Moretonhampstead Primary School Newsletter Betton Way, Moretonhampstead, Newton Abbot, Devon TQ13 8NA Tel: 01647 440482 Email: [email protected] Website: www.moretonhampstead.devon.sch.uk Headteacher: William Bentall Executive Headteacher: Rachel Shaw

18th January 2016 Dear Parents and Carers, Happy New Year to you all and I hope you had a happy and peaceful Christmas. Thank you to FOMs for organising the Christmas Fair which raised an impressive £650.

Upcoming Events Mon 1st Feb. 2.00 – 3.30pm- CAP (Child Assault Prevention) workshop for parents. FOMs meeting 19 Jan 9am Parent Forum- 3 Feb 9am

Term has started well and the children have all taken part in a successful whole school writing project based on the book ‘Stuck’ by Oliver Jeffers. We have also had a positive visit from our school improvement partner this week. She recognised the improvements we have made in our classroom environments and in the quality and quantity of work within the children’s books. She also commented that there are now more dynamic learning opportunities within classrooms and that we have taken positive steps to engage our boys, especially in literacy. There is always more to do of course and key priorities are to raise standards in spelling, provide more challenge for our moreable mathematicians and develop marking and feedback to offer more suggestions for improvement. Oliver P and Bailey accompanied me to the Grand Opening of The Atrium Studio School at Ashburton last Friday. We were welcomed with speeches by Hugh Bellamy, SDCC Principal, Matt Messias, the Atrium Principal, Mel Stride MP, Stewart Dodd from Satellite Architects and Brett Butler-Smythe, a candidate from TV’s The Apprentice. We were then given a tour of the school. It is a terrific building and the boys were well behaved ambassadors for our school. Even in winter, I would like to allow the children on the field as often as possible but would ask you to provide the children with alternative footwear (old trainers or wellies) and a change of trousers please. As always, do feel free to pop in and see me at any time. With very best wishes, Mr William Bentall Headteacher

Attendance It is my responsibility to ensure all our children receive the education they deserve. To support this, attendance, illness and lateness will need to be monitored for all children on a weekly basis from now.

Moretonhampstead Primary School Newsletter Betton Way, Moretonhampstead, Newton Abbot, Devon TQ13 8NA Tel: 01647 440482 Email: [email protected] Website: www.moretonhampstead.devon.sch.uk Headteacher: William Bentall Executive Headteacher: Rachel Shaw

Postcards These have been awarded to Pandora for always trying her best and for being a great friend and to Archie B for smashing his times-tables time!

Building Learning Powers, SEAL Stars & Merit Awards For 15th January: BLPs: Jake, Phoebe, Eryl, Leona, Amelie A and Aaron. SEAL Stars: Ste, Rosie, Arran, Annie, Millie and Amelie S. Merit: Oscar, Dylan, Henry, Harry P, Tommy and Charlie. Congratulations to them all.

Marvellous Manners Our certificates this week have been presented to Hannah in Pepperdon and to Brandon in Butterdon. We would also like to welcome Brandon to the school and he has been awarded a Marvellous Manners for his politeness.

Bikes/ Scooters Whilst we are happy for these to come into school, please remember that they should not be ridden in the school grounds as mini-buses are driving on and off the site.

Knitting Club This begins on Tuesday lunchtime, run by Freddie and Rufus. If your child is attending and can bring in needles/ wool that would help but is not essential.

Fundraiser Jess, Ali, Mina and Charlotte are currently arranging a fundraiser for a Year 6 project. They will be sending out a letter asking for donations for a cake sale and your support would be greatly appreciated.

Parent Lunches Letters will be coming out for Butterdon and Mardon parents with dates for their Parent Lunches this week.

Appeal To support refugees, Meg Connelly is organising a collection of woollen socks and knitting supplies. She is asking for donations of socks and also knitting needles (4mm or bigger) and wool (DK or thicker) which will be used to make hats and scarves in specially organised knitting workshops. Donations (ideally in a clear sealable plastic bag labelled with size) can be placed in collection boxes which will be in position at the front of the school from tomorrow.

Moretonhampstead Primary School Newsletter Betton Way, Moretonhampstead, Newton Abbot, Devon TQ13 8NA Tel: 01647 440482 Email: [email protected] Website: www.moretonhampstead.devon.sch.uk Headteacher: William Bentall Executive Headteacher: Rachel Shaw

Out of School Opportunities We have an exciting range of trips planned for all classes this term. Please support the teachers by returning reply slips as soon as you can and I would like to thank all of you who volunteer your time to help out on these trips. If you need support with funding do see me and if your child receives Pupil Premium we can help with costs if required. I also believe after-school clubs are a vital part of what we provide and appreciate provision is currently limited but a full range will return at half-term.

Accelerated Reader We are currently introducing a system called Accelerated Reader into the school. This will help us ensure books being read by our KS2 children are providing appropriate challenge whilst also helping us monitor reading more effectively. Most importantly, it will encourage children to read at home and develop their comprehension skills. Our apologies if, in the meantime, there has been inconsistencies in the regularity of books being sent home. We have invested heavily in our stock of books and these are currently being added onto the ‘system’. We would appreciate it if any school books hiding under sofas at home could be returned to school to help us with this process.

Morning Routine I have had positive feedback about our new arrangements for the morning routine. I will review these at half term. A reminder please that children should not be inside the school building until the bell rings at 8.45am and that all children should be in school by 8.55am. Your support is appreciated.

School Council The Council are currently gathering suggestions for new school ‘Golden Rules’ and ideas for a new House point display.

Class Learning News: Butterdon Our topic this term is based on the explorers who charted the world as we know it today and those who continue to explore it. For our Big Bang we came in dressed as an explorer, past or present and prepared a project to deliver to the class. There were a wide range of explorers, from Francis Drake to Neil Armstrong. Then, armed with our imaginations, we set off to explore the school grounds and produced detailed maps of the deserts and cave systems and mountain ranges that we saw.

Moretonhampstead Primary School Newsletter Betton Way, Moretonhampstead, Newton Abbot, Devon TQ13 8NA Tel: 01647 440482 Email: [email protected] Website: www.moretonhampstead.devon.sch.uk Headteacher: William Bentall Executive Headteacher: Rachel Shaw

Mardon We have been immersing ourselves into learning all about...Chocolate! We started off the term with our 'Big Bang'. We came in dressed up us chocolate tasters or explorers and became taste testers for the day. We also had fun taking part in an interesting quiz; did you know that on average, 8 insect parts are in each bar of chocolate produced and sold? No, we didn't either but that didn't deter us from tucking in and evaluating the taste, texture and smell of some yummy samples! We have also been investigating reversible and irreversible changes and states of matter in science...we created a chemical reaction using bicarbonate of soda and vinegar! Other aspects of our learning include the start of our ghost story Literacy unit where the children have produced some brilliant ideas based around ghostly clips and pictures. In maths we have been mastering methods for the different operations, including a problem solving activity all about palindromic numbers such as 1221 and 2332 and so on! Here’s to another exciting few weeks full of fun and great learning- super work Mardon!

Shapley We started off the new year by exploring the book ‘Stuck’ by Oliver Jeffers. We used it to create our own fabulous writing in different genres such as poetry, play-scripts and diary entries. We created some great twists to the original story. We have now started another literacy topic where we are finding out how to create atmosphere and suspense in stories. Our topic this half-term is based around trees. We enjoyed some outdoor learning by ‘exploring’ the school grounds and doing a treasure hunt to find creatures that live in oak trees. We looked for signs of life in and around the pond area.

Easdon Welcome back! Last week the children thoroughly enjoyed our whole school ‘Everybody Writes’ book called ‘Stuck’. The children learnt how to play a memory game to try and help them remember all twenty-four items that got stuck up the tree. The children then wrote a for sale advertisement to try and persuade people to buy this magnificent tree full of various items. We then made our very own class version of ‘Stuck’ and the children used interesting adjectives and alliteration to describe their object. You are welcome to have a look at our class book in the library. This week we have launched our new topic ‘The Arctic and Antarctic’. We have been busily completing our ‘BIG BANG BOOKLETS’ where we have learnt about doubling numbers, word problems, multiplication and 2D shapes. We have learnt how to program the BeeBots (which we renamed Polar-Bots) to navigate them around a map of the Arctic. For literacy we have been writing lists of things we may need in the Arctic/Antarctic and writing postcards as if we are there. We have been learning about speech marks for a Pingu sketch and have learnt and recorded facts about various polar animals.

Moretonhampstead Primary School Newsletter

Pepperdon

Betton Way, Moretonhampstead, Newton Abbot, Devon TQ13 8NA Tel: 01647 440482 Email: [email protected] Website: www.moretonhampstead.devon.sch.uk Headteacher: William Bentall Executive Headteacher: Rachel Shaw

Happy New Year everyone. In Pepperdon we really enjoyed learning about the story of Stuck last week. We were really good at remembering all the things that got stuck in the tree and we made a giant story map of the story which is in the corridor outside our classroom. We have also been learning about doubles and adding numbers. This week we have had fun learning about our new topic. On our Big Bang day, we dressed up as polar animals and brought in polar teddies to help us with our learning. We read tricky penguin words in a relay race, wrote a kit list for a trip to the Arctic or Antarctic and were learning about different ways to sort penguins in our maths, based on the story 365 Penguins.

Cranbrook In Cranbrook we have begun our topic looking at ‘Habitats’. We came to school dressed as animals and explored the habitat that our animals come from. We had lots of interesting creatures like a manta ray, a polar bear, a wild chicken and many more amazing animals.

We have also been learning maths in interesting ways like our number ‘splat’ game, where we can throw sponges at a target and shout out the numbers that we hit.

We also have a great adding machine in the classroom that shows what happens when you combine two groups to find the total.

School Admissions The annual consultation on admission arrangements will be open up to 31 January 2016. Parents and staff are invited to review and comment on the proposed arrangements for 2017-18 which affects all schools. To view the proposals and make comments please visit www.devon.gov.uk/admissionarrangements (or call MyDevon on 0345 155 1019 for a paper copy).

Adverse Weather Should the school be unable to open, or need to close early, we will send an email and a text message to parents via ParentPay and put a message on our website. Please make sure, if you have changed your mobile number or email address, that we have the up-to-date information in school. Thank you.

Moretonhampstead Primary School Newsletter Betton Way, Moretonhampstead, Newton Abbot, Devon TQ13 8NA Tel: 01647 440482 Email: [email protected] Website: www.moretonhampstead.devon.sch.uk Headteacher: William Bentall Executive Headteacher: Rachel Shaw

Dates What? KS2 Playleader Conference at Stover CAP Adult/Parents Workshop Living Coast Trip Parent Forum Sports Hall Athletics at Newton Abbot College Football Doel Cup at Highweek Children’s CAP Workshops

Hockey Tournament at South Dartmoor Gymnastics Competition at South Dartmoor

When? 20 January – 9.30-11.00pm 1 February – 2.00-3.20pm 2 February 3 February – 9.00am 3 February – 11.30-3.00pm

Who? KS2 Playleaders Adults and Parents Easdon and Pepperdon

5 February – 4.00-5.00pm 8-10 February inclusive 9.15-10.15am 11.00-12.00pm 1.15-2.15pm 8 February – 4.00-6.00pm

Yr 5/6

10 February – 2.00-4.00pm

Yr 4

Yr 5/6

Pepperdon / Cranbrook Mardon / Butterdon Easdon / Shapley Yr 5/6