Welcome to Willow Tree Class,

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Dear Parents,  

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Dear Parents and Carers, Welcome to Romsey Abbey Church of England Primary School! We have loved meeting you and the amazing children of Willow Tree Class and are now really looking forward to an exciting term ahead full of stories and adventures as we begin our first topic ‘Marvellous Me!’

 

Our main focus in the next few weeks will be building positive relationships, settling everyone in school, establishing rules and routines, completing Baseline and on entry assessments, and taking every child’s learning forward as we explore elements of our first topic.

 

Once the children are settled, we will introduce ‘Special Person of the Week’, when each child will have the opportunity to bring in five small items and share them with the class. This is to help us all learn more about each other and allow the children to practise their speaking and listening skills. When it is your child’s turn to be ‘Special Person of the Week’ they will bring home a prompt sheet with some ideas of what they might like to bring into school.

 

As we will be spending lots of time outdoors, please ensure that your child has suitable clothing. Soon, Willow Tree Class will begin Forest School activities. You may like to bring in a pair of jogging bottoms or leggings to protect your child’s legs from brambles whilst participating in Forest School. With the dry weather, they will not presently need their wellington boots. However, we will let you know when these need to be brought into school. If you have any questions or concerns, please email or phone the school office and we will get back to you as soon as possible.

 

Please ensure that all items of children’s clothing and belongings (including water bottles) are named so that they are easily identifiable and do not get misplaced. Water bottles should only contain water in order to develop healthy habits within school. It would also be useful for children to bring in a set of spare clothes in case of a toileting accident. Although we have a few spare clothes at school, we cannot guarantee that we will have the right size or type of clothing.

 

Please find below some additional key information we hope you find useful:

 

School Rules: We have three special rules in school which are to be ‘Ready, Respectful and Safe’. In simple terms, these mean, ‘Ready to learn, Respectful to others and property and Stay safe.’

 

Expectations: We have high expectations of every child and use house points, Golden Book certificates, a class marble jar and lots of praise and modelling to communicate these.

 

Home learning: Please share as many stories as you can with your child. We will soon be sending home a ‘Sound of the Day’ sheet. Please help them to practise their letter sounds and when given, their high frequency words and books. More information on how you can support your child at home will be sent out nearer the time.

 

Tapestry: We use the online learning journal, Tapestry, to record and track progress. This is an invaluable way of seeing what your child is learning in school through pictures and observations. We hope you have all been able to activate your child’s account through the link provided by email. Please let us know if you have any problems with this. We value your role as your children’s primary educators very highly and welcome any observations you are able to add to Tapestry.

 

Dates for your diaries:

- Our ‘Meet the Teacher’ meeting - Wednesday 20 th September at 3.15pm in Willow Tree classroom.

- Whole school trip to Hillier’s Arboretum - Thursday 5 th October. If you have a DBS check with the school and would like to volunteer to help on this day, please let us know!

- Parent’s Evenings – Monday 6 th and Tuesday 14 th of November. More details will follow about the timings of Parent’s Evenings nearer the time.

 

We are both very excited to be teaching your children this year and appreciate your continued support.

 

Thank you, Mrs Langford and Miss Woolley Reception Class Teachers

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