Dear Parents and Carers,

Another very busy week at Orton Wistow but a productive one also. We had our 4^th honours award assembly of the year, recognising some individual pupils who have demonstrated an impressive amount of responsibility in school. Listening to the reasons they had been chosen made me feel very proud of them all and reiterated the importance of the five learning tools we have in our school that we support the children to develop over time; Resilience, Teamwork, Concentration, Responsibility and Perseverance. 

A sad goodbye at Easter

On Friday 31^st March we will say a very sad goodbye to Mrs. McIntosh who is moving on to a new job within the Rutland Trust. Mrs.McIntosh has been a teacher at OWPS for nearly thirteen years and has taught across Key Stage One and Foundation Stage. When she first began her teaching career here she taught the Hummingbirds class as she was then Miss. Hinchliffe but after getting married and changing her name, her class became The Magpies. She has landed the perfect job for her as she will be heavily involved in developing arts and culture across several settings, something she has done here since joining the school. I know she is feeling very sad about saying goodbye to us, but I know you will join me in wishing her the best of luck in her new adventure. 

Parents Evening

Great to see that so many of you have already booked an appointment to see your child's teacher next week on Tuesday or Thursday. Please log in to School Cloud  (https://ortonwistow.schoolcloud.co.uk/)in the usual way to book a time as soon as you can if you haven't done so already. There is no report being shared with you prior to the meeting, but there will be one uploaded to the parent portal next half-term after we have completed our Spring term assessments. 

Mental Health Week

Although it is national children's mental health week next week, we decided to focus on this important subject in school over the past five days instead due to other things happening in the final week of the half-term. My assembly on Monday focussed on the theme of 'Let's Connect' and we talked about the importance of knowing who we can talk to when we have worries or concerns and the idea of setting ourselves an emotional goal. There have been lots of tweets this week related to things the children have been doing in class. 

Have a great weekend everyone, maybe there is someone you haven't connected with in a while that you could contact? 

Mr. Marks

Headteacher 

^{Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash}