Dear Parents,

I hope you had a restful half term. Thank you for all the supportive comments and for your cooperation with our procedures including the wearing of masks on school premises. Despite the new lockdown we are still very much business as usual. Please continue to be vigilant for symptoms of Covid-19, we are very grateful to you all for isolating and testing when necessary.

Next week sees Turtles begin their Forest Schools programme, which will be every Tuesday this half term. Parents have been emailed with details of clothes and footwear to bring into school. We will be recognising the two minutes silence for Remembrance Day on Wednesday. Items from the British Legion continue to be on sale - they are:

Zip pulls 50p
Wristband £1.00
Poppy reflector 50p
Snap band £1.50

I will have these with me in the mornings on the door if you would like to purchase something please bring exact money and also take them home with you rather than your child have them in school.

We are delighted to bring you the following message from WISPA:

Thank you so much to everyone who took in the scavenger hunt over the half term break. We had some fantastic pictures sent to us and we hope you enjoyed finding all of the pumpkins! Everybody that entered went into a prize draw and we are pleased to announce the winners below! Prizes can be collected from Claire Gaskin at the main entrance on Monday morning.

Prize winners are: Erol in Foxes, Xander in Squirrels, Austin and Ibrahim in Parrots, Luca, Rowan and Humphrey in Turtles, Iris and Kitty in Sharks, Baden in Dolphins.

Finally, next Friday we would like children to wear something spotty or stripy with their school uniform for Children in Need. We are aware that shops are closed, so please don't go to any trouble, stripy socks or a spotty hairband would be great, or even a homemade badge. A suggested donation of £1 would be very welcome.

Stay safe.

Helen Castell

Well done to the following children in Years 1 and 2 who have been awarded Shooting Stars for setting a great example to others this week.

Sharks: Betsy for amazing writing in her English and Abigail for wonderful reading!
Dolphins: Baden for his really good attitude to learning. Navayah for her fabulous firework dancing!
Turtles: Freddie for trying really hard all week and for super speedy phonics work!
Audrey for always taking pride and care over her work!
Parrots: Hannan for being a maths superstar with subtraction and Michael for always being an excellent role model for the whole class!

Well done to all the children for coming back to school so enthusiastically! Here's what to look forward to next week.

English: Reading/writing an introduction to The Ice Bear. Reading with Junko Tabei: One step at a time.
Handwriting: Diagonal joins to an ascender.
Phonics: Phoneme ow written as ou, and oi written as oy
Maths: Addition and Subtraction, crossing tens.
History: Remembrance day.
PSHE: Children in need, anti bullying week/tolerance.
Art: Poppyfield paintings
Music: Composing and performing
PE: Dance and the golden mile.
Science: Learning about habitats.
Computers: Learning to search for facts.

Well done to all the children for completing their activity passport last half term. We hope you and your families enjoyed the tasks! The new activity passport has now been published - please give these a go and let us know how you get on. We can't wait to see your photos!

Our email addresses are dolphins@writtleinfantschool.com and sharks@writtleinfantschool.com.

Welcome back Year One! We hope you had a lovely half term. Here’s what to look forward to next week:

English: We are continuing to write about our weekends. We are also going to look at the story components where, when and what happens next?
Maths: We are looking at the addition symbol, finding parts and counting on using a numberline.
History: We are comparing toys from the past to the present. We are also looking at significant events from the past that we still celebrate today.
PE: Challenging ourselves to increase our time during circuits. Learning about the different parts of our body we use during exercise.
Forest School: We hope Parrots enjoyed their final session. Turtles start on Tuesday! Please arrive in Forest Schools clothes and trainers. Wellies stay in school. A change of clothes is only necessary if it will be wet that day.

Please click this link for the week's home learning.

Our email addresses are parrots@writtleinfantschool.com and turtles@writtleinfantschool.com.

It was wonderful to welcome the children back to school. We have really enjoyed looking at all the Tapestry observations about half-term. This week we have learnt the poem '5 Little Pumpkins' which the children have thoroughly loved! We have also learnt about 'Bonfire Night' and the reasons why we have this tradition. The children learnt a new song about it called 'On Bonfire Night'. Next week the poem is 'Leaves are Falling'. We will be talking about Remembrance and making poppies. In Maths we will be finding out about the number 2. Please remember that we follow a mastery approach to maths so we focus on laying the foundations so children can apply their understanding to more complex maths later on. In phonics we will be learning the sounds m, d and g and the tricky word I. It's Diwali next week too, so we are going to find out about this wonderful celebration and the exciting story that goes with it! Have a fun weekend.

Our email addresses are foxes@writtleinfantschool.com and squirrels@writtleinfantschool.com.