This week, we celebrated Careers Week. This event was taking place across all Ysgol Eirias feeder primary schools (Pen y Bryn, Cystennin, Llandrillo yn Rhos and Nant y Groes). In our school, it was organised by our Year 5 teacher, Mr Weigh and what a superb job, he did. There has been great enthusiasm from the pupils all week and most importantly lots of chatter about what they want to be when they grow up.
Throughout the week, we have been delighted to welcome a host of parents, grandparents, friends of the school, friends of friends and many others, who have come in to talk to all classes about their job. For each session, the children have been preparing questions and have completed a wide variety of work related activities. At the same time, all classes have been learning the essentials about managing money, in an age-appropriate manner. The week culminated with children invited to come in dressed for the career they hope to have when they were older. (I’m not so sure it’s the greatest news that several members of staff came dressed for alternative careers!) A massive thank you to Mr Weigh and the staff for their hard work in organising this event. And an even bigger thank you to everyone who gave up their valuable time to come in and inspire our children to think about the jobs they would like to do. This week many children may have taken the first step towards a happy and fulfilling career. Mr J Wilkinson
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This is what community looks like.
On Saturday we came together for a Lent walk to raise money for CAFOD. The event was organised by Miss Copp, with the support of Governors, PTA and Parish. It was attended by children, staff, parents, grandparents, parishioners, our Parish Priest, members of the PTA, School Governors, babies and dogs. I’m coming together, our community raised over £500 to help CAFOD support other, less fortunate communities, overseas. A slight error in diary planning meant Comic Relief, Science Week and a Family Sharing Assembly collided. The result? Wacky Science Hair Assembly Day. It was busy.
The day featured a wide range of exciting Science activities, with pupils rotating around various classrooms (more pictures to follow). Our staff were joined by Science staff from Ysgol Eirias and Mr O’Kelly, a school Governor and retired surgeon, in planning and delivering learning to celebrate National Science Week. Of course there was also a variety of interesting hairstyles and wigs on display (pupils and staff), as we celebrated Wacky Hair Day for Comic Relief. Thank you for all your donations - we will let you know how much was raised asap. Finally, in the afternoon, we opened our doors (eventually) for a first Family Sharing Assembly since before CoVID struck. There were queues around the corner to see each class share a small part of their week’s learning. The highlights (as is often the case) were the sheer joy on so many pupil and parent faces plus the confidence of our young people (big and small) to perform in front of an audience. Thank you to all who joined us and to the PTA for refreshments afterwards. If pupil voice says ‘yes’, we’ll have another one very soon! So, we might not have planned to pack so much into one day, but it certainly felt worthwhile at 3.30pm. A big thank you, tonight, to a rather tired staff team. Mr J Wilkinson Last Thursday was ‘International School Meals Day’. It is sometimes easy to forget how fortunate we are to have such lovely meals, cooked for our children, by a great team. Also, to appreciate that, by September, all children in Welsh primary schools will receive these meals for free. As you as parents/carers will know full well, it’s not always easy to persuade our children to eat a wide variety of foods and to clear their plates but the kitchen staff and lunchtime supervisors work really hard to encourage pupils to eat well.
Continuing the cookery theme, next Tuesday ‘Can Cook, Well Fed’ will be starting a series of slow cooking workshops with a group of parents. We are delighted to participate in this initiative and hope it is a great success. For anyone struggling to put meals on the table, St Joseph’s Church continues to offer their ‘Food Hub’ on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays between 10am and 12.30pm, or by appointment (email stjosephscommunityfoodbank@gmail.com). Donations of food, Slow Cookers, electric blankets and hot water bottles are gratefully accepted. Finally, why not help cut food waste by visiting the ‘Zero Waste Fridge’ in St Joseph’s Community Centre on Thursdays (11am-12.30pm) and Fridays (9.30am-12 noon)? There was so much going on this week, it was hard to keep up.
On Wednesday we celebrated Dydd Gwyl Dewi with Eisteddfodau for Foundation Phase and Key Stage 2 plus Year 5 and 6 joined the Annual Colwyn Bay St David’s Day Parade and service in St Paul’s. The day was full of beautiful singing, poetry recitals, dawnsio gwerin, Welsh themed activities in class and handwriting and art competitions. We were joined, at the Eisteddfodau, by many parents in the morning and afternoon who, beforehand enjoyed a cup of tea, chat and a chance to view children’s work. On Friday we celebrated World Book Day. There were lots of wonderful costumes, including probably the best staff entries for many years! Children were read stories by different teachers from across the school and completed a range of reading activities during the day. Foundation Phase pupils visited the Reading Cafe and were joined by parents and grandparents. This was a brand new event, this year, organised by Mrs Roberts. With the shared books there was, once again, the chance of a cup of tea and chat. The week ended with our assembly, where we were joined by School Governors, Mr Mulholland and Mr MacClean. They presented certificates to all who entered our ‘Reading in Unusual Places Photo Competition’ as well as Book Tokens for the winners and runners up. It was certainly a busy week. We hope you and your children enjoyed it as much as we did. I’m off to put the kettle on. One important group of people, often overlooked, in our school community are Governors. As unpaid volunteers, they play a crucial role in developing mission and vision, supporting strategic direction and monitoring school development.
The last few weeks have provided many examples of the ways in which, this small group of people make a big difference. For example, this week the Finance and Staffing Committee have been desperately trying to ensure that we can set a budget for 2023-2024, without significantly impacting pupil learning and well-being. Our Vice-Chair has been assisting in finding a solution to a challenging problem. Our Mission and Purpose Committee are currently planning for our CAFOD Family walk. Last many Governors attended our ‘Fr Frank Goodbye Assembly’ and shared much appreciated positive feedback with staff and pupils. Our Chair carried out an extensive Health and Safety Inspection. Finally, another Governor is taking a lead role in developing the financial awareness element of our revised Curriculum for Wales. All of this happens on top of the half-termly full governors meetings and sub-committee meetings. On behalf of pupils, staff and parents, it feels like a good time to acknowledge their generous support, dedication and effort. Mr J Wilkinson Today, the children said goodbye and thank you to Fr Frank, our parish priest. It was a sad day and a special day, at the same time. Sad, because he will be greatly missed but special because our children are wonderful. There was beautiful singing both a hymn and Fr.Frank’s favourite song, a special poem from the whole school, cards from young and older and finally, the GIFT Team leading our scripture and prayer. The pupil-led collective worship was attended by Governors and members of the Oblate community and was organised by our talented Deputy Headteacher, Miss Copp. Mr J Wilkinson (Who is sorry he missed such a special event!) On Wednesday we celebrated Santes Dwynwen. This was a whole school theme with cross-curricular work in all classes. (There will be a number of similar days over the coming months.) There was a fantastic range of skills and activities on display and all children appeared to be enjoying another celebration of our shared Welsh culture.
On Thursday we also celebrated Santes Dwynwen, in mass, with Year 3 and 4 pupils. The singing was the best we’ve heard, in a long time, resulting in several parents/grandparents/staff being almost reduced to tears of happiness - a fitting tribute to the Welsh patron saint of lovers. #growinlove This was a very difficult week. The lights were shining, there was music and singing but we couldn’t shake the sadness. We were present but our thoughts and prayers were with the family of Mrs Gelezinis, our much loved colleague.
One of the joys of working with young people is that they keep you going, whatever the difficulties. This week our school choir, brilliantly lead by Miss Copp shone brightly. As did Years 1 and 2 in their ‘Big Little Nativity’. Author, Damian Harvey opened our new library, with fantastic murals painted by local artist Gary Drew. We celebrated mass with Fr Frank and our super kitchen staff provided a wonderful Christmas dinner for 162 pupils and 15 staff. There is as always, light in the darkness. We wish you all a Merry Christmas and look forward to welcoming you back in the New Year. We started the week, on Saturday, with a superb Christmas Fair. Huge thanks to all who worked so hard to make it such a success. The total funds will be split equally between school and parish and will help both to keep supporting our community in these challenging times. In the middle of the week, we welcomed Nursery parents to school for ‘Cocoa and Catch Up’. Parents, carers, staff and pupils shared Hot Chocolate, cakes and biscuits (baked by Nursery), the school choir entertained us with Carols and we looked at the classroom and the pupils’ work. This was a lovely event and one we hope to repeat with more classes. Thank you to all who came along. To end the week, we were assessed for the Cymraeg Campus Bronze Award. Our Criw Cymraeg, Mrs Martens, Miss Jones and all the staff and pupils worked really hard to meet all the targets. Their efforts were rewarded as we passed ‘with flying colours’. Da iawn, pawb.
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