if you are first in the vote, you will receive the amount that you requested in your application (or the amount that was requested up to £1,500).
Stores which will vote on your project
Please see below a list of stores taking part in the voting on your project.  Feel free to share this list of stores amongst your supporters and within your community.   
5482    De La Beche Swans Exp    SA1 3EZ
3241    Swansea Marina    SA1 3RA
6113    Swansea Sthlen Rd Exp    SA1 4AG
4673    Swanesa Mariner Exp    SA1 5BG
5732    Swansea Uplnds Cr Exp    SA2 0EY
5557    Sketty Swansea Exp    SA2 9BX
4612    Swansea Newton Rd Exp    SA3 4AS
2597    Gowerton Express    SA4 3EZ
3219    Swansea Extra    SA5 4BA
4781    Swansea Treboeth Exp    SA5 9EL

Pointers for next week

• Wednesday 13th - Curriculum Evening 1530 FP, 1600 KS2 - go to your child's class