Pensby Post autumn term 2018

Pensby Primary School

Every event of the year is a learning opportunity and
pumpkins in EYFS were explored and cooked! Our year
6 buddies got to know their new Reception partners and

looked after them exceptionally well.

Pensby Post
Autumn term 2018

Headteacher’s Words

Dear families,

Another autumn term has flown by and so much has happened in our
school. The class pages on the website are full of information and
pictures showing how much was done by the children—it is quite
amazing to see.

One of the biggest achievements this term, has been how many PTA events have been organised.
This is not usually amazing, but it is this term, because a core of 3 or 4 PTA members organised
all the events, and that is a lot of hard work for so few people, particularly when in the past up to
12 people have shared the workload. As ever, families have come out in droves to help and support
events on the day, but the PTA desperately needs more people to help with organisation. Please
take some time to read their page and come along to the next meeting being held on Tuesday 12th
February at 9.00am, 3.00pm and 6.00pm.

Our school was 10 years old in September. We have a visual legacy of the old infant and junior
schools in a photograph montage in the atrium—if you haven’t seen it, it is by the year 2
classroom...do have a look! A very special piece of art work has been created to celebrate our 10
year birthday and in the new year, this will be installed for everyone to see. We will be inviting you
in to admire it and the artist will be coming along to speak to the children about his work. There
will even be birthday cake for everyone!

This term we tried a new approach to parents evening. Next term we will be asking for your views
on how effective that was and did it enable you to get a clear picture of how your child is doing and
what needs to be done next. Please give that some thought and respond to our survey when it
comes out. I’ve also been helped by a few very understanding families this term, who have raised
questions about our Nursery Admissions policy and Behaviour policy. It was really interesting to
hear from a parents point of view how those policies worked and it was clear we could make
improvements that would benefit staff, pupils and families and that is what we have been doing.
Those updated policies will be sent to you in the new year once complete. Please do get in touch
with any suggestions for improvements—it is only by hearing your experiences that we can then
appreciate what needs to be done.

In the newsletter of the 14th November I wrote:

So – we text you, we email you, we phone you, we speak to you, we put things on SPTO – that’s quite a list!! I am aware that,
although all these methods of communication are fantastic, they can also be very confusing too. I would like to work with fami-
lies to streamline how we communicate with you, to make it clearer, easier and as simple as possible for everyone. It would be
really helpful if 1 family representative from each class were able to come along and help with this. I am hoping to meet with
this group on Thursday 29th November at 6.00pm in school – this is straight after film night. If you would like to volunteer to
represent your class please email in to the school office: [email protected] We do need 1 person from
each class to go ahead with this meeting!

Sadly we didn’t have a representative from each class for the meeting to go ahead. Since then I
have had a representatives volunteer for years 1 and 5—so only a few more to go! I am
rescheduling the meeting for Thursday 31st January at 6.00pm in school—please, please help me
to help you and come along to represent your child’s class. Emails to the school office!

At the top of this newsletter, is the new South Deeside Primary Schools Federation logo—and isn’t
it brilliant! It was designed by a child from Thingwall Primary and has all our logos around the
edge with hands joined together in the middle!

And finally,

Have a lovely Christmas break and we will see you back in school on Tuesday 8th January 2019!

Mrs K Brown, Headteacher

Film Night 2018

;

The PTA were well
supported by the
staff in offering a
fabulous film night
to the children. The

children in KS2
were able to enjoy

their film on 3
large screens in the

library. They
watched ‘A

Christmas Carol’
which fitted in
nicely with their

curriculum work
and Christmas

performance. KS1
and EYFS snuggled

into the year 2
classroom for a
more fitting film for
their age. It was a
fabulous night!

Fireworks!!!!
Our PTA firework event is by far the
cheapest in the area and superb value—a
full 19 minutes of the most amazing
fireworks were enjoyed this year! The
music that accompanied the display was
dramatic and uplifting. And to top it all,
the weather was perfect!

Our school building and site makes the
possibilities for maths lessons to be endless.
Every class will be given a ’diet’ of maths
lessons that helps them learn and inspires them
to enjoy the subject as much as possible.
Children are often seen working together and
with a variety of equipment, inside and
outside the classroom and school building!

It’s Maths—but not

as we know it!!!

PTA Events and Donations!

Our PTA is very small but utterly amazing! This term, a handful of
people have ensured that all the Christmas events have been

organised and enjoyed by our children. We really do need to stop
and appreciate all they have done to make this term memorable,

exciting and special for the children.

The autumn term is always the busiest, with a disco, film night,
fireworks evening and the Children’s Christmas fair. An extra event

to decorate a Halloween cookie was also offered and was yummy!
Pictures of these events can be seen in this edition of the Pensby
Post. The Round Table Carol Wagon evening is also organised by the

PTA and is enjoyed by the local community.

The PTA has only one aim when it spends the funds it raises—to
ensure that whatever is purchased benefits ALL the children in the
school. That is an aim to be proud of. This aim has ensured that ALL

the children now have the most amazing playground spaces and
equipment to play with.

The Spring term is a quieter term for the PTA, but a term when we
start to plan the summer fair. However, the current PTA numbers

at meetings means it is quite possible a summer fair can’t be
planned and held next year. Imagine how sad that would be for the
children in the school? The PTA needs at least 12 members to plan a

summer fair. We are going to hold 3 summer fair meetings of the
PTA in the hope we have enough people come along to get the event

going. The meetings will be:

Tuesday 12th February at 9.00am, 3.00pm and 6.00pm

In this 10 year celebration year, we need a great summer fair—make
this the meeting you come along to!

Thank you for your support at events this year. Have a lovely
Christmas and Happy New Year,

From your child/ren’s PTA

Remembrance Day

The whole school came together to recognise Remembrance Day. All the
children gathered in the central atrium and stood around the sides. They

observed a 2 minute silence perfectly.
In Breakfast Club, the children were led by Mrs Peter and used plastic bottles
to create an amazing three dimensional red poppy. 4 ribbons fall at the end of

the poppy and on each one the children had written messages of thanks and
appreciation.

The staff are very proud of how the children responded to our Remembrance
Day tribute and how caring and thoughtful they are.

Children’s Christmas Fair

The Children’s
Christmas Fair was a
fantastic event and
the children all came

together singing
songs, playing games
and having fun. Later
that day every class

had a visit from
Father Christmas.

Round Table / PTA

“It’s the most wonderful night of the year”!
This year, 17 amazing parents and staff came along to do the
Round Table Carol Wagon door to door collection. That was

the perfect number. We all met on the corner of Somerset
Road and Irby road, where some of our eager families had
also gathered to greet Santa! And then we set off at 6.30pm,
for what turned out to be the best night ever! Every street had
children with families waiting for Santa, excited and smiling.
The residents who answered their doors were so generous

and kind. It really was a night filled with the magic of
Christmas. An added bonus was it was a great ‘work out’ for
the 17 volunteers—we walked 12,000 steps and felt amazing!

Thank you to those volunteers who helped—it is greatly
appreciated!

Governor’s Page

Our school is now 10 years old and those 10 years have flown by! There
can’t be many schools that have been through such development and
change. Throughout these exciting and sometimes daunting years, the staff
and governors have shown great resilience and determination to build a
happy, safe and successful school. And that is exactly what we have—happy
birthday everyone!

Our school staff are very skilled at reflecting and thinking about ways to
improve and develop. This term, the governors have also begun this
process , reviewing the governor strategy plan that was written over 6 years
ago. Thankfully, everything we wanted to achieve on that plan has been
achieved. The Governing Body spent over two hours one evening, thinking
about what we do well and what we need to improve. Governors agreed
that our least confident areas were:

1) The broad and balanced curriculum - we know it happens but it is so
complex it is really tricky to track—how can we ‘see’ this fully?

2) Parent and pupil voice—this is very strong for pupils but not as strong for
parents—how can we involve parents more and hear their views?

The governors were delighted that these 2 areas were the same areas
identified by the school leadership team and that work on both of them had
already been shaped and started!

I think that most reassuringly of all, both staff and governors do not sit back
and rest at Pensby. They are always looking carefully at what they do and
why. This means the school is constantly evolving and moving with the
times to give the very best possible to the children and families. That is
certainly our biggest strength.

On behalf of the Governing Body, I wish you a very Happy Christmas and
peaceful New Year,

Mr D Spencer, Chair of Governors

NEON DISCO

The second Neon Disco was
great fun. This year, the

children really thought
through their T Shirt
designs and created

amazing images...in their
art lessons. The Neon

lights and games organised
at the disco make it
exciting and utterly

enjoyable! The behaviour
of the children at both
discos was impeccable—that
is incredible—well done

children!

Art and Design

Art and design in the
school is a strength.

It comes in many
shapes and forms
including, modelling,
sculpture, painting,
and abstract art. This
can happen inside
the classroom—or
outside! Art and
design is often linked
to other subjects
such as history and
geography, as well as
being a subject on its

own.

ICT Suite

During the summer, Mr Klausen worked
very hard with our IT technician to

convert the ‘spare classroom’ into an IT
suite for the children. This has been very
successful and now whole classes can use
the room. The next step is to finalise new
laptops for the classrooms—so the children
can have the best of both worlds—whole

class teaching and group teaching.

RE/PSHE and PE

Miracles and Heroes were discussed with In school, many subjects ‘overlap’ and can
the stories of Gideon and the Midianites fit into several areas of the curriculum. RE
– the children were able to explain what
miracles had occurred in the story and and PSHE (Personal, Social, Health and
Economic) are two very closely linked
discussed their understanding of
miracles…. “My mum said I’m a miracle subjects.
baby!”….. “My daddy is a hero because For example, this term in year 2 the
he is a policeman and he finds people children discussed ‘obedience’ and what
who are lost.”… “Anybody can be a hero it meant and they talked about who they
because anyone can help someone else!” would/wouldn’t obey…”I obey my
parents if they asked me to do something
The children were able to make links like tidy my room, otherwise I wouldn’t
between this and their work on Rosa get my dinner!”…. “I wouldn’t obey
Parks and Malala Yousafzai and how they
risked their lives to make important strangers!”
changes. So linking RE and PSHE to They also discussed friendships and trust
and the ways in which they could be kind
history and geography—wow!
to others – linked to the Samson and
Delilah story. And they reflected on their
talents and spoke about the talents they

noticed in others – linked to the David
and Goliath story.

And in PE, the children in Reception class
studied and attempted a Sikh dance—they

did really well!

School Office Page

Dear families,

What a busy and quick term this has been! We have been busy in the
office with some new equipment—our new signing in system is much
more streamlined now, although we will be making it even easier with

a few tweaks and adjustments.

Free School Meals (FSM) - Since the introduction of Universal Free
School Meals (UFSM) many eligible FSM children in Wirral are not being

identified and therefore funding may be reduced to support those
children and their families. There is a system that can help schools and
families quickly check if they are eligible for Free School Meals and all
Wirral Schools will be given this system next year. The office staff will
be busy contacting families to help them check this as soon as we can.

Did you know that we generate multiple log in details for your child for
our online systems? We can do this for TUCASI and for SPTO. This is
often useful for families and as long as you have parental rights you
can request this at any time. Just let us know!

We had hoped to have a new online system classed SIMS lite. This will
enable families to log in directly and change their contact details e.g.
phone numbers, emails etc. SIMS is not quite ready to launch this yet,

but we will let you know as soon as we have it. In the meantime,
please keep up updated with any communication changes by

completing a ’request for changes in data’ form available on the
office page on the website.

We do our best to get payments on TUCASI as quickly as we can to give
families notice. This term, the good organisation of the terms events,
meant that families could pre pay well in advance and spread costs.

Feedback has been very positive for this, so we will aim to do the same
next term. Please pay on time as once an event is removed from
TUCASI it is a two person job to add it back on and then remove it
again—hence the need for an administration fee.

And finally, do email in to us with any questions/queries you may have:

[email protected]

and keep checking our page on the website:

http://pensbyprimaryschool.org/school-office/

Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to all our families!

Mrs K Yeardsley-Jones, Mrs J Macrae, Mrs D Shaw, Miss H Lloyd-Jones

The whole school enjoyed
Outdoor classroom day.
Luckily the weather was
good despite the rain as
the children arrived in
school. Every class had

their lessons outside,
whether it was maths,

english, science,
geography or any other
subject. All the children
needed was warm clothes
and their wellies! The
children had an amazing
day and have requested

another one soon!

Outdoor classroom day

Visit to Heswall Primary

In November, years 3 and 4 walked to Heswall Primary School (one of our Federation
Primary School Partners) to meet the author Steven Butler who entertained them with
stories of his early childhood before teaching everyone how to draw one of the main
characters in his book. The children again behaved impeccably and we are very proud of

them.

Barnstondale 2018

It rained and rained at Barnstondale this year—but
that did not stop the children from having a go at all
the activities. Their determination and resilience was

something to admire as they tackled archery,
abseiling and climbing, zip wire and problem solving

in the rain! Impressive year 4!

Year 6 Bake off

After a shaky first round (with some year 6
children forgetting their ingredients!) the bake
off swung into action. Yet again, the skills of the

children were astounding. Thanks go to Mrs
Humphreys, our Catering Manager, for giving up

her own time every week to do this for the
children. Year 6, you owe Mrs Humphreys a lot of

thanks! Check out the year 6 class page on the
website for more bake off pictures!

Barclay’s Life Skills

We were very fortunate to have the team from Barclay’s bank come
into school, and work with year 6. They run a ‘Lifeskills’ programme

that helps prepare young people for life and work.
(see https://barclayslikeskills.com )

The team came into school and continued the work they started with
the class when they were in year 5, encouraging them to stop, think
and consider what money is and what is means. This really is an essen-

tial life skill that they cannot afford to miss.

Team work!

Our school is more than results,
tests and books. We pride

ourselves on encouraging our
amazing young people to go on
to high school with good values.

One of these values is to be a
team player. In school, team
work comes in many shapes and
forms, within lessons and within
other events, such as sporting
competitions. We are proud of

our children’s values!

This year Nursery EYFS and KS1
joined Reception, Performance
year 1 and year
2018
2 for their
Nativity It was a magical, sweet
and moving performance
Performance. and every child did their
About 130
best and made us very
children aged 3 proud.
to 7 took part!

Key Stage 2 Performance 2018

The KS2 performance
was worthy of any

stage in the country.
Incredible acting,

speaking, singing and
dancing from all the
children AMAZING!!