Dear Parents and Carers, 

Nearly the end of May and I was feeling cold at break time and then running for shelter at lunch! We must be due some warm and sunny weather soon. Fingers crossed for half-term.

This week Mr Eardley and I met with Anne who works for E4Education, our website provider, to look at the parent portal tool they have created. Our website goes from strength to strength and we are excited about the further improvements this option could make to our digital offer at OWPS. We are looking into how we can streamline different things we do in school, trying to connect them together via a digital platform, making it easier for all those involved to manage and navigate through information linked to the school and to the pupils. We will contact you later in the term with further information about the parent portal.  

With the final half-term of the year readily approaching, we have begun to think about the next academic year and how school will look in September. It has been great to see some visitors come into school recently. We are having drama workshops, we had a visit from Wood Green Animal Shelter and have secured residential bookings for next year. I'm excited about the prospect of being able to offer all those extras at school that vary and enrich the experiences for the children and improve our curriculum even further. 

My assembly this morning was linked to our learning tools and the focus was on 'Concentration'. It was a live assembly via zoom (a nice way for me to be able to say hello to all the children) and they all attempted to focus on some pictures and then answer questions about them. Even some of our youngest pupils were able to remain focused and showed great concentration, resulting in them answering all the questions correctly! We talked about things that can help us to improve our concentration. Please ask your children about this at home over the weekend. Test how hard they were concentrating on my assembly! 

Have a wonderful weekend,

Mr Marks 

Deputy Head Teacher

^{Photo by Rainer Gelhot on Unsplash}

Each week, we publish the latest achievements of the children at Orton Wistow Primary School.  You can find out the weekly results for:

• Attendance
• Class Dojos
• Dojo Masters
• House Points
• Reading Champions
• Shining Stars
• Times Table Rock Stars
• Golden Mile

Wood Green Animal Charity Visit OWPS

By Mrs Simmons, DT Lead

On Friday 14th of May, Wood Green - The Animals Charity came to deliver Dog Safety workshops to all children in the school. 

Year groups learnt about the body language of dogs and what to do in the event of a dog approaching them outside of school. 

We then thought about how humans and dogs are similar in times we want to have attention and when they do not.

Adam at Wood Green, then delivered a whole school assembly (via Zoom) about the wonderful work that they do at their centre in Godmanchester.  We are looking forward to their next visit!

You can read more about Wood Green — The Animal Charity by visiting their website at Wood Green.

^{Photo by Beth Macdonald on Unsplash}

New Design for our House Shields

We are delighted to reveal the new design for the OWPS House Shields, which have been redesigned by our designer Carla Corrado and her colleague Lauren Doe, in collaboration with Mr Eardley.  The new images can be used on the website and in print media.  We're sure you'll agree that they look fabulous!

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History of the House Shields 

In 2006/2007, Orton Wistow Primary School ran a competition to rename the houses at the school. As a result of the competition, the four names were decided.

• Dempsey is named after Nick Dempsey, the Olympic sailor, who used to be a pupil at the school.
   
• Mallard is named after the famous steam train, LNER Class A4 4468.  It is the holder of the world speed record for steam locomotives.  The record speed of 126 mph was achieved on the 3rd July 1938 on a stretch of track on the East Coast Main Line, just north of Peterborough.
   
• Fens is named after the stretch of fenland countryside, The Fens, that lies to the North and East of Peterborough. It is a particularly fertile area of low-lying countryside that was drained in the 19th century to provide land for agriculture.  
   
• Nene is named after the River Nene, which flows through the Nene Valley from the hills of West Northamptonshire to Peterborough.

The children created the initial designs, for example choosing the Guildhall as the symbol for Fens.

Peter West, an ex-teacher, produced the original designs, which are now on display in the Main Hall. We asked Carla to use these as a starting point, and Mr Eardley and the design team have been working on the designs since last October to get them right!

House Points on the Home Page

Now that we have our wonderful new House Shields, we have decided to display them on the website's home page. Each week, you will be able to see the latest running totals for each of the houses.  After Sports Day, we will keep the totals under wraps until we reveal the winning house at the end of term.

Staffing News

By Mr Eardley, Head Teacher

We have some exciting news!

Mrs Morris and her husband are expecting twins in November, and we are sure that you will want to pass on your best wishes. 

We had a busy day last week interviewing nine great candidates to replace Miss Jeffery when she leaves at the end of this term.  We have appointed Mrs. Philips to join us as a Key Stage Two teacher. As we were already aware that Mrs. Morris would be absent for most of the year on maternity leave, we have also appointed Miss Strike to join us for the coming year. Mrs. Morris will not have a class next year and will cover classes/groups when she is in school before and after her maternity leave. 

Mrs Phillips and Miss Strike are both experienced teachers and are excited about joining our team. I know that I can count on you to give them a warm welcome when they join us in September. We hope that they will be able to meet their new classes in July when we have finalised our transition arrangements.

PE Days and PE Kit

As per the letter that went home yesterday, Mr Cowles would like to let parents and carers know that the PE days for all clasess are staying the same for next term.

He would also like to inform you that the children now have the option of wearing either a plain NAVY top OR a plain/school logo WHITE top on their PE days.  It is hoped that this choice of either a navy or white PE top will help to keep the children looking smart as the white tops can easily get muddy. 

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