Dear Parents,

A very busy and fun-packed week! Thank you all for your support on our amazing Sports Day. It could not have gone any better and the enthusiasm, participation and encouragement of others demonstrated by the children was truly heartwarming. My thanks go to all our staff, Year Six students from our Junior School for their help and particularly to Mrs Scott-Simons for hours spent in planning the format.

Our new children have started their visits to prepare them for September. Reverend Tony from All Saints Church led an assembly on Monday about change as we come up to the time for transition for children and Year Two visited the Junior school to see the lower school play.

Year 1 and 2 enjoyed a workshop of African drumming on Wednesday, thank you so much to WISPA for funding this activity. Foundation Stage had an exciting delivery of duck eggs this week and we have already seen a number of them hatch! I use any excuse to visit EYFS at the moment, the ducklings are very cute! Thank you again to WISPA for funding this amazing experience. 12 Year Two children went to a Basketball session organised by Chelmsford School Sports Partnership and they had great fun in a friendly session.

Summer Fayre

We are gearing up for our biggest fundraiser of the year, the WISPA and WJSPA Summer Fayre tomorrow at Writtle Junior School from 11.30 until 2.00. Thank you so much for the huge pile of donations we received today! Anyone who would like to help set up or tidy away tomorrow is very welcome to join our band of volunteers, we will be here early! If you are coming along on the day, please remember to buy your raffle tickets if you haven't already and bring plenty of cash and small change for the stalls. We look forward to seeing you!

Diary Dates

We originally had a Family Learning Time scheduled for 29th June but with assembly rehearsals and school trips filling up our daily timetable, reluctantly we will have to cancel it. We did have a session before half term for the Jubilee. Reading Mondays continue (not for EYFS on 4th July due to their trip). The last session for this term will be on 11th July.

The wonderful 2 Johns, who have delivered e-safety training in school, are hosting a session for parents on their Facebook page at 7.30 pm on 11th July. It is well worth listening to as issues with internet safety are constantly changing.

Year Group Performances

Each year group is rehearsing for their end of year assembly - the dates are fast approaching!

Friday 1st July - Year 1
Thursday 14th July - EYFS
Friday 15th July - Year 2

Each assembly starts at 9.30am and should take no more than 1 hour. Due to space in the hall we can only permit 2 spectators per family and unfortunately no younger siblings. We look forward to seeing our Year 1 parents next Friday.

Toilet Plea

We have had a lot of children with upset tummies recently. We are also noticing more unpleasantness in the children’s toilets at school. Please remind your children about hand washing and good hygiene when using the toilet.

Drop off and pick up

We have received complaints from residents living along Long Brandocks about cars parking on the grass verges. Please take care when parking at drop off and pick up times, leaving extra time for your journey so that you can park further away if necessary. We have also noticed a number of parents walking with their children through the staff car park to the Junior School. Please use the footpath instead, as with the number of cars and delivery vans constantly moving in and out of a tight space, it really is not a safe area for children.

I look forward to seeing you tomorrow at the Fayre.

Best wishes
Helen Castell

Lodge Road will not be covered by a School Crossing Patrol officer from Monday 20th June until the end of term. Please take extra care.
Teachers cannot always check the class email during the day. Please send urgent messages to parents@writtleinfantschool.com.
We love to share awards, medals, trophies, even anecdotes from children’s achievements outside of school. Please hand them to me or email parents@writtleinfantschool.com for assemblies on Friday.
Diary dates and school events can added from our website to the calendar on your phone. Click on your chosen list of dates from the Links section and then click export at the bottom of the page.

SHARKS - Teddy V for inclusivity and kindness on the way to the Year 2 basketball event. Charlie T for politeness, sitting beautifully during our music rehearsal and working hard on concentrating on our songs. Blythe for independence, working through her maths sheets this week.

DOLPHINS - Stanley P for independence when talking to the new parents, Freddie W for inclusivity and honesty whilst playing football, Teddy for inclusivity in high 5 netball as he worked brilliantly in a team and Leo for perseverance in writing a recount.

PARROTS - Isabel for being independent throughout the school day and Frankie C for being inclusive and ensuring other children can join her games. Ruby D for perseverance and Jacob G-O for politeness.

TURTLES - Brody and Farrah for inclusivity with welcoming the EYFS children to the class this week. Isabelle B for always being polite and impeccably behaved, Max S for independence in maths. Yasin for perseverance and Kim F for politeness.

SQUIRRELS - Artie for independence when getting changed for Sports Day and Adonise for inclusivity by helping all her friends to work as a team. Violet for perseverance and Alesha for independence.

FOXES - Ayla for perseverance when reading, now you are a fabulous reader! Archer M for being super independent! Ronnie and Felix for perseverance with writing. Charlie B for politeness and Naomi for independence.

We have completed our maths measurement unit this week by looking at litres, millilitres and temperature. They may wish to carry on measuring and comparing mass, capacity and temperature at home. We were really proud of everyone’s achievements and enthusiasm during their first Writtle Infant School Sports Day (no-one would have known that they hadn’t had one before)!

Our African adventures continued with a marvellous morning of Djembe drumming, which the children wrote about. It was a memorable occasion for both pupils and staff who were allowed to join in too. 12 of our year 2’s visited Galleywood Infant School for a basketball training session and enjoyed playing some matches. The rest of the Year 2 children received a last minute invitation to watch the lower school junior performance of ‘Porridge’. Further transition activities are planned for the remainder of the term.

Please remember our cinema trip is next Friday and ALL children will need a packed lunch. Apologies, we sent a school menu order in error for Friday next week!

Click here for this week's home learning.

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

Wow what a busy week we have had, with Sports Day, an African drumming workshop and rehearsals for our end of year assembly next week! We look forward to seeing you there.
In English we retold the story of Grandma Bird and looked at the use of verbs in the text. We have also been practising spelling the Year One tricky words and have written them in sentences with a focus on using capital letters and full stops. In maths we have been learning about money. We looked at coins and notes and found different ways to make £1. We also played finding more/less maths games.

Click the link for this week's home learning.

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

This week we have been learning about ducks! We have loved watching the duckling eggs hatch and one more will hatch today! We have learnt about the life cycle of a duck and learnt how to draw a duck. We have also written facts about ducks. In maths we have been learning about doubling objects and numbers and number 17. We really enjoyed the Sports Day this week and we hope you did too! We were super impressed with the children's skills and how well- behaved they were. We have also been going to visit a Year 1 classroom this week and have welcomed new Foxes and Squirrels children and parents on their visits. The children have been lovely and have helped the new children by showing them the classroom and playing with them. Please don't forget to fill the form for our school trip! Have a lovely weekend.