Newsletter 14th July

Flourishing
What a rainy day! The children have been stuck indoors all day but the school has, nonetheless, been full of joyful noise. Both Year Two and the pre-school children have treated me to a show today and, right now, I am listening to beautiful singing from the hall where children from Moretonhampstead and North Tawton have joined our Year Fours and Fives for a singing workshop in preparation for the Whiddon Music Festival in September. Children from Year Three and Four travelled with Mr Frewin to Okehampton to play in a football tournament this week and, I am told, a good time was had by all. The children performed well, enmjoyed thier football and were great representatives for our school. With music and shows and performcances and chilren off in France sporting events all around I feel comfort in knowing that this school is fulfilling it's promise to care for the whole child. I hope you agree.

Staffing changes
Last week, I told you about changes to class teachers for next year. I promised then to let you know about some other staffing changes that affect support staff. We hope to be welocming some new members of staff to join the team next term under Emma Goodwin's leadership.

Elaine Lawson
Elaine has been our admin at Chagfrod since I started here as head. She has been my greatest support and without her I don't think I could have done the job. I am thankful for her every single day and I know many members of our school community feel the same. Elaine has been asked to move across and work at Okehampton Primary from September. This is a real loss for our school and we are very sorry to see her go.

Christine Ramoutar
Christine joined us at Chagford two years ago. It is no exaggeration to say that she has transformed the school experience of many children since she has been here and that there are children attending school confidently today who, but for Christine's work, may well have become school refusers. She is something of a miracel worker. Christine has been asked to take on a similar role at Okehampton Primary. There is great need at Okehampton Primary and I know that she will be a key part of the team there . We will miss Christine from our team very much indeed.

Dani Rout
Dani has worked with Tina in our Early Years Unit for nine years - longer than the vast majority of children in our school have been alive! Every child who has passed through our unit in the last nine years has been through her hands - that's an impact on an awful lot of children! Dani has decided to step away from her role at the school to make time for other commitments. In all my time at this school I have never heard anyone have a bad word to say about Dani - she is kindness, patience and humour personified. She will be very much missed.

Claire-Shauna Saunders
Claire has been away from work for a while now dealing wiht her health. It is sad to accept that she won't be returning but we trust that she has made the right choice for her health and for her wellbeing. Claire may not be so well known to most parents as the anmes above as she has mostly worked one to one with children who needed a lot of extra support. The families whose children were cared for by Claire know what a difference she made.

Our school is so much a community that the loss of any member is felt deeply. We feel very sad to be saying goodbye to Elaine, Christine, Dani and Claire even though we know that each of them will be moving on to an important new step of their journeys. It has been pointed out to me that my message about last week did not explicitly state that Ms Simpson and Miss Pollard will  also be leaving Chagford Primary for pastures new at the end of the year. Again these are absolutely beloved members of the team and we are so sorry to be saying goodbye even though we are excited for their next steps in the professional journeys. I shall be making a proper fuss of them in next week's newsletter!

Year One and Two River Walk
Children from Year One and Two took a walk down the River Teign together. I have rarely seen such a set of such shining eyes as I saw on their return from the trip. Thanks to Mrs Lloyd and to Mrs Robertson for organising this and, especially, to the parents who came along to walk with us and help supervise.

Thanks to Zoe and all the PTFA for the Summer Fayre - everyone had a great time and I know a good amount of money was raised for the PTFA. The PTFA have such a great team - we are so very grateful for all the hard work they do and for the smiles with which it is always done.

Year Six Residential
Since Tuesday, our Year Sixes have been in Normandy on residential with children from right across the Dartmoor Multi Academy Trust. This project has been fully funded by the Turing Scheme so that no child has had to pay an penny for the experience.
The children have been staying in a beautiful chateau in the countryside, they have visited the D-Day landing beaches and the WW1 cemeteries, they have visited Mont St Michel, a French resteraunt, and much more.
We are looking forward to welcoming them all back on Monday ands hearing all their stories. In the meantime, we have been keeping up with their activities by looking at the blog which you can find here.
This trip has been organised by Mrs Underwood and Mrs Jordan - massive thanks to them for all their hard work and for giving our children this amazing experience.

Sarah McIntyre and Philip Reeve
We were lucky enough to have a visit from our Patron of Reading, Sarah McIntyre, and her co-author Philip Reeve this week. They worked on a HUGE mural with the children and gave us very entertaining assemblies. THANK YOU!!
This was Sarah's third visit to the school. These visits have been funded by the Chagword Literary Festival and we are very grateful indeed! This time they focussed on thier charming and very popular AdventureMice series so we drew lots and lots of Mermice. 
Between them, Sarah and Philip have written and illustrated a staggering number of books for children and young people from toddlers to young adults. AT the end of the day they signed and dedicated books so a lot of children went of very proudly. We love to build that sense of pride and ownership in children's reading.

Dates for Your Diary

Sports Day - Wednesday 19th July
Key Stage One - parents and carers welcome to enter the school grounds through the top bus gate from 9:00 a.m.
Key Stage Two - parents and carers welcome to enter the school grounds through the top bus gate from 1:30 p.m.

Leavers Service - Thursday 20th July
Two p.m. in the Church of St Michael the Archangel

Term Dates for 2023 - 24
​Full dates for next school year have been published on the school website. You can find them here.