Headteacher’s Blog – Friday November 11th 2022

I think everyone enjoyed their break and have returned to school enthusiastic and eager to learn. We have heard lots of half term news but they quickly settled to their learning.

We had a productive training day with everyone meeting in Nannerch. One of the Welsh Advisors joined us and helped share resources for our ‘Cymraeg pob dydd’ – everyday Welsh that can be used outside lesson times. We then looked at the new Digital Framework, Mrs Foster is the digital lead for the Cluster.

We discussed the approach to Relationships and Sexuality Education and Swimming. The teachers then had some time to complete some preparation work including Christmas concerts.

Dosbarth Disglair

Since our return they have been working hard on their Welsh. They have been sharing ‘Darllen gyda Sam’ and are learning greetings and how to ask how others are feeling and to respond to ‘Sut wyt ti?’ Theyare also learning our colours and days of the week!

They have been finding out facts about stars and have investigated the 2D shapes made by folding down the points of different numbered pointy stars.

In Maths they have been focusing on subtraction.

In Health and Wellbeing, they enjoyed playing the game ‘launch the planet’.

This week in Dosbarth Dewi- They have enjoyed preparing and singing along with the Urdd World Cup Jambori. The class has been buzzing to the tunes of Aderyn Melyn and Yma o Hyd. It has brought back memories for the older learners in class who have been showing us the actions to the songs they remember. It was fantastic to see the class in the colours of the Welsh flag and joining in with excitement.

It has been amazing looking at the homework the class completed over half term. The class has put in lots of effort and the best part is that they have

really enjoyed taking the opportunity to look at the night sky. In topic this week, they have looked at the star 'Polaris' and how it is used to navigate in the dark. This has allowed the class to use the co-ordinates skills they've learnt in maths this week to plot constellations in quadrants on a grid. There have been some brilliant conversations in class this week about why we use co-ordinates and we tried out the 'What 3 Words' app to see what word combinations our classroom had.

Om Friday Reverend Kathy invited us to Church for a Remembrance Service. The children made a beautiful wreath and a pot of poppies to place in Church in remembrance of those who have been in service during conflicts. 

Headteacher’s Blog –  Week Ending Friday October 28th 2022

A big well done everyone, we have got to the end of a very busy half term. The learners have worked hard and enjoyed all our activities this half term. A big thank you to all the staff who have supported their classes so well and supported me and each other in managing any staff absence by taking on extra duties. This is really appreciated. Thanks to Parents for all you have done to support us.

We had a wonderful Harvest Service the children were all stars; they did a brilliant job of reading or saying their lines. Fantastic Welsh from the Infants and their art work was super. A big thank you to Mrs Gillett for putting it together and to Rev Kathy. I think everyone will be looking forward to a traditional Christmas concert this year.

I was proud of all the donations for the foodbank, we have done a brilliant job as a school community.

Many thanks to Parents who made the effort to bring the children to the Nannerch disco, the Parents of older pupils were able to leave them and disappear for a coffee in the pub. I think that worked well for everyone and the children had a brilliant time everyone . I was really proud of them in the way they all interacted together.

I loved taking the Juniors down memory lane with all their memories of the Jambori’s in Foundation Phase.

Dosbarth Disgalir

They have been working hard practicing their phonic sounds ai, ay and a_e.

They have completed lots of work on nouns identifying people, places and objects.

RM Maths has been practiced pretty much daily, I really like that programme. Lots of learners were celebrating as they had certificates. I was really pleased to see we had children who were off school working on their RM maths too!

They had obviously done a lot of work in practicing their Welsh pronunciation to say ‘Diolch am y …’ – Thank you for the …

Within RVE they heard the story of ‘ Feeding the 5,000’ and putting it into practice in real terms by contributing to the Food Bank. They sorted food into perishable and non-perishable goods.

Dosbarth Dewi

As October is Black History Month, Dosbarth Dewi have looked at the book 'Hidden Figures'. The book explains how four women fought for equality and helped win the space race. In groups the class have been researching Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson and Christine Darden. They have worked collaboratively on the Chromebooks to create a Powerpoint about them to share with the class.

To celebrate Wales reaching the World Cup, the class have been learning songs 'Yma o Hyd' and 'Aderyn Melyn' to sing in the Urdd Jambori. It was nice seeing some of the children's memories coming back to when they last went to the Jambori in Foundation Phase. There was dancing and excited voices for Aderyn Melyn.

Have a wonderful well deserved half term break everyone.

Headteacher’s Blog –Week Ending Friday 21st October 2002

Another lovely week in school. Thursday was the best day for me as I was needed to accompany Year 5 and 6 to the forest to do some apple pressing. The children were so funny as they could see the apples discolouring and weren’t sure until they tasted the apple juice which was the best apple juice I have tasted! Joseph also said that his older sister had planted the apple trees and I was able to confirm that the former pupils had planted them.

Steve the ranger was very complimentary about our learners, he said they had brilliant team-working skills.

We also had a wonderful assembly from Welsh Water / Dwr Cymru reminding us all to be mindful with the water we used.

I love the new self-registration board in Dosbarth Disglair.

Dosbarth Disglair

This week the children have been learning all about how to work as part of a team. They have been problem solving, creating an obstacle course, planning and building. They were eager to demonstrate, discuss and improve them. What lovely Autumn leaves the children found in the garden, these became their Autumn hedgehogs where the children were eager to share facts they knew about them. Ordering the planets in the solar system gave great opportunity for ordering and learning about ordinal numbers. Miss Gunes has created a new self-registration board which should promote more independent skills. The children were excited to collect conkers which helped us with adding and taking away. The older children have been learning about nouns which will help them write their own creative story based on Whatever Next. Dwr Cymru came to visit us to talk about saving water and being more water sufficient. The children liked the various 'Darllen Gyda Sam' activities, where they played Welsh twister, snap games as well as reading Darllen Gyda Sam books.

Dosbarth Dewi

They have had a great week, they had their last Eyes to the Sky meeting. This week Professor Azi and Dr Sarah joined them in class. Professor Azi talked the class about growing up in Iran and how studying Astrophysics has led to her travelling the world and settling in Durham researching the formation of galaxies. Dr Sarah talked to the class about the parts of Space we can find on our planet. She shared how the children can spot these meteorites in grass as they look like stones that have been burned. The class got very excited when she explained that to study them; she zaps the rocks with lasers.

Headteacher’s Blog – Week ending Friday 14th October 2022

The weeks fly by with lots of exciting activities happening in class. We have very engaged learners and we are appreciative of all that parents do at home to support us.

Many thanks to all who attended the Parents evenings. I am sure everyone appreciated their time with the teachers. Please get in touch if there are any other questions or concerns.

We have been talking about our school vision and the impact it has on our life in school.

Dosbarth Disglair.

The younger children in Dosbarth Disglair have been enjoying learning various counting songs, their favourite was 'Five Little Space Men in a flying saucer' with them joining in with counting and actions. The older children have been concentrating on counting in 2's, 5's and 10's and have liked using natural materials to show their calculations in a visual way.

Last week they wrote instructions on making a space helmet, then they created an algorithm using Purple Mash which were proud to share with their groups.

They have learnt about directions, which has supported the coding game they have been playing on J2E they had to programme the rocket to land on various planets.

Gravity has been a fun word to learn, they have been understanding what it means as well as using balloons to understand the concept of gravity they have had fun and exercise.

Kandinsky the artist and one of his paintings 'planets’ has been an exciting visual stimulus the children have each created their own planet picture based on his style.

Dosbarth Dewi

They have  had a really exciting week, last week they started looking at hydroponics in Science and Technology; they placed cauliflower seeds in a cup with moist paper towel to try and get them to germinate. They have been very fortunate that the mild weather has helped  their seeds to germinate. This means they have been able to set up a hydroponics investigation to see which is the best method of growing plants in the future in space.

Wednesday afternoon was fascinating as Laura, an astrophysics student in Durham joined them for a Zoom call as part of our Eyes to the Sky project. She told us all about her childhood in Wales and looking at the stars in Snowdonia, she showed them some amazing photos of the Milky Way too. Laura then explained how recently she's been focused on tracking asteroids in space and re-creating them through 3-D printing. The class had so many questions for Laura about asteroids and telescopes. She has inspired them with her photography skills, so for their virtual gallery lots of the class want to create their own pieces of art based on the images, she showed them.

Headteacher’s Blog- Week ending Friday 7th October 2022

Another busy week with everyone enjoying their time in school despite the weather. I am so impressed with our pupils and their approach to school life and their care and concern for each other. I had the pleasure of attending a more able and talented Welsh day with two of our Year 6 pupils. I was so proud of them and their skills in engaging with all the activities on offer and for their behaviour. They really excelled.

Dosbarth Disglair

Learners have really enjoyed their Space theme, they have embraced it in all their work. They have been learning facts all about the moon, and they made their own moon cakes to take home. Learners enjoyed comparing a boiled egg to the layers of the moon, labelling with the words 'crust', 'mantle' and 'core'. Creating and painting the planets, thinking about the colours and textures to create that special effect!!

They have been listening to the music of Gustav Holst, The Planet Suite.

The younger children have been concentrating on sorting activities and the older children counting in 2's, 5's and 10's in a fun way. They used silly alien names for their Venn diagram, and then sorted the names depending on the amount of letters in the silly names!!!

Dosbarth Dewi

This week Dosbarth Dewi have been using their Welsh skills to create a personal profile about a fictional character called 'Lilly'. They used pupil voice to decide on the character's name, age and family. They had so many suggestions for names of her friends, it's clear that there are some Harry Potter fans in class as some children wanted her to be friends with Bellatrix. They've then been putting these facts into sentences with actions and developing confidence in performing about Lilly. It was wonderful to see talk for writing skills being used to support Welsh writing.

It was nice to have a visit from a former parent this week, who spoke to the class about their role with Greenpeace and being eco-friendly to look after the planet. This visit fitted in fantastically with the class' current language work on poetry as the task that has been set for the children is to write a poem with an eco-message. We have a class of eco-warriors and I'm sure they'll use their poetry skills in the coming weeks to share a very powerful message.

The class started planning a science investigation this week about hydroponics and growing plants in space. They are planning to grow plants using hydroponics and soil and see which grows best. Dosbarth Dewi really enjoyed watching the time lapse videos of how plants grow in soil and in water. The bit they enjoyed the most was watching how the roots spread out in the soil to search for nutrients. They can't wait to find out which grows best, fingers crossed the cauliflower seeds germinate!

Headteacher’s Blog- Week ending Friday 30th September 2022

A big thank you to everyone for donating towards the costs in the garden, we have raised over £100 which is brilliant. The cost of the maintenance within the garden to ensure it met safety standards was £1,400. We will continue to hold events to support this as it is such a fantastic resource for our learners to use.

As a Federation we have received training on the Schools Partnership programme so that we can work closely with two other local primary schools. We will be visiting each other’s schools and have them visit us to share ideas and expertise. This is funded by the Welsh Government following a cluster grant application.

Dosbarth Disglair have been so creative this week making space rockets for their teddies, even one fitted Mrs Gunes! We really chuckled seeing a photo of Teddy at home wearing his, he had obviously just woken up but he was so proud. From this they have begun to learn about instructions and their purpose. They are now starting to write their own instructions. They created papier mache planets and were able to name the planets as well as share facts about them.

The older children became more confident in counting in twos and the younger learners with counting and number formation. They found so many Sycamore seeds in the garden that they were able to create their own helicopter game with the children adding their own creative ideas so they could play their games during P.E.

This week Dosbarth Dewi had an exciting visitor-  Dr Alex from Liverpool John Moore's University. He came to talk to the class about his job as an astronomer. He told the class all about galaxies and nebulas. He explained how he creates simulations about how galaxies are made in huge super computers. The class really enjoyed his talk and had lots of interesting questions for him; some really put him on the spot. He must have been extremely impressed as he went to Ysgol Nannerch afterwards and told Mr Hills how Nercwys learners had displayed brilliant knowledge.

The children have been really creative this week and have been using papier mache to create their own solar system models. They can't wait to decorate them, using all the facts that they've learnt about the individual planets from their leaflets to help them.

We have some future netball stars in Dosbarth Dewi, it is fantastic each week watching their skills and confidence grow. They've started to use the positions to understand where they're allowed in the court and using all our passing skills to pass the ball to their team. It has been fantastic to see the teamwork skills developing.

Headteacher’s Blog – Week ending Friday 23rd September2022

I am sure everyone appreciated the Bank Holiday and an opportunity for the nation to pay their respects to the Queen for the tremendous service she has given to the Country. We have enjoyed hearing their reactions and even a visit to London to be in the midst of everything.

We had a very successful Curriculum evening sharing once again our Vision and Rationale for the Curriculum for Wales. We revisited the process of consulting all the Stakeholders and our journey so far and the reminder that this was an evolving process and that the learners were already contributing new ideas and suggestions for the outline – that they could be the raindrops added to our rural scene. A big thank you to Mrs John, Mrs Foster and the Governors curriculum subcommittee for leading all of this. I will display our Curriculum Vision and Rationale at the forthcoming Parents evenings in case you missed the evening.

I have been on a Headteacher’s conference in Llandudno - my to do list is a little longer as a result! I was lucky enough to listen to an inspirational speaker Sir John Jones. The more I listened the more I appreciate and wanted to celebrate our wonderful team who consistently do their utmost for our learners. Diolch yn fawr pawb!

Everyone is really pleased to have access to our wonderful garden once again, thank you to Mancoed for coming to get it sorted for us. Thank you so much for supporting us in our fundraising to ensure the garden is kept as a safe space for the learners to enjoy.

Dosbarth Disglair have been busy creating their own outdoor aliens and using standard and nonstandard to measure their heights. The creating of the space station has been so much fun with lots of shiny paint, buttons and knobs with a great opportunity for oracy skills. In the classroom they have been making funny aliens and becoming more familiar with using an iPad to record their creations. They have focussed on the story of 'Whatever Next' and will be making a sandwich for baby bear to take to the moon and this will then follow on to instruction writing. Through pupil voice Dosbarth Disglair will have a day of fun on Friday wearing their own clothes, playing games, outdoor activities as well as craft activities.

Dosbarth Dewi

The learners have been learning how to play team games. They have been learning this half term about netball, it is fantastic to see Dosbarth Dewi so enthusiastic about the sport and enjoying playing short games against each other. They are working hard to remember what all the different positions mean and to remember not to move with the ball. Dosbarth Dewi has some future netball stars!

Dosbarth Dewi have been enjoying a Science and Technology week; as part of our topic of space and thinking about how humans could survive in space or on a different planet. We've been looking at the life cycles of plants and what they need to survive. Which led the learners in to the garden to explore where in the life cycle the vegetables we planted are. They found some interesting things such as vegetables that have seeded and some that are ready for harvest, such as their carrots. This helped them understand how plants grow on our planet.

We had learner voice to support our fundraising for the garden, the learners decided to Harvest the vegetables that have grown. Using our numeracy skills to weigh and measure the vegetables. After that they used the vegetables to cook a soup. It was delicious! They can't wait to grow different vegetables to try over the winter and into summer.

Headteacher’s Blog -Week ending Friday 16th September 2022

Another busy week in school. It has been lovely walking into classes and seeing how engaged everyone is, we have happy smiling learners enjoying their tasks and activities. Our Schools Improvement Advisor was impressed when she walked around.

Dosbarth Disglair

The learners visited Church to reflect and listen to messages read out by the Rev Kathy which had been left in the condolence book.

The learners investigated does the higher we drop the asteroid or space rock effect the size of the crater. They also wrote special facts about the Queen to celebrate her life. They made a list of foods that teddy from the story ‘Whatever Next’, might take on his picnic, they created a table and used this data to create a graph pictogram.

The learners enjoyed the game ‘Faint o’r Gloch Mr Estron’ learning Welsh counting through Welsh yard games. They also learnt about colour mixing using shaving foam and various colours to see what happens.

Dosbarth Dewi

It has been an exciting week in Dosbarth Dewi, the learners have started their Science and Technology work, looking at how they could survive in space. Their first task was to think about plants and what they need to grow. This gave them the perfect opportunity to go into the school garden and look at how the vegetables have grown over the summer. They could see that there has been a good habitat for caterpillars over the summer, but they could also see some onions and carrots in our garden beds. The learner can't wait for them to grow some more so that they can taste them.

The learners have been exploring artwork by Peter Thorpe. The whole class were mesmerised by his pieces and discussed the artwork as a class last week and thought about the materials he used to create the pieces. The learners thought they could be pieces of digital art; they could be made with oil pastels or that they were water colour paint. They thought this because of how the colours were blended together in the pieces. So, they could work out which one, they had a go at blending oil pastels and water colours. It was so interesting seeing all the colour creations being made.

As a class the learners have been thinking about Queen Elizabeth II and what she meant to us. The learners have written messages of condolence and were able to take these messages up to Church to be shared with the wider community. We have discussed King Charles III and all the changes that are happening, including how our money and national anthem will change.

We have the Curriculum evening at Nannerch to look forward to.

We have had to spend a lot to maintain the garden so we will try and organise some fund raisers to try and support this.

Breakfast and After School Club continue to be busy. Many thanks to all the staff for managing the clubs so effectively. It is wonderful to see so many learners engaged in activities to support their learning in Breakfast Club. The learners also enjoy their learner directed activities in After School Club and they enjoy a Healthy snack.

Headteacher’s Blog – Week ending Friday September 9th 2022

I hope you all had a lovely summer. It has been super to see everyone looking smart in their school uniforms. We had so many smiles when everyone came back to see their friends. A big well done to our new Nursery pupils who settled wonderfully in school this week, and to Reception pupils who are still smiling but looking a little tired today as this is their first full week in school. Year 3 look very settled in their new class already. I asked some of the children what they had enjoyed the most about their return to school. This is what they said:

Mia and Macie said- playing with my friends.

Teddy said- hugging everyone.

Jamie & Brodie- said making number aliens.

Freya said- making new friends

Finn said -Everything!

Seren said -I missed hearing my friends’ voices

Dosbarth Disglair

We have had lots of fun thinking about creating aliens, counting how many body parts and counting the corresponding number to them.

We really enjoyed ‘Darllen gyda Sam’, our Welsh reading.

In P.E we had lots of fun playing yard games.

We have been designing a Harvest Festival poster

Dosbarth Dewi

It was fantastic to welcome all the children back, and Year 3 to Dosbarth Dewi. It has been brilliant watching new friendships being formed. The children have all been supporting one another to settle in and getting to know the class routines.

Our topic is called ’Eyes to the Sky’. The children created a jamboard to show everything they knew about space. It was fascinating listening to what they knew. We also had some amazing discussions about how long it takes to travel to different galaxies. Thankfully the class have got some expert scientists coming to talk to them about deep space.

As part of our settling in, we have had a ‘circle time’ session about friendship. The class came up with an interesting list of the qualities of a good friend. We have created a class display using our handprints to show all these qualities.

We had some very sad news about the passing of HRH Queen Elizabeth II. We celebrated her tireless devotion to the nation. We shared our memories of her and the significant events that marked her life and ours as a Nation. The Rev Kathy invited us to Church to say a prayer if we wanted and have a chance to reflect.