A short and sweet half-term but nonetheless, a lot crammed in! We hope you enjoy reading the updates below. Please also note the dates for the Eisteddfod,  World Book Day and Parent Consultation Meetings coming up.

Return to School

Children return after the half-term break on Monday 19th January.

As a reminder, our remaining staff training day dates can be found here.

Attendance and Punctuality

Our current Whole School Attendance is 93.0%. Our Target for the end of the year is to be at 93.5%

The graph below shows each class’ attendance since September…

Arriving at school on time is also really important. Children who arrive late at school typically miss the beginning of our literacy sessions where we usually start with group reading. Where children regularly miss these sessions, it can hinder their progress. In addition to this, children who arrive late for school often become worried or flustered as they walk in late in front of their peers and then try to catch up on the instructions already provided by the teacher.

If you regularly struggle to get your child to school on time, you may want to consider enrolling your child in our breakfast club. 

Appointment of second Deputy Headteacher

As you will know Mrs Hollings, our previous Deputy Headteacher, retired at the end of the summer term. Governors carried out a recruitment process during the last half-term and Mrs Hill was appointed as the new Deputy Headteacher. She will work alongside the other deputy headteacher, Mr Jones. For a school of our size, it is typical to have two deputy headteachers rather than one. Mrs Hill is looking forward to starting her new role after half-term and looks forward to helping children and parents in whatever ways she can.

Pupil Learning Review Meetings for Parents

We’d like to invite parents to make a 10-minute appointment to meet with their child’s teacher after school on either Tuesday 5th or Wednesday 6th March.

Parents of children in our Nursery will also be able to make an appointment to meet with Mrs Howells during the day on Wednesday 6th or after school on Tuesday 5th and Wednesday 6th. 

We will send out an online booking form next week for parents to book their appointment slot but we wanted to share the dates with you ahead of that.

Safer Internet Day

On Tuesday 6th February, we joined schools and organisations across the world to mark ‘Safer Internet Day’. The internet is an amazing resource, particularly for learning, however, it’s so important that we teach children to use it safely. The Department of Technology took assemblies in the school to remind us how to say safe online. We use a simple acronym – S.M.A.R.T – in school which reminds us of simple steps we can take to stay safe online.

Over the past few years, the number of e-safety incidents that we see affecting our children has increased significantly. These incidents are mostly where children have said nasty things to each other or in large Whatsapp groups or Snapchat groups in the evenings and then they come to school upset the following day. We’ve had a few incidents where children have shared their Social Media password with others, who have then logged into their account and caused issues. There have also been multiple occasions where other children have set up online profiles posing as another child. On a few occasions, incidents have involved children sending images of themselves to others or even arranging to meet strangers. I cannot emphasise enough the importance of knowing what your child does online. If you need further help and advice with this, you can visit our e-safety page or come in and chat with Miss Shepherd or one of our staff who can tell you some of the most obvious things to check and put in place.

PTA Pancakes

We’re so grateful to the PTA who organised and served pancakes to all pupils on the last day of term. There were a range of different toppings and a lot of happy children! Thank you so much to all members of the PTA who came in to help us serve the pancakes to our children.
The PTA are currently fundraising for playground games/equipment for our children and also a new set of iPads.

If you’re willing to join the PTA, we’d love to welcome you to the team – we usually meet on the second Thursday of each half-term, straight after school in the infant hall. Childcare is provided.

Coming up…

The PTA will be organising a whole-school Easter Egg hunt towards the end of this term and also a disco for Reception, Years 1&2, 3&4 and 5&6. More information will follow this term.

Local Councillors Visit

It was great to welcome Cllr. Davies and Cllr. Spencer in one afternoon this term. Children invited them in to ask them lots of questions about Newport Council. We talked about how councillors are elected, the jobs that councillors do, the different wards around Newport, democracy, developments happening in Newport and where the council gets its money from. The children had lots of good questions to ask as well as telling the councillors what they would do to improve Newport and our area.

Knitting Club

We have a range of after-school clubs that children can join. One club which is a new one for us is knitting club. It started this term and the children (and staff!) who attend have absolutely loved learning how to make things out of wool! We’re so grateful to Mrs Hall who comes in each week to teach us and share her knitting skills!

Parent Governor Election Outcome

We are so grateful to all the parents who very kindly put themselves forward to stand as a parent governors. Each of the candidates wrote great statements which really demonstrated how much they care for our school and community. Following the election, we are pleased to welcome Mrs Davies and Mrs Lawrence as our new governors.

Football Team Update

The school football team are on a winning streak! They recently won an away game against Jubilee Park Primary and a home game against St Andrews Primary. We’re so proud of all the children who represent the school on one of our sports teams.

For some time, children on our football team have been trying to negotiate a round of chicken nuggets from Mr Mansfield if they win a game – they regularly chant ‘chicken nuggies’ on the minibus on our way to away games. True to his word, Mr Mansfield treated the boys to a plate of chicken nuggets during our star pupil assembly last Friday following their Jubilee Park win.

Holocaust Memorial Service

Mr Jones and Miss Vers took some year 6 children to represent our school at the Newport Holocaust Memorial Service.

Air Quality in St Julians

The Eco Council have been working with the Air Quality Management team from Newport Council, taking part in an initiative to monitor the Air Quality around the site. An Air Quality Device is left on the site for a period and then sealed and sent for analysis regularly to provide us with information about air quality. We will report back to you with our findings!

Pupil Learning Passports

You will have received a message from Miss Welsh via your class Dojo feed this week, about our Pupil Learning Passports. At St Julian’s Primary, we create a ‘Pupil Learning Passport’ for each child. These passports, along with our ‘Pupil Learning Review’ meetings, help school staff know about the needs and interests of every child, which helps us make sure we provide the best support possible. At present, these passports capture teacher and pupil input but we’ve been working out the best way to also capture parents’ comments and views for these profiles. You will have received a link on Dojo for parents to contribute their ideas to the Pupil Passport.

Eisteddfod

It’s a highlight for us every year, our Annual Eisteddfod to celebrate St. David’s Day! On 1st March, we will hold 2 Eisteddfods – one for older children in the junior hall lasting most of the day, and a mini-Eisteddfod for younger children starting at 1pm.

For those of you wondering what an Eisteddfod is – it’s a day of celebration for all things Welsh. Children enter a variety of competitions – some in the lead up to the day and some on the day itself. The competitions include singing, dancing, musical instruments, poetry recitation, as well as handwriting, story writing, design and technology, art and poetry.

The larger Eisteddfod will be streamed to parents, so you can join us throughout the day to celebrate with us.

Children in the Foundation Phase (Reception to Year 2) will work on their entries in school. Some competitions junior children can work on at home are:

Design and Technology – 

• Year 3 – A dragon with moving parts
• Year 4 – A castle with moving parts
• Year 5 – A working coal mineshaft
• Year 6 – A model of the Newport Transporter Bridge

Practise Singing – (click the link to hear the audio)

• Year 3 and 4 children should practise singing ‘Sosban Fach’ – click here to listen to it
• Year 5 and 6 children should practise singing ‘Calon Lan’ – click here to listen to it

Practise Poetry Recitation – (click the link to hear the audio)

• Year 3 – Ble wyt ti’n byw?
• Year 4 – Dau Gi Bach
• Year 5 – Dw i’n hapus!
• Year 6 – Yn Y Parc

Children will be invited to perform to one of the teachers ahead of the day and the teachers will then ask the finalists to perform on stage on the day.

Practise their musical instrument – 

• Children can play a song or tune of their choice. One of the teachers will listen to them play ahead of the Eisteddfod and the finalists will be asked to perform on the day.

World Book Day

Reminder that World Book Day is on Thursday 7th March. Children can dress as their favourite book character for the day and we will enjoy reading stories to each other during the afternoon.

Updates from Each Year Group