OUR SCHOOL NEEDS YOU!

Our school needs your help to collect Tesco schools vouchers! Vouchers collected in previous years have exceeded 20,000 and have helped us to obtain some exciting resources. This year we are looking to set a school record and collect more vouchers than ever before! Please try to collect as many vouchers as you can and do not be afraid to ask your friends, neighbours, work colleagues for their vouchers as well. Many people who do not have children simply discard these vouchers and we could make valuable use of them. Collecting boxes are by the school office. Please bring in your vouchers on or before 01/06/12.

Parents' Information Sessions

Parents' Information Sessions for the summer term will be held in the school hall from 9.00 to 9.30: Monday 23rd April - Year 2, Tuesday 24th April - Reception, Wednesday 25th April -  Year 3, Thursday 26th April - Year 1, Friday 27th April - Year 4.

Last Chance - Digital Leaders Application

Mr. Spracklen is welcoming children to apply for the role of 'Digital Leaders' within school. If you wish to apply, you will need to fill out a short online form (available now on SWGfL Merlin - see picture) before 7.00pm on 30/03/12. Children from Reception to Year 4 are encouraged to apply with the aim of appointing a child from each class to the 'Digital Leaders' team! The form will ask you why you should be considered for this role and we will be looking for original responses that come from the children. Below the responsibilities of a 'Digital Leader' are listed:

Website/Blogs/Online:

Write blog posts for your class and comment on other blogs across the school
Helping staff to upload pictures/videos to their blog

ICT Clubs:
Plan and lead ICT club at lunchtimes for Years R/1 and 2/3 (1 day each)
Possibly lead an after-school ICT club

Other
Change photographs on the TV screen in the reception

Organise competitions e.g. a drawing competition in Purple Mash

Possibly attend events and other schools to share ICT learning

Attend after-school training for staff and parents - with your parents' permission of course!

Trialling new software as required

REMINDER - Ofsted Parent View

As you know at the Prince of Wales First School we are always looking for feedback and encourage you to provide this in a variety of ways. Whether this is through face-to-face conversation, comments on our class blogs or through our annual parents questionnaire, we always welcome your feedback. Building on this, we would now encourage you to go online and express your views using the new 'Parent View' website from Ofsted. This 12-question survey will help other parents as they make important choices about their child's education and provide Ofsted with information about our school that will help them inform their priorities for inspection. The questionnaire does not allow free text
comments but invites responses to a series of closed questions. To express your view, please visit our school website now and click on the parent tab and look for the link to the Parent View website. Alternatively, visit: http://parentview.ofsted.gov.uk/.

Sport Relief - Well Done

Well done to everyone who took part in Sport Relief today (Friday 23rd March). It was fantastic to see the array of 'silly' costumes and all the children did so well to complete the mile. A special thank-you to everyone who has bought in their sponsorship money already, we would ask that remaining money be bought to school before the end of term (30th March). Well done again everyone, it looks like we are on course to raising a school-record amount of money for a real worthwhile course.

Money raised at our Global Awareness cafe

We managed to raise £100 by selling the lovely food cooked by each class during our Global Awareness Week. Thank you for your support! We have sent this money to our friend Lamin Manneh and his family in Mandinari, The Gambia. He will use this money to buy medicine for his son, Mustapha who has not yet developed an immunity to malaria. He will also use the money to help him continue his training. Lamin is a young man who at the age of 28 is the only breadwinner to support an extended family of 16 children, adults and elderly people, including some who are very ill. I have sent some interesting letters written to Lamin from some of the classes, including some fascinating insights into the the sorts of questions the children want to find the answers to.

Sport Relief Mile

We are planning to join in with the “Sport Relief Day” on Friday 23^rd March by all “running a mile” within the school grounds and dressing up in fancy dress (the theme being “something silly”). There will be a 3-lap course set up within the school. Different groups of children will be covering the mile-long course in different ways- mostly walking, some children using wheelchairs, some running parts of the course, there might be some skipping, dribbling footballs, balancing tennis balls on rackets etc. I’m sure you get the idea. We will be encouraging the children to come up with their own entertaining ideas for the event. Older children will be allowed to cover more than a mile if they are comfortable doing so, though we will be limiting the amount of time participating to one hour. The children will not be put under any pressure to actually finish the mile if they become tired. We will, however, be presenting the activity as a worthy challenge. We will be doing this on the morning of Friday 23^rd March, starting at 9.30, though staggering the classes to avoid congestion at the start. The Reception class will be doing the “run” in the afternoon. We are asking the children to collect some sponsorship money. All money collected will go to the Sport Relief fund. We provide you with a copy of the Sport Relief sponsor form. As well as a funny costume the children will of course need appropriate footwear for the “run”. Thank you for your support. Yours sincerely, Mr D MacBean - P.E. Co-ordinator

Musicians - Dates for your diary!

Dear All Musicians, please note the following dates: Saturday, 30th June 2012 - DASP Prom Concert 2012, in the Marquee. Rehearsals during the day. PROPOSED - Tuesday, 18th December 2012 - DASP Christmas Concert 2012, TH School Theatre.

Mr Farrington is off on his travels again!

Mr Farrington cannot resist the lure of India. During the Easter holidays he is leading a group of 7 teachers on an educational study visit to Bangalore. If you want to follow his exciting trip, follow his Blog which will be posted soon! You could send him questions or make comments about the photos he posts!

Learn about your home town!

POWSA are organising a town quiz over the Easter holidays. Collect a quiz sheet from the office (£2 to POWSA) and have fun as a family searching for the answers to Mr Farrington's Dorchester quiz. We guarantee you will learn something new about your town. The winning family get an Easter Egg!

Books, bears and pyjamas day

We are going to be writing a bedtime story on Friday 30th March! Children will be working with a partner from a different class to plan, write and illustrate their own shared bedtime storybook.
We are asking the children to come to school dressed in their pyjamas (and dressing gowns if you like!), bringing their teddy bear and a favourite bedtime story.
A fun way to end the term!

Belle Vue Infant & Newport Junior School!

Today (Monday 19th March, 2012), we will be visited by our two link schools - Belle Vue Infant and Newport Junior School. from Aldershot. Around 30 pupils from the two schools will be visiting us and joining in some special activities as part of our Olympic Humanities Week. Our visitors will also be joining us for a special Dorset themed hot dinner as part of Dorset Food Week.  We wish all our visitors from the two schools a very warm welcome!

Jurassic Coast Van

As part of our Olympic Humanities Week, all pupils will be visited by the Jurassic Coast Van on Wednesday. This is part of the ‘Big Jurassic Classroom’ project that the school is involved in which encourages us to think about our local World Heritage Site as the Olympics draws closer. On Wednesday why not ask your child what work they completed with the Jurassic Coast Team? Did they see any fossils? Can they remember the fossil names? How is a fossil formed?

A message from the POWSA blog!

We've raised £218.95 (as at 23/02/12) with easyfundraising so far but we need your help to keep donations coming in. Sign up at http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/powsa and start making a difference...simply by shopping. Shop Online and Raise Money! Have you heard about easyfundraising yet? It’s the easiest way to help raise money forPrince Of Wales School Association POWSA - Dorchester! If you already shop online with retailers such as Amazon, M&S, Argos, John Lewis, Comet, Vodafone, eBay, Boden and Play.com, then we need you to sign up for free to raise money while you shop!

So how does it work?
You shop directly with the retailer as you would normally, but if you sign up tohttp://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/powsa for free and use the links on the easyfundraising site to take you to the retailer, then a percentage of whatever you spend comes directly to us at no extra cost to yourself.
How much can you raise?Spend £100 with M&S online or Amazon and you raise £2.50 for us. £100 with WH Smith puts £2.00 in our pocket and so on. There's over 2,000 retailers on their site, and some of the donations can be as much as 15% of your purchase.

Save money too!easyfundraising is FREE to use plus you'll get access to hundreds of exclusive discounts and voucher codes, so not only will you be helping us, you’ll be saving money yourself.

Dangers posed by Jequirity Bean Bracelets

The DCC Health and Safety team have alerted us to the dangers posed by Jequirity Bean bracelets. These bracelets have been on sale at various retail outlets across the UK,including the Eden Project in Cornwall.  The Jequirity bean bracelet ismade from the deadly seed of the plant abrus precatorious. It contains thetoxin abrin that if swallowed, has the potential to kill in doses of just 3micrograms. Abrin is chemically similar to ricin, a chemical warfare agent.People who have bought, or are in possession of the bracelets, are beingurged to bag them, then wash their hands and avoid touching their eyes.They should then hand the bracelet into their local police station where itwill be disposed of safely.There is further information available on the Public Health Agency websiteon the following link:http://www.publichealth.hscni.net/news/pha-issues-safety-warning-jequirity-bean-braceletsWe have attached an image of the bracelet for your information.

Could you be a Digital Leader?

Mr. Spracklen is welcoming children to apply for the role of 'Digital Leaders' within school. If you wish to apply, you will need to fill out a short online form (available now on SWGfL Merlin - see picture). Children from Reception to Year 4 are encouraged to apply with the aim of appointing a child from each class to the 'Digital Leaders' team! The form will ask you why you should be considered for this role and we will be looking for original responses that come from the children. Below the responsibilities of a 'Digital Leader' are listed:

Website/Blogs/Online:

Write blog posts for your class and comment on other blogs across the school
Helping staff to upload pictures/videos to their blog

ICT Clubs:

Plan and lead ICT club at lunchtimes for 3/4 and 5/6 (1 day each)
Possibly lead an after-school ICT club

Other

Change photographs on the TV screen in the reception

Organise competitions e.g. a drawing competition in Purple Mash

Possibly attend events and other schools to share ICT learning

Attend after-school training for staff and parents - with your parents' permission of course!

Trialling new software as required

Year 2 are now on iTunes!!!

A big thank-you to everyone who contributed to the Year 2 radio show for Global Awareness Week 2012. The recordings we received from home were brilliant and we especially enjoyed hearing the excellent guest appearances from parents and other family members. The final product is one to be truly proud of and you can download it now and listen at home using iTunes. To do this, just follow this link: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/year-2-fairtrade-radio-show/id507502690.

Friday's Celebration Event

On Friday 2nd March, there will be some displays in the hall from each class showing their work this week on Global Awareness. Each class will also have some food they have made to sell! We shall also be putting on some dance and music displays throughout the afternoon. This is intended to be a very informal celebration of the week's work and you are invited to join us at any time from 2.15p.m. until 3.45p.m. There will also be a Traidcraft stall selling Fairtrade items and providing information. If you are not able to come along you might give your child a small amount of money for them to buy some food
from the other class stalls.