Latest News | Bishops Waltham Infant School

End of our first week of the summer term

Fri 23 Apr 2021

Dear Parents and Carers

What a super first week back we have had. The sunshine was out and the children have been amazing at their learning. They have thoroughly enjoyed seeing all their friends and teachers in school and lots of excited chatter!

Please remember to fill in your 'Big Ask' survey with your children. They have lots of ideas about what they would like to happen and see in the world!

Happy St George's day today, to everybody celebrating. We have lots of exciting activities on our 'fun things to do' page, if you would like something to do this this weekend.

All the Year R and Year 2 children enjoyed their PE session with Active me 360 this week. They thoroughly enjoyed working in our school and said how lovely, friendly and polite all our children and staff are. We look forward to working with them for the summer term. Our dance Kidz and Football after school clubs started back too, with Rocksteady and Yoga starting back next week. It is nice to feel a little bit more normal!

With everybody exiting at the same time, our school is a very busy place. Please can you make sure that your children who attend school and younger children , are not on their bikes and scooters. Our school has always been a scooter and bike free zone at pick up and drop off time to avoid any accidents for the children and adults. Thank you for your cooperation.

Try to have a little peek in our bird box this weekend too-both birds have been busy flying in and out today, looking after their 8 eggs!

We hope you all have a lovely time in the sunshine this weekend!

Best wishes

Mrs Riches

2021 Schools' Bird Box Project

Fri 23 Apr 2021

Dear Parents/Carers,

We have eight eggs in our Blue Tit nest, the next 6 weeks are traditionally the busiest in the bird calendar so make sure you keep checking the Seenature website and our Blue Tit nest in case you miss out on anything.

Seenature have published their viewing figures for the week Monday 5th April to Monday 19th April, Bishops Waltham Infant School are 13th on the list with 237 visitors, thank you for logging on and getting our school onto the list.

1. Gateway Primary 646 visitors 2. Shakespeare Infant 475 visitors 3. Salford Primary 431 visitors 4. Castlehill Primary 414 visitors 5. Weston Shore Infant 381 visitors 6. Hart Plain Junior 351 visitors 7. Burwash Primary 331 visitors 8. Woodborough Primary 312 visitors 9. Roseacre Junior 280 visitors

10. St James Primary West End 268 visitors 11. Brompton / Westbrook Primary 264 visitors 12. St Paul's Nelson 245 visitors 13. Bishops Waltham Infant 237 visitors 14. Cecil Road Primary 235 visitors 15. Jubilee Primary 221 visitors 16. Eastry Primary 209 visitors 17. Bean Primary 207 visitors

18. Hillcroft Primary 179 visitors 19. Wilmington 177 visitors 20. Downderry Primary 174 visitors 20. Rodbourne Cheney Primary 174 visitors

Seenature website - New weekly website articles

Bird Box 2021 Week 6 - Building a nest

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/week-7-building-a-nest-2-2-2-2/

Garden Birds - The House Sparrow

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/the-house-sparrow-2-2-2/

Bird Food Recipes - Tasty Oat Crumble

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/may-week-4-tasty-oat-crumble-2-2-2/

Pupil Zone Week 6

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/pupil-zone-week-6-2-2-2/

Kind regards

School Office, Bishops Waltham Infant School

2021 Schools' Bird Box Project

Tue 20 Apr 2021

Dear Parents/Carers,

Our Blue Tit has been busy laying eggs, we can't wait to see the chicks start hatching.

Seenature have published their viewing figures for the week Monday 29th March to Monday 5th April 2021. Please help us get our visitor numbers up and visit the website: http://www.seenature.org.uk/schools/bishops-waltham-infant-school/

1. Cecil Road Primary 380 visitors 2. Salford Primary 333 visitors 3. Gateway Primary 332 visitors 4. Brompton Westbrook Primary 294 visitors

5. Castlehill 287 visitors 6. Shakespeare Infant 274 visitors 7. Wilmington Primary 243 visitors 8. Woodborough Primary 240 visitors

9. Burwash Primary 231 visitors 10. St James Primary West End 230 visitors 11. Hart Plain 225 visitors 12. Roseacre Junior 195 visitors

13.. Jubilee Primary 175 visitors 14. St Augustines CEP 167 visitors 15. Bean Primary 166 visitors

Seenature website - New weekly website articles

Bird Box 2021 Week 4 - Skeletons and Muscles

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/week-5-skeletons-and-muscles-2-2-2-2/

Garden Birds - The Starling

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/the-starling-2-2-2/

Bird Food Recipes - Peanut Butter Cakes

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/april-week-3-peanut-butter-cakes-2-2-2/

Pupil Zone Week 4

http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/pupil-zone-week-4-2-2-2/

Kind regards

School Office, Bishops Waltham Infant School

FREE BOOKS FROM USBORNE

Mon 19 Apr 2021 Miss Salter

Thank you to all who placed orders through our Year R parent Laura Gailis at The Rainbow Book Corner. These orders enabled us to receive a generous collection of Usborne books for free. The children will love having the opportunity to read this excellent selection.
You can find Laura on Facebook and Instagram if you search for The Rainbow Book Corner. Alternatively you can follow this link. The Rainbow Book Corner

Welcome Back and Important changes to school times-Please read

Mon 19 Apr 2021

Welcome back to school everybody. I hope you all had a lovely break and managed to get out and about in the sunshine last week. The children are all happy and excited to be back and were keen to get going with their new learning projects today.

With the relaxing of restrictions in England, we have looked at how we can reflect this in our school drop off and pick up times. From Tuesday 20th April, these will be as follows for ALL CHILDREN.

Gates will be open 8.45-9am for dropping off

Gates will be open from 3pm-3.10pm for picking up

Our one way system will still be in place. Both the little blue gate at the front and the gate by the pool will be for entry only.

Children in Year R and Year 1 will exit through the car park. Please note there will be no traffic permitted to move in the car park during these times, including staff, parents and carers using the disabled bays, unless there is an emergency. Traffic will be permitted to move outside of these times only, this is for everybody's safety.

Year R and Year 1 children will exit through the car park. Year 2 will exit down the ramp.

Face masks are still to be worn. We will assess the need for this as more restrictions are lifted over the coming weeks. We are still one parent per family group on site.

Please try to keep the flow of dropping off keep moving as quickly as possible by using email and telephone to let teachers know any information you would like them to know, not at the class door. They will respond as quickly as they can when they aren't teaching. Staggering drop offs and pickups during these times will also help, instead of arriving and queuing. We thank you in advance for your cooperation in helping to keep our school as safe as it can be.

Parent/Teacher meetings are also happening via zoom this week and next. Please sign up for a time, if you haven't already done so. All emails and links have been sent out in the same way that we did in November.

Please look for a separate email that we will be sending out called 'The Big Ask' this week. It is the biggest survey of it's kind to understand and collate children's opinions and views. Teachers will be talking to the children too, and they will need to be completed at home. We will also put all the information on our 'Parent Information' Page.

With the warmer weather upon us, please remember to put sunscreen on and bring hats and water bottles. Long hair (for girls and boys) need to be tied back and large hair bows/cat ears etc need to be worn at home and not school. Trainers/sandals/school shoes can be worn, but please remember socks (one of the worst injuries I have ever seen in school was when I first started teaching and a child tripped in sandals with no socks).

Please also remember our voluntary one way system when dropping off and picking up in cars and park considerately on the estate. Hoe Road car park is an excellent place to Park and Stride and will save you driving onto the estate to try to find a space (if you are anything like me and hate parallel parking!). It is only 5 minutes away and will help to alleviate traffic congestion. Parking on our yellow zigzags is strictly forbidden and you will be asked to move along. Cars who park on here will have their number plates reported to the police, as the zigzags are there to provide safety for children crossing the busy roads to us and the juniors.

We are looking forward to opening our library back up this week. For the first few weeks we will be using it with our teaching staff, then hopefully (fingers crossed) we will be able to welcome back parent helpers. We are still being flexible in our approach and will use government guidance to steer our way.

It is lovely to be back!

Best wishes

Mrs Riches

Headteacher

We wish you a Happy Easter

Thu 01 Apr 2021

Dear Parents and Carers

Our newsletter is being published today and will be emailed to you, along with all the information for the extra curricular clubs that will be starting back after Easter in our outside area. Please don't forget to sign up for our Parent/Teacher meetings, starting in the first week back.

Our birdbox is also getting a little visitor to watch, so have a look on the live feed at how their nest building is going!

Thank you to our PTA who have been selling Easter treats over the last two weeks. They will be situated in the car park after school today for the year 1 parents. Every penny really helps fund the treats for the children in school and we are very grateful to all the volunteers who give p their free time to help out.

The Easter bunny has been visiting our school this afternoon and the children all have an Easter treat to take home. Some children even think they saw him (descriptions have been varied, to say the least!).

Well done to all our Year R gardeners this week, who did a smashing job of weeding and planting! I have loved seeing Year 1's amazing recipe books-full of super ideas. Year 2 have also wowed me with their information foldouts of Lord Nelson and his life! What a talented, creative bunch of learners and teachers we have at BWIS!

We had a little bit of good news from Hampshire County Council this week. All the old toilet areas in the older part of the school are being refurbished in the summer break (including Lilypads). We are very excited and cannot wait until September to see the finished areas!

On this note, I will say goodbye and behalf of all the staff say thank you again for your support and understanding of the all the staff in our school during this last term. We have appreciated your hard work in helping your children through the time when school was not open to all, despite the many challenges you faced at home juggling your own work and families. Hopefully our cautious road to recovery will serve us well and we are able to maintain our 'getting back to normal' path.

Best wishes and take care

Mrs Riches

Headteacher

New School Menus

Thu 01 Apr 2021

The new school menu will run from April till October.

Children with special dietary menus will have been sent these separately.

2021 Schools' Bird Box Project

Thu 01 Apr 2021

Dear Parents/Carers,

Seenature have shared their top website views (see below), help us to get our school into the top 15 by visiting the website www.seenature.org.uk and click on live streams.

The Blue Tit is still busy bringing in nesting materials, Seenature have said that this activity will increase over the next 10-14 days.

School website visits - Sunday 21st March - Sunday 28th March 2021

1. Roseacre Junior 422 visits 2. Woodborough Primary 341 visits 3.Shakespeare Infant 277 visits 4. Castlehill Primary 233 visits 5.Brompton/Westbrook Primary 225 visits 6. St James Primary West End 200 visits 7.Eastry Primary 184 visits 8. Cecil Road Primary 178 visits 8.Jubilee Primary 178 views 10. Downderry Primary 172 visits 11. Hillcroft Primary 170 visits 12. Burwash Primary 156 visits 13. Hart Plain Junior 140 visits 14. St Augustine's - West Sussex 120 visits 15. Weston Shore Infant 114 visits

Articles are published on the Seenature website each week. Please visit the website to see what's new.

Bird Box 2021 Week 3 - Looking out for birds this spring!
http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/week-4-looking-out-for-birds-this-spring-2-2-2-2/
Garden Birds - The Blue Tit
http://www.seenature.org.uk/see-nature-news/the-blue-tit-2-2-2/
Mealworm Pudding - To be published on Wednesday 31st March 2021
Pupil Zone Week 3 - To be published on Wednesday 31st March 2021

Kind regards

School Office, Bishops Waltham Infant School