Latest News | Bishops Waltham Infant School

Standards at BWIS

Wed 19 Jul 2023

We are extremely pleased to share our super results with you this year, from our Year R (Good Level of Development -GLD), to Year 1 (Phonics) and Year 2 (SATs).

Across all areas we attained higher than our local authority, Hampshire and National.

We have sustained these high levels for many years now, which is an outstanding achievement. We are sending out our annual standards letter today, and if you would like to see the graphs of the comparisons, please visit our standards page here:

Standards at BWIS

We have looked at the many reasons that impact our children and the time they spend with us. Our children start at different start points and for some children their progress journey is far more important. We also believe that children's personal development and their behaviour and attitude contribute greatly to their success, happiness and wellbeing and we are building the foundations for long after they leave us.

Below, are just some of the reasons the staff have come up with that have contributed to our children's success and wellbeing this year;

Clear, strong leadership consistently driving our school forward, recognised by Hampshire in our annual LLP (Learning Leadership Partner) visit. Our Senior Leadership Team is Mrs Riches, Mrs Charles, Mrs Campone and Miss Turner
Dedicated, Caring, highly skilled staff who work as a team-Teachers and Learning Support Assistants work harmoniously to teach all children. Learning is adapted, modified and extended according to our learner’s needs
An ‘Integrated Curriculum’, designed to enthuse and excite our learners, building on prior learning.
Clear ‘Learning Values’ that underpin our learning.
Excellent Continued Professional development for all staff
Strong leadership within Year Teams. Our Year leaders are: Miss Apsey, Mrs Moth and Miss Turner
Our approach to learning during lockdown, giving our very young learners daily lessons with their teachers and an excellent curriculum to help learning at home.
Rigorous assessment processes that impact our teaching-reviewing and modifying where needed.
Ensuring our learning is embedded and prior skills and knowledge are reviewed, revisited many times
Excellent relationships between staff, pupils and parents, where we work together.
SEND children and parents are supported by our highly skilled SENDCO. Mrs Campone
An embedded school ethos that permeates our school, through our BADGER values
Governors that support and challenge the school.
Parents playing a very active part in their children’s learning, supporting learning outcomes and reading.
Our new reading raffle initiative
Our strong phonics teaching by ALL staff (Teachers and Learning Support Assistants)
Our children are taught to be confident, independent learners who take risks and enjoy solving problems.
Our planned first-hand experiences – using the local environment, school grounds, trips and outdoors wherever possible.
Excellent remote learning opportunities when in lockdown, particularly during 2021
An extremely dedicated staff who want the very best for all children - supporting a child who needs more help, and extending children who are able learners.
All children feeling valued with celebration systems for achievement in all curriculum areas embedded
Ensuring there are no barriers to learning-pupil premium funding spent strategically to enable all learners to achieve their best.
‘Closing the gap’. Close monitoring and individualised learning ensure no child gets ‘left behind’; ‘Keeping up’ as opposed to ‘catching up’.
Focused targeting and support. Children understand how to make their learning better and what their ‘next steps’ need to be to succeed.
Our Sporting Curriculum-children love working as a team. Sportsmanship, resilience, behaviour are just some of the benefits of our children playing team games at a young age.
Clubs! Both lunchtime ones run by staff and our wide range of ‘After School’ and ‘Morning’ clubs, enabling children to achieve in a non-academic activity, boosting self esteem.
Being part of our community- taking part in community events, learning how to be citizens of Bishops Waltham.
Happy learners! Our behaviour systems work. Unacceptable behaviour, including bullying, will not be tolerated and is dealt with swiftly and effectively. Children feel safe and secure and trust that we would not let harm come to them.
Children and staff wellbeing a priority across our school
Our Trickbox programme teach children how to be calm, creative, communicate and be confident
Our office team, lunch team and site team all form part of our staff jigsaw puzzle, enabling everybody to work effectively
Secure transition programs at this busy time of year-so children are ready for their next class or school.
A PTA that tirelessly fundraised for us to have extra resources to make our learning even better

It is a long list, and I am aware that some of the points have remained on our list for a few years. I am very proud of our school, and the sustained approach to striving for the very best for our children our whole team shares. I thank our whole community; staff, parents and governors for everybody's contributions this year. Well done to you all!

Kind regards

Mrs Riches

Hampshire 'Back to Basics' Family Wellbeing

Wed 19 Jul 2023

Hampshire has launched a new resource to help parents support their children's wellbeing. Today, we will be sending home the 'Tips and Ideas' sheet to support at home during the summer break. On the back is a Family Plan that you can fill in with your children and put up on your fridge/noticeboards as a reminder.

HAMPSHIRE BACK TO BASICS

BWIS HEALTHY HEART, HEALTHY MIND PAGE

Parental Survey

Tue 18 Jul 2023

Dear Parents and Carers

Please see emails for a link to our BWIS Parental Survey this year. If you cannot find it in your email the link is also here:

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/936H9TL

We would also appreciate you filling in the OFSTED Parent View questionnaire too. You will see that some of the questions are similar, but there is more explanation on ours. Any prospective parent can view this questionnaire if there are enough responses on it. Please log in to comment on this here:

https://parentview.ofsted.gov.uk/

We thank you for the positive comments on the reports-the children are a credit to all of you. They are polite, caring and love to learn. the whole school team enjoy teaching them. We have lots of positive comments from all visitors and helpers in comments about how lovely the children are, and our caring ethos permeates the whole school.

Please do take the time to celebrate with us. We also welcome future ideas to continue our ongoing momentum of providing a lovely place where children can learn.

Kind regards

Mrs Riches

Hanging Basket Competition

Mon 17 Jul 2023

Dear Parents/Carers,

This year we took part in Bishops Waltham hanging basket competition, well done to Hedgehog Class who won a 'Highly Commended' award.

Kind regards

School Office

Weekly Update Friday 14th July

Fri 14 Jul 2023

We have one week to go until the end of our school year. This week we had a lovely Open Afternoon for all our children, where their Records of Achievement were given out. We have had some lovely comments from parents and children about their learning this year and they have been fantastic learners.

For our Year 2 children, this time is very special, exciting and worrying all at the same time. We can see how excited they are, and they are like bottles of pop in school. They cannot wait to share their leaver's performance with their parents and carers next Wednesday afternoon, then come back for their Leavers' Disco in the evening.

Year 1 have made the most amazing display of their Lighthouse home learning. If you haven't seen them yet, please come in and have a look!

We have all been invited to look around the new fire station in Bishops Waltham, where our fantastic art work is hanging up. Year R went this week and had a good look around-they loved the gym and the locker room, but said the best bit was using the hose to put the fire out!

This week we invited an adviser from Hampshire to look at safeguarding in our school, and our procedures for keeping children safe. He talked to staff and children and was really pleased that our safeguarding culture was so strong. Staff are vigilant and children know who to talk to and feel safe in school. As always we are always open to suggestions on how we can be better, and there were some good tips for us to action.

We are recruiting for new governors in the new year. There are a few slots to fill, including parent positions. If you know of anyone not connected to the school, or are a parent at our school and would like to join, please look out for our advert in September.

We hope everybody has a restful weekend.

Best Wishes

Mrs Riches

Weekly Update Friday 30th June

Fri 30 Jun 2023

We had our last ‘Stay and Play Sessions this week for our new Year R children. Our current Year R children had a lovely time showing the new children all the things they could do and play with. We are really looking forward to seeing them next Thursday on Transition morning.

Our Year 2 children have started visiting the junior school in small groups and we welcomed the Year 3 teachers to our school this week. They were very impressed by our children’s brilliant learning in DT and are also looking forward to transition morning.

Mrs Moth and Miss Beckley have been proudly displaying Year 1’s lighthouse home learning on the ramp display area. They look amazing- what talented, creative Year 1 children we have.

I am in the middle of reading everybody’s ‘Records of Achievement’ and could not be more proud of all our children this year. They are all trying their very best, and love learning. My favourite part of being a headteacher is celebrating our children’s successes. The Records of Achievement will be given out during our open afternoon and really are a special record of your child’s learning for the whole year.

Wishing everybody a lovely weekend. Our gardens needed the rain today, but hopefully the sunshine will be back soon!

Best wishes

Mrs Riches

Bereavement support for families and children

Thu 29 Jun 2023

Dear Parents and Carers

We have created a page on our wellbeing page with a link to bereavement support organisations in Hampshire. Losing a close loved one can be very confusing for young children. At BWIS we give personalised support to families who reach out to us, often with some of the organisations listed. Sometimes, having somebody to talk to through the weeks and months ahead can help.

Often, we don't talk about bereavement and grief. My mum died last year, very soon after a cancer diagnosis. Only now do I feel able to share this. With bereavement counselling and the care of my family and friends I eventually felt able to return to the challenging role of leading a school.

The page is a growing list and we hope it can be of help to families in our BWIS community.

Bereavement and Care

Best wishes

Mrs Riches

Family First

Mon 26 Jun 2023

Please find a link to a bi annual magazine aimed at parents with children under 16. Family First Magazine is a bi-annual magazine specifically designed to improve the health of over 6,000,000 families across England, Wales & Scotland. The link below contains lots of information for parents

Family First

Industrial Action

Mon 26 Jun 2023

Dear Parents and Carers

You may have seen on the news that the NEU have called for 2 further days of industrial action in July.

As always, the teachers have kindly given notice of their intention in advance, as we know how many parents are affected regarding childcare.

The teachers are not taking part in the industrial action planned in July and school will be open to all (normal school days).

Kind regards

Mrs Riches

Weekly Update Friday 23rd June

Fri 23 Jun 2023

What another lovely week we have had at school.

The Year 2 children have been busy designing their pirate puppets and learning their parts for the Leavers’ Assembly. Year 1 were doing some tricky maths this week, and were amazing their teachers with their number facts and Year R have been introducing all the new September entrants to our school in the ‘Stay and Play’ sessions.

We also had our annual visit from our Hampshire Learning Leadership Partner.(LLP). He spent a day at our school observing phonics with our Phonics leaders, meeting with our Senior Leadership Team, looking at standards and attainment for all children and discussing attendance and safeguarding. He also met with children to talk about their learning, and fed back to Mr Cleminson our Chair of Governors.

He was very impressed with all aspects of our school. Our phonic teaching was excellent, and we know our children really well. Our leadership and management is very strong and we all work together really well as a team, with strong processes in school. He was also really impressed with our children, our curriculum and learning, and our whole school values and ethos.

The visit was a real lift for all our staff. Report writing and the end of the year is a really busy time for us, and having an expert recognise how special our school is, is really lovely for everybody to hear. Everybody cares a lot for the children and each other at BWIS, with lots of happy children and laughter, and it really is a special place to learn. I would like to say thank you to all our staff and children to celebrate their achievements for the year. Well done to everybody!

Our last school trip for the year took place today, and there were very tired, but excited, children talking about all the creatures they found on the beach today. Thank you again to all the parents who helped on all our trips and with Year 2 swimming- we are very grateful to be able to run these so successfully with your help.

On that note, wehope you all have a lovely weekend. It really does feel like summer has arrived!

Best wishes

Mrs Riches