Happy New Year!

Can we remind you that the Spring Term starts for the children on Wednesday, 9th January 2013. Monday 7th and Tuesday 8th are teacher training days.

Join us for Christmas carols

Parents are invited to join us in the hall at 3.00 on Thursday to sing some Christmas carols with us! Please bring your voices or other instruments!

Christmas Concerts

The children performed their two plays exceptionally well this morning to very appreciative audiences. We look forward to seeing more parents and other friends of the school tomorrow and on Thursday!

 

Party food

Reception, Years 1 and 2 will be having a Christmas party on Thursday afternoon. On Friday afternoon, it will be the turn of Years 3 and 4. Please check with classteams for details of the party food we would like you to send in!

The children have really deserved their party with their hard work over the whole term!

Christmas Technology Day

This Friday we are having our annual Christmas Technology Day. The children will be working with children from all the other classes choosing three activities. Expect your child to bring home a little collection of items to decorate your Christmas home!

Christmas music was 'ringing' today in assembly!

Musicians at The Prince of Wales School performed magnificently today in assembly. They all stood up in front of the whole school, pupils, parents and teachers and performed their Christmas pieces with such confidence! It was a real treat for me especially to see how the children learning instruments have come on since last year. Special 'thank you's' go to Mrs Staddon and Miss Johnson for their hard work leading the recorder groups this term. We now have a quarter of the school learning a musical instrument which is great! We currently have recorder, guitar, ukelele, singing, violin, percussion and brass lessons at school. If your child is interested then please either come and see me or visit our helpful staff in the school office.
Mrs Mewett

Reminder for instrumentalists

 

Children who learn musical instruments are performing in Monday’s assembly beginning at 10am. They need to remember their instrument and music and bring this into assembly with them.

If you would like to come and watch then please enter the school via the school office, you’re more than welcome! Please remember though it is a normal school assembly and not a polished performance!

Mrs Mewett

Festivals of Light

Today Mr Farrington led an assembly about Festivals of Light. The hall was decorated with hundreds of fairy lights as we learned about Divali, Hannukah, Christingle and Martinmas. How can we all shed a little light in the darkness?

POWSA Christmas Fair this Friday!

We are desperate for volunteers to help at the fair this Friday! Please let us know if you can help at any time during the afternoon to help setup or after school for running a stall. There is a form on the white board by the school office or you could email us to let us know - powsa@hotmail.co.uk

Thanks - Jon

Nice to be back!

I’ve had a lovely first week back after my maternity leave. The children in have actually remembered me (!?) and I’ve enjoyed visiting all classes, getting to know children who have since joined the school.

 Up to Christmas you will see me in school everyday (apart from Tuesday) and I will be working with all classes getting ready for The Prince of Wales School two Christmas performances!

We are also holding Christmas Carols in the School Hall on Thursday 20^th December at 3pm, all are welcome. If you do play a musical instrument please bring along and join the parent/ staff group for the occasion!

 

My office is in the foyer so if you do wish to come and see me, please do!

 

Mrs Mewett (Deputy Head)

 

Plea to parents!

A plea to parents!

On Thursday 20^th December at 3pm in the school hall the children invite you to join them to celebrate Christmas and sing carols. Last year it was very successful, particularly as the music was performed by our talented parents!

A couple of parents have offered their musical skills so far for this year; we have a pianist and a recorder player but would LOVE to have more parents playing. PLEASE share your skills and let Mrs Mewett know if you can come and play.

 

Thank you!

Children in Need Day

Thanks to your generosity the school raised over £185 last Friday on Children in Need Day! Well done and thanks for your fantastic support; the children's costumes were brilliant! Year 4 made sure I joined in the fun by decorating my boring white shirt with coloured felt tip circles at the end of Reception class assembly!

POWSA Christmas Fair

It's that time of year already. Here at POWSA HQ we are busy planning and organising this years annual festive family fun evening. So get out your diaries and calenders and put a BIG RED CIRCLE around Friday 7th December, after school onwards. There will be many an opportunity to play games, have your face painted, win at a tombola and buy those last minute gifts, along with your chance to win some amazing raffle prizes (more details to follow). Bring your friends and family for a fantastically fun afternoon, the chance to get in the festive mood and help raise money for our fantastic school.

Justice

Our latest assembly theme is Justice.  This week the children will be learning about how we can ensure that the "right things" happen after something goes wrong.  Miss Johnson and some year 4 children introduced this theme in this morning's assembly by acting out a play about bullying.  The children learned that by TELLING someone that they trust about bullying incidents that they can make "the right things" happen.  We will continue to look at UNICEF's rights of the child and how we can help uphold these over the course of the next couple of weeks.

POWSA Book Fair

We would like to thank the members of POWSA for the all of their hard work running the School's Book Fair. The commission that was raised enabled Mr. MacBean to buy £660 worth of new books for the school. These books will be used as resources for our daily "Guided Reading" sessions.

A special thank you should be given to Mrs Karen Briant who organised this event.

The Soldier's Charity

We have received a letter of thanks from the Soldier's Charity to which we donated £313 from our Harvest Celebrations. The letter explains how our funds can help young soldiers injured in the conflict in Afghanistan. One soldier, Mark Harding, has told us how support from The Soldier's Charity has enabled him to overcome traumatic injury to be in a position to compete for a place in the GB Paralympic sprint kayaking squad. 

Forgiveness

Our assemblies at the moment are on the theme of Forgiveness. These have included a link with Remembrance, a story from Mrs Birbeck and Mr MacBean explaining the words and background to the song "Amazing Grace".

 

Moustache growing in November

This November Mr Farrington is supporting Movember, the charity encouraging men to grow moustaches to raise funds and awareness about testicular and prostrate cancer. If any parents would like to support him, please give any donations in at the office, or give his emerging moustache a cheer when you see him!

Running Blind on the big screen!

Mr Farrington represented the school at the Co-operative Film Festival in Manchester on Friday 2nd November. Advisors told me they had been impressed with the children's vitality and enthusiasm that shone through the film. I will be showing off the T shirt I was given on my return to school!

Introducing Mrs. Johnson (Video Post)

Mrs. Johnson who will be Year. 2 Class Teacher from January 2013 has recorded a special message for the class. This presentation/talk is the same presentation that Mrs. Johnson gave as part of the interview process. We hope you all enjoy this and welcome your comments welcoming Mrs. Johnson to the Prince of Wales First School. Mr. Spracklen

Olympic and Paralympic values

London 2012 Olympic Committee have sent us seven certificates to present to children displaying exceptional attitudes in one of the seven olympic and paralympic values. It was a great honour to present these to six of our children, including 3 with physical disabilities. I decided to give the certificate about INSPIRATION to Mr Spracklen in recognition of his creative and innovative teaching and leadership! I hope this will be a permanent reminder for him of his time at The Prince of Wales Schoo: "where we are all inspired to learn!"

ICT Awards

Mr Spracklen left us with a parting present today: five class ICT plaques to accompany our half termly certificates for achievement in ICT. Thanks Gary: whenever we present these awards we will think of all the things you have added to the school!

Awards Assembly

This morning we gave out our half termly certificates and cups. These are to say well done to children for their achievement and their effort and progress in English, maths, ICT, PE and the creative arts. We also awarded seven certificates in each class for good citizenship, for being caring, considerate, courteous, communicative, confident, co-operative and conscientious!

Mr. Spracklen says “Good-bye and Thank-you!”

I would love to write to everyone (every member of staff, every pupil, every parent and every member of the POW community) who has made my time at the Prince of Wales First School so special. I would like to thank everyone personally, however, this is simply not possible.

Each of you reading this has made the last three and a half years of my life simply incredible! I have been honored to call myself a teacher at this school which has developed me so much as a teacher, a leader and ultimately as a person. I thank everyone who has engaged in the work I have led from the use of SWGfL Merlin to helping run (and attend) events like the recent Summer Soiree. I thank everyone who has been unfazed by my slightly unorthodox styles of trashing classrooms, building time tunnels and setting off rockets!

Most of all, I thank you parents for trusting me with your amazing children and Mr. Farrington for allowing me the freedom to teach them creatively. I have loved every minute at the Prince of Wales First School. I hope that as I take on my new role on Portland, I can inspire others to teach in the inclusive, engage and inspiring way that is so engrained at the Prince of Wales First School.

In the last few years I have been fortunate enough to be invited to speak at I.C.T Conferences about our work at the Prince of Wales First School. At these conferences I often finish with a quote from the late Steve Job (founder of Apple Computers). I would like to close this short message with that same quote:

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do”

I have loved my time at the Prince of Wales First School and hope that my pupils will all grow up to “love what they do”.

Warmest thanks again.


Mr. Spracklen
Thursday 25th October, 2012

Money raised at Harvest Assemblies

In our school assembly today we presented a cheque for £313.85 to Col. Richard East. This was the money that we had raised in our Harvest Assemblies. Col. East was representing the charity A.B.F "The Soldiers' Charity". He told us how the money would be used to help soldiers to rebuild their lives after returning from fighting in wars. In the photograph you can see Kieran and Beth handing the cheque to Col. East.

Parent teacher consultation evenings

I hope you found it useful to meet your child's classteacher last week. If you could not make either of the two evenings, please make contact to arrange an alternative convenient time with the classteacher. If you also wish to discuss your child's progress with any additional staff involved please discuss this with the classteacher, Mrs Moger (the SENCo) or Mr Farrington.

SCHOOL NURSE TOMORROW

The School Nurse will be running a drop in from 8:45am tomorrow morning (Monday 22nd October). Want to know more about what the School Nurse does please see this useful web link from Dorset HealthCare University NHS Trust: http://www.dorsethealthcare.nhs.uk/services/children-and-families/school-nursing-dorset.htm

POWSA Blog - Non ICT Day

I have this little sister Lola, she is small and very funny.  Next Wednesday (the 24^th of October) will be a non-ICT day.  That means all the children, including Lola and all the teachers cannot use computers or other technology in school! There will be no blogging, no typing, no googling, no surfing. There will certainly be no interactive white boarding, no tweeting, no ipadding, no videoing and certainly no tomatoes! Lola is looking forward to catching out her teachers, if they use some ICT, they have to pay a 50p fine!  Hopefully all the children will help Lola and raise funds for the school. Thank you - Charlie (and the POWSA Committee) - PS donations to POWSA for school equipment will be welcomed (as always!!)

POWSA Blog - Book Fair!

Just a quick reminder that the scholastic book fair starts today.  The books are available to browse by both children and parents after school Wed-Mon and at the parents evening tonight. Why not stock up on a few Christmas presents, or introduce your kids to another fantastic author? Once our target has been reached, the school receive 60% of the profit back to spend on books for school.  This has proven a very profitable venture in the past and we hope to replicate the success again this year!

Harvest collection

Many thanks. Due to your generosity and kindness we have sent £313 to the joint benevolent funds of the armed forces at our harvest celebration and cafe.

Exciting News!

Here is some very exciting news from the team at Mathletics - The world's most powerful online learning resource has arrived on iPad, with the launch today of Mathletics Student - our brand new dedicated iPad app. Even better news is that the app is completely free, all you need is a Mathletics username & password. Mathletics Student has been custom-designed and built by our dedicated team of developers, who even invented some groundbreaking new mobile technology in the process! For the first time, students with an iPad can hold Mathletics in their hands and take it with them anywhere. Curriculum activities are downloaded right into the app* with all points and credits automatically syncing with the student's main desktop account. What's more, all of their results will appear (in real-time!) in your Teacher Centre reports in exactly the same way. PLUS - Mathletics Student also features an exciting update to the famous Live Mathletics game. The hugely popular 60-second mathematical race game returns with a sleek new interface and TEN competition levels - expanded to include word problems, algebra, number patterns and even logarithms! New-look Live Mathletics is also now available in desktop Mathletics too. *Note - not all curriculum activities will be immediately accessible via iPad. The full library of activities covering all ages will be rolled out across the coming months. Mathletics Student coming soon to Android tablets.

Running Blind: Congratulations!

Our film Running Blind has been selected for screening at The Co-operative Film Festival 2012! This will take place in Manchester on Friday 2nd November.  Mr Farrington will be representing the school as he is due in Lancashire to visit his mum!

Training Day

Can I remind all parents that Friday 26th October is a teacher training day and the week after is our autumn half term break.

Harvest celebration

Many thanks for your support at today's harvest celebrations, whether it be our performances this morning or coming along to our harvest cafe this afternoon. Your contributions to our harvest display were superb and I am sure that we will have raised a substantial sum for our chosen charity: the Benevolent Funds for all three armed forces.

Creativity

This week and next in our assemblies we are thinking about creativity and the wonders of creation, not least the amazing talent for learning that our children demonstrate on a daily basis! Today Miss Johnson unwrapped a wonderful gift: the world! and asked the children to think about our responsibilities to look after our environment.

Home Learning diaries

I would like to encourage all parents to get involved with your child's Home Learning Diaries. It is great to hear about the range of activities the children are doing. I hope you all agree how important it is to develop a love of reading through regular sharing of books at home!

Your views are important to us

Please give us your views on the school by following the link to the Ofsted Parent View on our website. It will only take you a few minutes! For direct link click here: http://parentview.ofsted.gov.uk/parent-view-results/survey/result/10060/current

FANTASTIC NEWS!

I am delighted to confirm that our school film 'Running Blind' has been selected to be screened at the Co-operative Film Festival 2012. Congratulations! The organisers of the Film Festival are currently in the process of creating a programme for the festival and a letter confirming the date and time of our screening (Thursday 1st November or Friday 2nd November) will follow in due course. For more information about the Co-operative Film Festival 2012 please visit: http://www.co-operative.coop/filmfestival/About-the-Festival/. For more information about 'Running Blind' see our previous Blog post at: http://pow-office.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/film-premiere-big-success.html and to watch the film click here: http://pow-office.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/our-paralympic-inspired-film-watch-it.html

Current focus in assemblies

This week and next we are focusing upon the idea of PEACE in our assemblies. We have explored the idea of finding moments of calm and quiet so that we can relax and think about the important things in life. Mrs Birbeck read the lovely story "Peace at last". Mr Farrington talked about his way of finding peace by walking in the countryside, picking blackberries and introduced the children to St Francis of Assissi.

Listen back to our pupils on Wessex FM!

Every morning this week Wessex FM are playing clips from pupils at the Prince of Wales First School as part of their Breakfast Show feature 'School Report'. This is currently going out each morning on Wessex FM at 6.30am and 8.30am (after the news). If you have missed the first two days, you can now listen back at: http://www.wessexfm.com/school-report.php. For more information about the pupils visit to Wessex FM, check out the Digital Leader Blog at: http://www.dl-pow.blogspot.co.uk/

'Running Blind' inspired film.

CLICK THIS BLOG TITLE TO SEE 'The Missing Kite' made at home by Sophie. This film is clearly inspired by "Running Blind', the film made by pupils at the Prince of Wales First School.

On Wessex FM next week!

On Monday 10th September, 2012, seven digital leaders from the Prince of Wales First School, went on a special trip to Wessex FM to meet Breakfast Show DJ James O'Neill. We enjoyed a tour of the studio as well as taking part in a new feature for James' show which will start on Monday 17th September and run all week at 6.30am and 8.30am. We hope you will all be able to listen in and would love to read your comments on our work in the comment section of our Blog at: http://dl-pow.blogspot.co.uk/.