Dear Parents and Carers,
What a wonderful start to the term it has been – despite the weather, the children have thrown themselves into their learning with enthusiasm and energy. Thank you so much for your kind messages and updates following the half term holiday.
This term, our value is ‘We are curious’ and we will be exploring the bible passage ‘to live life in all its fullness’. We discussed this briefly on Thursday and the children were incredibly mindful about appreciating the positive things in life and ensuring we look after our loved ones.
Congratulations to the following children who were awarded the Class Stars of the week:
Class 1 – Jasiah Longmuir Small
Class 2 – Ben Sanders
Class 3 – Eli Griffiths
Class 4 – Cooper Facey
This term is a very busy term with lots of exciting things planned. Not only do we have parent/carer evening sessions, but children in classes 2, 3 and 4 will receive their Spring reports. This is a chance for the class teacher to celebrate what the children have done well and what we will be focussing on during the second half of the year. For children in class 1, their reports will be coming out later in the year but parents/carers will still have a chance to meet with Mrs Parker during the evening sessions. These will take place between Monday 18th March until Thursday 28th March.
I hope you all have a wonderful (and dry!) weekend. We can’t wait to see you all again on Monday.
Take care,  KF

ATTENDANCE

Class 2 will have a special non-uniform day to celebrate winning the greatest overall attendance for last term !
This will be on Friday 1st March.
Please note, this is class 2 only.  As it is a PE day clothes and footwear suitable for outdoor physical activity should be worn. Thank you. Ms B.

SCOPAY

Preschool invoices are now ready. Please also look out for this half terms swimming (to include year 2 from Monday 4th March) , the C3 trip to Exeter, and the C4 residential.

If you returned a form for this half terms ‘Jumpers’ extended care those dates will now be showing in your SCOPAY accounts. We would like the dues for this to be settled in advance please. If you use child care vouchers please apply for them straight away so we can be sure to claim the moneys from DCC before the change over in banking….

As we gear up to become part of the Ventrus Multi Academy Trust (MAT)  it is very important that all dues are settled by Friday 22nd March.  We have a lot of financial logistics to sort out not only financial year end April 6th, but a change in banking, and administrative software. Thank you for helping us to initiate this as smoothly as possible by covering your balances in good time.

FROGS

A quick update on how FROGS have been spending your generous donations this year – and a date for your diaries! Some of the things we’ve contributed to so far:
– £2k on new early reader books
– £1k on special maths blocks
– Class Christmas gifts totalling £500 of new equipment
– Subsidies for the class 4 trip to Coldharbour Mill, class 2 trip to Dunster and class 3’s upcoming trip to Exeter, which helps to reduce the cost for parents
– Paid fees for rehearsal and performance space for Peter Pan
– ⁠New netball posts costing £325
– New curriculum books for class 4 (cost tbc)
Plus many other things that the school would otherwise struggle to pay for.

We always need people to help plan and organise events and to help on the day. We are particularly looking for parents of younger pupils to get involved to ensure that FROGS can continue to support the school to provide a fantastic environment for all our children. We are a small team and without guarantees of help it may not be possible to run some events, jeopardising our ability to meet our future funding aims. If you would like to get involved please chat to Erin Matthews or email erinmatthewsswim@gmail.com
TIA 
Meanwhile, look out for details of our next exciting event happening on *Friday 22 March*!!!!    All will be revealed later this week!!

Parent Teachers meetings

Will be held over a two week period of 18 to 28th March.  Bookings will be via the google form sent out by email today.

Diary Dates and reminder of communications sent out this week:

Click here  for the school calendar which can be found at the bottom of the website home page.

February 27/28/29th !!  – Bikeability year 5. Have you checked over the bicycle ?

Friday 1st March – Reception class Multi-skills at the Braunton Academy – please drop the children at the Academy in the morning, a minibus will bring them back to school in time for lunch.

Tuesday 5th March – Class 3 day trip to Exeter Museum to support the Egyptian topic – please return the permission slips asap and note the early start ! We appreciate your helping each other out with lifts to and back from the station to ease the morning flow.

Thursday 7th MARCH = WORLD BOOK DAY.

Thursday 21st March –  local schools football and netball tournament. All day at Kingsacre school.  Team selection notifications still to come…

w/c 18th March – Parent teachers meetings – bookings should be made via the google form sent out by email.  (Choose the teacher,  see and select from the days/times on the list.  Options will be removed as they are selected. You should receive an email confirmation. Please contact the office if you make a mistake, or the teacher directly if you cannot attend any of the times but would still like to meet with them.

Last day of term Thurs 28th March 2024.

Click here  for the school calendar which can be found at the bottom of the website home page.

The school’s Designated Safeguarding Lead is Mr Kevin Fry
Our Deputy Safeguarding Lead is  Emma Hill
Our SENCo is Mrs Lucy Rinvolucri.
Make contact with us via  dsl@georgeham-primary.devon.sch.uk

If you have any concerns that you’d like to discuss, please call through to Lottie and ask for an appointment.
You may also find some useful or helpful information on our Safeguarding webpage… https://georgehamceps.wpengine.com/staying-safe/

Attendance… We report the attendance of individual year groups as it’s a really good way to see if school attendance is at a good percentage…  as high as possible of course! The DfE have a target of 96.5%
Attending school regularly is vital to help children achieve and to give them the best possible start in life. It’s also the legal requirement of parents once children are of school age and enrolled in mainstream education. Ofsted has a strong view about attendance of course. Too many absences can lead into difficult discussions about how we can support children to achieve and do well – we could even be downgraded for our current Good status as a result.
Absences will only be authorised if they meet exceptional circumstances. With only 190 statutory school days in the year, there are 175 days (weekends and school holidays) left to plan for family visits, non-urgent medical/dental appointments, holidays etc. School holidays are published well in advance and parents are expected to plan and take family holidays at this time so as not to disrupt their child’s education. We also try to arrange our Inset (training) days to provide time for travel… such as this term’s Friday October 20th.
Holidays… are almost always not recognised as meeting ‘exceptional circumstances’ and therefore an absence would be unauthorised. This could result in a penalty notice being issued by DCC.
Punctuality is important too, and the earlier we get our children into the right habits, the better. You may not realise that being just 5 minutes late every day equals 3 days of school lost a year. Please bring your child for 8.45am when they door is open and the classroom has a learning activity ready for them.