Western December Newsletter
2020
Welcome
December looked a little different this year at Western but it has still been such a magical, festive and action-packed month. Whilst we very much missed seeing families in school at our traditional events, we embraced many new ways to mark the season. Hopefully you all had the opportunity to view our Fenwick inspired Christmas windows! If not, don't worry, you will see a selection in our newsletter!
Class Christmas parties were great fun yesterday, despite being on a smaller scale due to restrictions. Children loved their party food, prizes and treats which were all kindly sponsored by First Class Supply Agency.
Families in Early Years are able to, at their leisure, enjoy the magic of our traditional nativity song from Reception and mini performance from Nursery on Tapestry. Children in KS1 and KS2 performed 'Give a Little Love' to create a little Christmas cheer to share with families on our school app.
Christmas Lunches in classes were followed by a cosy Christmas movie and thoroughly enjoyed by children and staff. Disco fun was replaced by the Friends of Western Polar Express Treat Day and we also had the Northern Stage performance of 'The Emperors New Clothes' streamed live into our classrooms. All of these events in school added some sparkle to the season!
Generosity and kindness were once again overflowing this month with our Western Family to Family hamper scheme proving a huge success. We would all like to offer our heartfelt thanks to everyone who donated so generously and thoughtfully. We know you have made a huge difference to the lives of others this Christmas by giving with such love and care. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank all parents, carers, staff and Governors for all of their support over the term. We feel proud to work together as such a strong community for the good of every child.
We wish you all a wonderful Christmas break and hope, even with the challenging times that Covid brings, you are able to spend time with loved ones to relax, reconnect and enjoy the season.
We will very much look forward to seeing you all when school reopens for the spring term on Monday 4th January.
Warmest wishes
Miss Hill and the whole staff team
P.S. If you are enjoying the newsletters we send we'd love it if you could please give them a like by pressing the heart. This helps us tailor the news we send you.
Thank you to our brilliant Friends of Western Team
CONTACT TRACING OVER CHRISTMAS
Reminder - Children return to school on Monday 4th January 2021.
Good to be Green Stars Friday 4th December
Good to be Green Stars 14th December
Nursery
Round the back!
Polar Express adventure
Christmas dinner
Reception
Christmas Tree Science
Polar Express Day
We made elf cookie bites and drank hot chocolate.
We went on an adventure to find our magic bells and had a wonderful day.
The Nativity
Year 1
The Polar Express
A Festive Lunch Time
Snowman Fun!
Year 2
Art
RE
Polar Express Day
Year 3
There has been lots of singing this festive season in Year 3. The whole year group learned the 'Give a Little Love' song because we all agreed it perfectly reflected our Western values. We loved contributing to the whole school rendition which will be coming out on the app for families to see very soon. They developed many skills in singing, timing and how green screens work, to create this masterpiece.
3VT also had the privilege of learning another song, Peace Child, as part of North Tyneside Music Hub's Christmas singing collaboration this year. They learned the song and the sign language to go with it, in a very short space of time and did a fantastic job of performing it. A version of this will also be going out on the app, specifically for the families of 3VT so everyone can share in the joy of the song.
On Polar Express Day, Year 3 explored the visual stills from scenes in the film and recreated their favourite ones in small groups. They showed excellent drama skills. They also created their own Polar Express scene using a range of media. Of course, the hot chocolate and popcorn was a big hit!
Year 4
RE
Give a Little Love
Christmas Dinner
Year 5
The children have been practising so hard at learning our special song this year. From rehearsals in the classroom to learning at home in their bedrooms, we have been so proud of how hard they have worked. This paid off when it came to record their audio and video segment of the whole school singing performance. It only took two takes and they were done! They have had a fabulous time taking part in this and it is going to be exciting to see what the final product looks and sounds like!
POLAR EXPRESS DAY
Last Thursday was slightly different across the whole of school. The children in Year 5 came in and were so excited when they found that their first task of the day was watching the first part of the film. In between watching the movie, they took part in a Christmas craft extravaganza day. The giant snowflakes they created were superb and they also put their hands and minds to work making cardboard gingerbread houses. The treat of the day was hot chocolate and popcorn during the movie which put us all in a super-festive mood.
WONDERFUL WINDOWS
Over the last few weeks the children have been hard at work creating their Christmas windows. The whole of upper Key Stage 2 joined together to work as a team in representing the 12 Days of Christmas. We put a Geordie spin on it and Year 5 choose some great ideas such as 10 Acts of the Arena and 9 Great North Run medals. They were all so proud when they were able to walk around the outside of school and see their windows all the way from one to twelve.
Year 6
Christmas Window Crafting
Give A Little Love
Festive Spirit!
Values
We have all agreed that everyone has different needs at different times and being fair doesn't necessarily mean everyone getting the same, but everyone getting what they need as an individual. We all believe that we are all equal and all humans and deserve to have the same opportunities. This coincided with International Human Rights day on 10th December.
As we head into the Christmas holidays we have also been thinking about other holidays such as the Jewish holiday, Hanukkah. This is a family festival celebrating light and is an important family celebration where gifts are shared and time is spent with loved ones. What are you looking forward to doing this holiday? What are you excited to do with your family?
Family to Family Hampers
Eco-Council
This month, we elected a new Eco Council made up of Year 5 and 6 children. Take a look at our new Eco members above:
Back row (Left to right): Lewis (6AT), Jordan (6AT), Jack (6AT), Leah (6LL), Anna (6LL), Ewan (6LL). Front row (Left to right) Dylan (5SP), Kain (5SP), Samiyah (5SP), Eva (5AW), Alisha (5AW), Saibh (5AW).
We have been looking closely at our Green Flag Award and objectives from our Action Plan with a new updated version to follow very soon. One of our objectives from last year was to measure energy usage in the school. Dylan and Kain have been working extremely hard to collect all the data and evaluate what we have been using this term. They created graphs to show our water, electricity and energy levels and the increases over the Autumn term. They also prepared a short presentation to share their findings with the rest of the Eco Council and the school. This is what they found out and what we can do as a school to reduce these levels:
Dress a Western Christmas Window
Mental Health First Aid
Staffing Update
In January, we will be welcoming Miss Fox as our new Care, Guidance and Support Leader. Miss Fox brings a wealth of experience and expertise to the team and is very much looking forward to getting to know our families, children, staff and community. We look forward to introducing her to you all in the New Year.
Change for Life
Their Eatwell Guide is a great way to demonstrate to children what proportion of food they should eat from the different food groups.
Message from Northumbria Police
At Northumbria Police our connection with our local communities is the cornerstone of neighbourhood policing. It is at the heart of everything we do so we can continue to keep people safe from harm in this fantastic region that we live in.
So this year, we know that Christmas will be celebrated differently and we wanted to give something back to the local communities. It may not be much but we simply wanted to say ‘thank you’.
This year we have teamed up with the Percy Hedley Foundation to create a Christmas video, which we would like to share with all the children, parents or guardians across the force area.
The video is only two minutes long and is a thank you from everyone at Northumbria Police for the part the children, the schools and their communities have played over the last few months. We want everyone to keep doing what they are doing and keep themselves as safe as possible. It is a message from our Chief Constable Winton Keenen and includes officers and staff from across the Force. Even some of our four legged employees want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas.
If you would like to send a message to your local policing team to wish them a Merry Christmas you can do this by leaving a comment underneath the video or if you wish, you can send you messages to us via email. You can be as creative as you like but it would go a long way to know that your school is thinking of them. We will only share this with our officers so if you could get them back to us by 15th December we would be most grateful.
Kind regards and have a Merry Christmas
Northumbria Police
Attendance
Families will be contacted if their child's attendance falls below 90% by Mrs Robson. Having attendance below 90% is classed as being a persistent absentee and any absences will be recorded as unauthorised by school when a child's attendance is below 90%. We are here to help and will work with families to see what support we can offer to improve attendance.
Free School Meals
If your circumstances have changed, you can check if you are eligible and apply using the online portal via the link below. Just select: 'How to apply', click ‘Apply for free school meals’, register or log in and just follow the instructions: https://my.northtyneside.gov.uk/category/238/free-school-meals
Andrew Hall, Specialist Safeguarding Consultant, gives advice on TikTok
TikTok is used by many teenagers and sometimes children younger than that 13 despite its terms and conditions. Using the new Family Pairing feature can allow parents to guide their child’s TikTok experience in a safer way. Features include:
- Search: Decide what can be searched for. This includes content, users, hashtags, or sounds
- Screen Time Management: Sets how long your teen can spend on TikTok each day
- Discoverability: Decide on the account being private (you decide who can see their content) or public (anyone can search and view content)
To find out more information about TikTok's Family Pairing feature and to download a helpful poster to share with pupils and parents, go to: https://swgfl.org.uk/magazine/tiktok-update-parental-controls-with-family-pairing-feature/
Thrive
Please follow this link to access the resources. They include a festive, sensory treasure hunt, make your own Christmas decorations and selfie props for you to colour and make as a family.
Wellbeing at Western
There are a number of websites which focus solely on reporting positive news. Some examples are postive.news and The Happy Newspaper. It might also be a nice idea to create your own family happy newspaper, you could fill it with stories from your own family and friends or stories you find online.
We know that this year has been very challenging in many different ways. Some of us might still be struggling and worrying about what 2021 might bring. There are lots of places out there who can offer support and someone to talk to about any worries you might have. We have included some useful numbers in the image below.
GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)
School App - SchoolGateway
Our app allows us to message you and also enables you to reply directly to us. This makes communication between home and school much easier for families and school. As you know, we have now moved to a completely paperless communication system. All letters and school communications are now sent via the SchoolGateway app.
If you are new to school and haven't yet downloaded the app, please follow the steps below.
Downloading the App:
Please download School Gateway from your app store (Android and iPhone). Once you have downloaded the app, you will need to click "Sign Up". It will ask you to enter your email address and phone number. A pin is then sent to your phone, which you will use to activate your account.
OR
For those parents or carers without a smartphone, you can visit the website:
www.schoolgateway.com and click on ‘New User’. Enter your email address and mobile phone number and you’ll receive a text message with a PIN number. Use this PIN to log into School Gateway.
Trouble logging in? It might be because school doesn’t have your current email and mobile phone number on record. Please contact school and we’ll update the details on our system.
Please contact Mr Ashard on 0191 263 0202 or western.office@ntlp.org.uk if you have any problems getting started or have any questions regarding SchoolGateway.
Social Distancing on site
School Term Dates 2020/21
Western Community Primary School
Email: western.office@ntlp.org.uk
Website: westerncommunityprimary.org.uk
Location: Rutland Road, Wallsend, UK
Phone: 0191 263 0202
Twitter: @westernprimary