Issue 402: 21st October 2022

Dear Parents and Carers,

Let's hope yesterday's torrential downpour isn't a sign of things to come for our half-term break. It was the first day in school for a long time that we had a wet playtime and lunchtime, but the children coped well and quite a few classes went outside in the afternoon to complete the Wistow Mile and get some fresh air. The midday supervisors set themselves up across the school at lunchtime to ensure all our young people were safe, happy and had access to a variety of wet play resources during the hour.

Parents Evening

We had over 90% of parents' evening meetings go ahead successfully using School Cloud this week. After Mrs. Schneider had uploaded all the reports to the Parent Portal, there was a technical fault with the system, but luckily this was resolved before the appointments began. If you have had any problems accessing the report or the parent portal, please contact the school office and let them know. 

Autumn 2 half-term

The second half of this term is always a busy few weeks, especially with the run-up to Christmas. It is also one of the best times to be in a primary school. Just some of the things we have to look forward to are: Bonfire Lunch, Book Fair, Foundation Stage Nativity, Year 2 Performance, two honours awards and the Christmas Fayre! I feel exhausted just writing the list. 

This week's 'Are you smarter than a Wistow pupil?' questions are:

1. What are phishing and identity theft? (Year 6 Online Safety) 
2. How might the Four Noble Truths influence how a Buddhist lives their life? (Year 4 RE)
3. Why wouldn't this piece of code (see below) work? (Year 3 Computing)

Good luck!

Have a great half-term, everyone. We will see all the children back in school on Tuesday 1^st November. 

Mr. Marks

Headteacher

^{Photo by DESIGNECOLOGIST on Unsplash}

Each week, we publish the latest achievements of the children at Orton Wistow Primary School.

Year 1 RE Trip

By Mrs Ironside, History and Phonics Lead, and Year 1 Class Teacher

On Wednesday 12^th October, the whole of Year 1 walked to St Andrew’s church, Alwalton to meet Rev Alexandra, Rev Sarah and Jonno, the churchwarden. It was a beautiful warm autumn afternoon, and we really enjoyed the opportunity to get out of school and experience the changing seasons around us.

The children were very excited on their walk, and kept talking about how they had visited the church last year. Rev Alexandra welcomed us with open arms, and was incredibly impressed at the knowledge the children had retained from their RE learning so far this year. She spent some time telling the children about who Christian’s believe Jesus is, and why the altar, font and candles are significant.

We are hoping to arrange a visit to a mosque in the Spring term as we start to learn about Islam and what it is like to be a Muslim.

Harvest Collection for the Foodbank

Thank you to everyone who brought in harvest donations for the foodbank.

On Friday 21st October, two representatives from the Foodbank Peterborough came to collect all the items that had been donated. 

They were very impressed with how much we had collected and asked us to pass on their thanks to all the children and parents for bringing in their food donations. 

Two volunteers from Year 6 helped to carry the bags outside and load them into crates, ready to take to the Foodbank.  The donations were going to be weighed and put to good use.

An email from the foodbank later that afternoon commented:

Just wanted to say thank you so much for the kind donation from your harvest festival collection again this year...you collected 180kg of food.So please do pass on our thanks to all that helped.

Thank you again for supporting the Harvest Collection. 

To find out more about the Foodbank, please visit: https://peterborough.foodbank.org.uk/about/

Netball News 21.10.22

On the 7th of October, the first-ever competitive Orton Wistow Primary School netball team took part in a match. The girls played their first fixture this year and represented the school brilliantly. Even though the result didn’t go our way, the girls stuck together as a team and battled on.

On the 12th of October, the year 5/6 netball team represented Orton Wistow at the Nene Park Netball Festival. The girls demonstrated the Learning Toolkit Skills in abundance and scored some great goals.

Football News 21.10.22

The girl's football team continued their success on Friday 14th October with a 3-0 victory over Winyates Primary school. Both teams battled tremendously hard, but the girls stuck together to earn the 3 points. A great start to the footballing season for them.

Operation Christmas Child 2022

Orton Wistow Primary School is collecting both filled shoeboxes and individual items which will be safely packed and processed by a local group and donated to Operation Christmas Child.

Calling all Landscape Gardeners

Mrs Simmons is planning a 'Mindful Garden' as part of our Mental Health and Wellbeing initiative at OWPS.

If anyone has or knows of a gardening/landscape business who could come and quote for our 'mindful garden' we would be delighted to hear from you! 

 Please contact office@owps.org.uk if you are able to help. Thank you!

Visits to the Library

After half-term, parents will be able to pop down to the library with their children to share a story or choose a book. This will be on Fridays from 3:15 to 3:30. Please come in through your child's classroom and go out via the main office. 

FOWS Donations

FOWS would like to ask for the following donations to be dropped in after half-term that can be used for the Christmas Fair:

• Unwanted teddies for the Teddies Tombola
• Unwanted children's party bag favours for the Lucky Dip

Marathon Completed!

Lara Carter, a mum at the school, ran the London Marathon and completed it!

She would like to say a big thank you to everyone who donated, supported and bought cakes:

I managed to surpass my fundraising target of £1,500 just a few days before the marathon. The atmosphere was amazing, and the whole experience is one I will never forget. 

Thank you again!

Discover what is coming up in the OWPS Dining Car.

Read about what is happening locally, nationally and internationally.

^{Disclaimer: Orton Wistow Primary School does not endorse any products, services or activities that appear in the Community section of this newsletter, and is not responsible for any contract entered into by either party. Given the current circumstances, we would recommend all parents check with any providers regarding the status of these services, activities and clubs}