Friday 11th March

Another great week at Waunarlwydd with loads of highlights. Morning nursery’s highlight during ‘k’ week has definitely been designing, making and flying kites, while it’s been a pleasure welcoming our newest members of the school to afternoon nursery. Lots of smiling faces which is always a great sign! Reception’s highlight was venturing into the woodland to create and toss natural pancakes. Miss Tyrrell’s class have thoroughly enjoyed discussing what it means to be Welsh and performing their folk dancing. Mrs Horseman and Mrs Tucker’s class have also been enjoying their ‘Wales’ topic and thoroughly enjoyed making love spoons out of clay. Year 2 have been film directors and critics this week, using ‘Lucky dip’ to develop their film making skills.

The undoubted highlight for Year 3 and 4 was their incredible trip to Techniquest where they thoroughly enjoyed the practical tasks as well as the show. Most pleasing for us were the comments made by Techniquest staff highlighting the children’s wonderful manners and behaviour! We are proud of you all!

The highlight for Year 5 has been developing their first aid and life saving skills with Mrs Cornish. A big thanks to Mrs Cornish for delivering the sessions in such a fun yet informative way. Finally, ‘Circus Eruption’ proved a big hit with Year 6 where the children enjoyed watching and learning all sorts of circus skills! They’re looking forward to their next session! A super week all round!

Dates for the diary

Thursday 17^th March – Year 5/6 Circus Eruption 

Friday 18^th March – Comic Relief (non-uniform day)

Friday 18th March – Fire safety talk (Year 2 and Year 5)

Fortnight beginning 28^th March – Teacher/ parent meetings (Face to face)

(We will update you with any further dates regarding trips and events as soon as possible!)

Speaking with Children about the War in Ukraine

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate in getting in touch!

Have a great weekend!

Mr Jamie Evans

Deputy Headteacher

Friday March 4th

What a wonderful week to begin another half term! It’s been great to see more learning and laughter across the school! Let’s hope today’s sunshine will stay around for as long as possible! We’ve had two celebration days this week and we’d like to thank all our families for the awesome effort on both St David’s Day and World Book Day!

The beginning of the week focused on celebrating all things Welsh and it was amazing to see the enthusiasm and positive attitude of all the children towards Wales and the Welsh language. Children across the school produced some wonderful artwork, poetry, music and craft! Great work everyone!

It was a pleasure to see the array of costumes entering the school on Thursday for World Book Day! Superheroes, wizards and all kinds of characters filled the school and everyone enjoyed celebrating the wonderful world of literature! It was great to end the the week with the long awaited return of celebration assemblies!

Children have also enjoyed the return of after school activity clubs this week! A big thanks to staff for making them so enjoyable!

For your information

With the terrible situation unfolding in Ukraine, the following link offers advice on how to discuss the issue with children should they ask questions:

Speaking with Children about the War in Ukraine

INSET DAYS and extra Bank Holiday 

Spring term INSET – Friday 8^th April

Summer Term INSETs – Friday June 24^th and Monday June 27^th

Bank holiday (Queen’s Jubilee) – Friday April 29^th

Dates for the diary

Thursday March 10^th – Year 3 and 4 Techniquest trip

Thursday 10^th March and Thursday 17^th March – Year 5/6 Circus Eruption 

Friday 18^th March – Comic Relief (non-uniform day)

Fortnight beginning 28^th March – Teacher/ parent meetings (Face to face)

(We will update you with any further dates regarding trips and events as soon as possible!)

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate in getting in touch!

Have a great weekend! Let’s hope the sunshine stays!

Mr Jamie Evans

Deputy Headteacher

IMPORTANT!!!

You should all have received the information regarding school closures tomorrow (Friday 18^th February). Due to the weather warning for tomorrow rising to RED due to the severe storm forecast, the local authority has advised schools that they should close for all pupils and staff! It is essential that we take on board the expert advice given and we all take every precaution to keep ourselves and our family safe throughout!

Teachers have provided pupils with activities that they can get on with at home tomorrow! Staff will be working from home!

 Although this is not the way we had hoped to end the half term, we would like to thank all children, staff and families for their efforts and support throughout another challenging but rewarding time. Once again, the children of Waunarlwydd have shown what superstars they are! As we look to be heading towards a more settled time concerning COVID-19, we will be making some alterations after half term. The wearing of face coverings will be optional outdoors, although staff will continue to wear them within communal areas indoors. Our drop off and pick up process will remain the same. There will be more updates following half term.

Clubs will resume after half term for those that have completed the online forms.

Dates for the diary

Tuesday March 1^st – St David’s Day (Children can wear Welsh costumes, colours or kits)

Thursday March 3^rd – World Book Day (Children can dress up as their favourite character)

Thursady March 10^th – Year 3 and 4 Techniquest trip

Thursday 10^th March and Thursday 17^th March – Year 5/6 Circus Eruption 

Friday 18^th March – Comic Relief (non-uniform day)

Fortnight beginning 28^th March – Teacher/ parent meetings (As it stands, these will be face to face)

(We will update you with any further dates regarding trips and events as soon as possible!)

INSET DAYS and extra Bank Holiday 

Spring term INSET – Friday 8^th April

Summer Term INSETs – Friday June 24^th and Monday June 27^th

Bank holiday (Queen’s Jubilee) – Friday April 29^th

Once again thanks for your support and, as always, if you have any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate in getting in touch!

Stay safe tomorrow and have a great half term!

See you all on Monday 28^th February!

Mr Jamie Evans

Deputy Headteacher

It has been another fun-filled week at Waunarlwydd! The week started with our girls’ football team competing in a tournament in which they did themselves proud! It was wonderful to see a school sporting team represented after such a long time. We look forward to taking part in many more sporting events after half term and during the summer term. 

 Our younger pupils have loved their ‘Supertato’ topic and were so excited to show their ‘Super Vegetables’ to the class and explain their superpowers.  They were all amazing so thankyou grown-ups for all your help! Highlights linked to ‘Supertato’ have been weighing vegetables (including some giant potatoes), measuring superheroes, squashing the army of playdough peas with mashers and capturing peas in Numicon using tweezers. Creating their own heroes to include in their story writing was another highlight while the children also loved their ramp investigation and predicting which surface the superhero car would travel the furthest on – carpet, wood or concrete. It’s been all about ‘George’s Marvellous Medicine’ in year 3 with the children thoroughly enjoying their experiments and designing explosion art including onomatopoeia inspired by Roy Lichstenstein. Year 4 have travelled back in time this week and thoroughly enjoyed learning about the Egyptians and the Bronze Age. Another highlight has been working outdoors, making willow fences and weaving baskets. In Year 5 and 6 this week, the highlight was writing poetry from the perspective of a refugee with awesome results. Such strong and emotive language choices were used throughout. They also enjoyed learning about the five pillars of Islam, while time telling skills have improved enormously.

**Clubs will resume after half term. You will be sent an online form next week to allow staff to prepare for numbers. Please complete the form by Thursday 17^th February.

 INSET DAYS and extra Bank Holiday 

Spring term INSET – Friday 8^th April

Summer Term INSETs – Friday June 24^th and Monday June 27^th

Bank holiday (Queen’s Jubilee) – Friday April 29^th

Dates for the diary

Tuesday March 1^st – St David’s Day (Children can wear Welsh costumes, colours or kits)

Thursday March 3^rd – World Book Day (Children can dress up as their favourite character)

Thursady March 10^th – Year 3 and 4 Techniquest trip

Thursday 10^th March and Thursday 17^th March – Year 5/6 Circus Eruption 

Friday 18^th March – Comic Relief (non-uniform day)

Fortnight beginning 28^th March – Teacher/ parent meetings (We are hopeful that these will be face to face)

(We will update you with any further dates regarding trips and events as soon as possible!)

As the outlook regarding COVID and schools looks far more positive, we would like to thank you again for your support in getting us to this point. We will update you with any post half-term changes next week!

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate in getting in touch!

Have a great weekend!

Mr Jamie Evans

Deputy Headteacher

Friday January 28th

It’s been another great week at Waunarlwydd Primary School with lots of learning and laughter. As always, it’s been a pleasure to witness the quality of learning and positive relationships provided by pupils and staff alike.

We would like to give our very best to the many staff and families that have been affected by COVID recently and we wish everyone a healthy return to school as soon as possible. As a school, we have faced a very challenging few weeks with regards to staffing levels and it is testament to the commitment of every member of staff, particularly our wonderful TAs, that we have been able to get through it, while keeping every class open. Lets hope for a more settled time as we move forward! With regards to current processes, in line with guidance, we will not be making any changes at present. We look forward to resuming our after school activities after half term.

As always, if you have any queries or concerns, please don’t hesitate in getting in touch with us!

Happy New Year – Tuesday 4th January 2022

Firstly, we’d like to wish you all a Happy New Year! We hope that all our families are well and were able to enjoy a happy and healthy Christmas. For any pupils or families that are experiencing illness, we wish you a speedy recovery. We are all looking forward to welcoming our wonderful children back to school on Thursday 6th January, with loads of very exciting plans in place!

With schools now placed on very high alert with regards to the Omicron variant, we have updated our risk assessments. No changes have been made regarding drop off and pick up times. However, we do ask that you support our whole school community effort by:

• wearing a face covering and keeping your distance when on site
• letting us know if your child is unwell
• checking this website regularly for warn / inform notices which may relate to your child’s class.

Like you, we want to retain face-to-face learning this term as far as it is possible to do so, and so ask you to help us by complying with these measures.

As always thanks for your ongoing support and, if you have any queries or concerns, don’t hesitate in getting in touch with us!

16 12 21 Letter to parents and carers FINAL

Thursday December 16th

As you may have seen in the media today, schools across Wales have been directed by the Minister for Education to put in place 2 planning days ( Tuesday January 4^th and Wednesday January 5^th) to assess staffing capacity and to put necessary measures in place to support the safe return of learners. This will result in pupils returning to school on Thursday 6th January. At this point we have no plans to reintroduce staggered start and finish times. Face coverings will need to be worn on school premises. As always, we will keep you informed of any further updates as we receive them. 

 As we come to the end of the Autumn term (one which has not been without challenges), a huge thankyou to all staff, families and most importantly our wonderful children, for helping to make the Autumn term at Waunarlwydd a success!

We wish you all a safe and very happy Christmas and New Year! 

Mr Jamie Evans (Deputy Headteacher)

Friday 10th December

What a week! Christmas has well and truly arrived at Waunarlwydd! The beginning of the week was full of epic dance moves at our Christmas Discos. A huge thanks to DJ Dan’s Disco for providing such wonderful entertainment. The parties continued in the classrooms with party food and lots of Christmas games. All the children have loved learning their Christmas songs and can’t wait to show you! There’s also been some really creative Christmas craft and Christmas themed learning during an incredibly busy but exciting week! The week ended with Christmas Jumper Day raising money for ‘Save the Children.’ A big thanks for all your donations. We’ll let you know how much we’ve raised next week!

What’s on next week

The biggest news for next week is the expected visit on Tuesday from a very, very special guest who will be visiting the children of Waunarlwydd during his busiest time of the year!

Non-uniform – We have seen some wonderful Christmas jumpers on show today. To make sure we get plenty of wear out of them, children will not be expected to wear uniform next week!

Reminders 

Friday 17th December is an INSET DAY so the children’s last day is Thursday 16th December.

Tuesday 4th January 2022 is an INSET DAY so children will return to school on Wednesday January 5th 2022.

Congratulations

A huge congratulations to Malky Mackay on his selection for Swansea Schoolboys Under 11s. Good luck for the season ahead Malky!

As always thanks for your ongoing support and, if you have any queries or concerns, don’t hesitate in getting in touch with us!

Have a great weekend!

Mr Jamie Evans (Deputy Headteacher)

Friday November 26th

Another great week in Waunarlwydd! Wednesday was a very exciting day in Nursery. They discovered giant footprints in the playground which led them to 2 frozen eggs. They experimented with lots of ways to melt the eggs and found 2 baby dinosaurs. The children loved making a cosy nest for them and are looking after them until they find out where they have come from. If anyone has any information, please let us know! This week in Reception, children have been learning all about time. They have enjoyed sequencing their day, talking about what we do at different times of the day, learning how to tell the time to o’clock and making our very own clocks which we can use at home. They also had fun exploring the ice that appeared at the bottom of our slide on a cold frosty morning, and watching it melt and turn back to water when we brought it into our classroom.  Miss Tyrrell’s class have enjoyed using super descriptive words to describe Herb and Meathook’s appearance and personality during their role on the wall session. They also loved learning about the different parts of a castle. Their wonderful creative skills were also demonstrated when using different 2D shapes to make a dragon independently. The smell of fresh bread could be found in Mrs Horseman and Mrs Tucker’s class this week. The children have thoroughly enjoyed making their own bread, just like the bakery in the Great fire of London. They have also written some fantastic diary entries and enjoyed making bonfires with sticks and leaves in outdoor learning. Christmas has been in the air in Mrs Evans and Mrs Thomas’ class this week and the children have started to learn their Christmas songs. You’re in for a treat! Other highlights include some awesome numeracy work using odd and even numbers and the creation of their own electrical circuits.

The highlight in Year 3 has been learning all about the local pirate wreckers on the Gower peninsula. The children loved using this as the stimulus for their Talk for Writing. Another big highpoint has been the huge progress all the children have made using column subtraction. Year 4 have thoroughly enjoyed creating their own giant reports to make top trump games. As the festive season approaches, they have loved learning their Christmas songs too, while in numeracy lessons they have started to learn division facts and methods to share. Great work! It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas in Year 5 and 6 with the children starting to learn their songs. Other highlights have included another great ‘Bouncing Back’ session with Action for Children and using their colour mixing skills to paint the sea on their sea scape work. They’ve also loved finishing off and typing up their flashback stories as well as circuit training in PE. A busy week all round!

December comes upon us next week and we are busy planning events to make the festive period as special as possible for the children of Waunarlwydd School. Children have begun practising their Christmas songs and are looking forward to sharing their videos with you. Party planning is underway and excitement is building nicely!