7th January 2022

Happy New Year!  I hope that you all had chance to have some special time with family and friends over the Christmas break. 

We have been so pleased to welcome the children back to school this week, and it has, as always, been a busy one. The children have been learning all about the school vision and values and creating reflection areas in their classrooms. We are particularly excited about the tree/cross that they have been making with Miss Bolar which will be hung in the hall as a whole school reflection focus. 

By next Friday our class homepages for this half-term will be live on the school website. As parents know, you can sign in to the class home pages and find information about this half-term's learning and updated class timetables. There are also links to all the online platforms that we use which are available for the children to access at home. Next Friday will also see the start of this half-term's weekly home learning which will go live on Google Classroom (KS1) or Tapestry (Reception). This home learning is to support parents who wish to do additional learning at home with their children. (it is not compulsory).

Grasshopper parents may have noticed a new addition to their class' teaching team this week. Miss Mitchell has joined Sandygate for this term as a trainee teacher. She will be working with Mrs Browning to plan and teach learning for the Grasshopper children until the Easter holidays. So now we have a Mrs Mitchell and a Miss Mitchell in Year 2!

Mrs Reynolds

Year 1 Walk to the Woods

Year 1 had a lovely, cold, walk to the woods this morning where they made art with natural materials.

Next Week's  'Learning at a Glance'

Class Worship

This week each class has been focussing on one of our school values to prepare a Class Worship. We are hoping that we will be able to invite parents in to watch their child's class worship and dates for these are in the school calendar. All the Class Worships start at 9am and will be no longer than 20 minutes.

We will be asking parents to register if they wish to attend, so that we can control numbers, and there will be a limit of 2 people attending per child. As with the Nativity Plays we would ask that you take a Lateral Flow Test before attending if you are able, wear a face covering and do not attend if you have any COVID symptoms.

As guidance is changing so rapidly at present this may change and we will confirm attendance for each class 3 days prior to their Class Worship. 

The first class worship is for Grasshopper Class on 24th January and if you wish to attend please register here   https://forms.gle/WJiniFnyaJY7Jg4H6

Dragonfly Class will have their worship on 28th January and you can register to attend here https://forms.gle/ye5s1XPrrXC8iM2L9

Parent Helpers

We would be pleased to welcome back Parent Helpers next week so, if you were helping on a regular day next week then please continue to come into school at that time. We would ask that you wear a face covering at all times whilst on school premises and, if you are able to, it would be appreciated if you could take a Lateral Flow test before coming in to school. 

Primary School Admissions

The deadline for applying for a primary school place, either junior school transfer for Year 3 or for a Reception place in September 2022, is 15th January 2022. If your application is late then you may not get an offer of a place for September. To apply go to https://www.buckinghamshire.gov.uk/schools-and-learning/schools-index/school-admissions/apply-for-a-primary-school-place/ 

Buckinghamshire have advised that, whilst the submission deadline is midnight on 15th January there may not be IT support after 4pm on that day so do not leave it until the last moment!

Clubs

There are still spaces on many clubs this term. Cookery, French, Colouring , Book Club and after school Playball are full.  Spanish is full for Year 1 and 2 but there are still spaces for Reception. Youth Moves has a few limited spaces. The other clubs still have lots of spaces if your child would like to take part. 

Details of all the clubs on offer and further information and booking details can be found on the school website here

A big PFA welcome back to school to all our lovely children and their families. We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and wish you a very happy 2022.

The next PFA meeting will be held on Tuesday 11th January at 8pm via zoom only. We hope to see as many of you as possible and of course everyone is welcome.
The details to log into the meeting and attend are:

Meeting ID - 883 6964 3122
Passcode - 644738

This year we lose several members of the committee as their children move up to junior school, and we are still without a chair or vice chair. We can’t run a committee without volunteers and so if you have any time to spare, no matter how small, we really would appreciate your help.

The school disco has been rescheduled to Saturday 26th March at 3pm. More details to follow but for now please reserve the date in your diary.

We would really love to hear any fundraising ideas you may have. This term again is going to require some creativity due to restrictions to try and reduce Covid19 spread. Any ideas please email marlowcofepfa@gmail.com.  We are very keen to hear them.