Education

Education PRIMARY SCHOOL

PLAY SCHOOL NOTRE ECOLE PLAYGROUP LITTLE HANDS MVC VILLAGE COLLEGE U3A

EDUCATION

Melbourn Playgroup

Little Hands Karen 01763 260964

Melbourn Playgroup Claire Armstrong and Jennie Riggs 01763 223459 07842 151512

Notre Ecole Janet Whitton 261231

Primary School Headteacher Stephanie Wilcox 223457 U3A (Univ. of Third Age) Chairman Tony Garrick 01223 510201 Village College Principal Simon Holmes 223400 We were very excited to be able to offer our families the opportunity to come to playgroup with their child for two ‘Wild Together’ sessions. The sessions ran on two Saturdays in January and we were really pleased that 13 families attended.

Wild Together is all about supporting families in taking pre-school children out into their natural environment to be able to enhance their understanding of the wider world around them and develop the vocabulary they need to be able to talk about their experiences.

The first session took place on a chilly, foggy morning. The first activity was collecting natural treasures to fill an egg box museum. Next the children collected different leaves and had a go at identifying them using a simple chart. The children then used the leaves to make leaf lanterns which involved sticking leaves onto the outside of a glass jam jar which can then be hung up in the garden. The final activity was collecting sticks and putting them into a tin can to make bug hotels.

For the second session when the families arrived they were greeted by a camp fire, which was lovely as it was a very frosty morning. The first activity was making seed bombs, this was a little messy but great fun. To make a seed bomb the children mixed together half a cup of flour and one cup of soil then we added some seeds. Once it was all mixed up they made them into balls and put them in an egg box to keep until we are ready to put them out onto the ground, this will be after all the frosty mornings have stopped. The children then made kites out of a sheet of paper, string and a stick. Sadly it wasn’t very windy but with lots of running about we did get the kites to fly! The session finished by roasting a marshmallow over the camp fire and then making up our own stories using story cubes. Thank you to Heidi from PECT for running these session for us.

We are really looking forward to developing our outside at playgroup too

and we would like to say a big thank you to James at Shire Trees Ltd for our new tree. We are looking forward to seeing it grow and being able to watch the leaves change colour in Autumn.

Melbourn Primary School

Melbourn Primary School is a values-based school which means that we explicitly teach and promote core values to our children. A value is a principle or behaviour that we consider important in shaping the way that we live our lives. Our values were decided by the school community and can be found on our website https://www.melbournprimaryschool.org.uk/vision-values/.

At the time of writing, our value for the half term is kindness. Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, a 19th century poet and writer, said that, “kindness is the golden chain by which society is bound.” In our assemblies and classrooms, we have been considering what it means to be kind – the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate.

We have discussed how it is easy to be kind to our friends and family, but perhaps harder with people we don’t know so well. As part of this work, we have reflected on the story of The Good Samaritan and how this encourages us to be kind to everyone we meet regardless of their status, race or religion and without any hope of a reward. This can be a challenge in a modern-day context, where sadly the emphasis is often on ourselves.

If you were to spend any time in our school, I am confident that you would see and feel kindness pervading amongst the children and staff – it is stamped through us ‘stick of rock’ style! This was noticed by the inspector in our recent Ofsted inspection, who reported that, “this is a happy school where individuals are valued. Pupils are supported to be the best they can be. They are caring, kind and respectful to each other.” We were proud that our ethos and values were so tangible and we were once again identified as a ‘GOOD’ school.

We began the 2021-2022 school year with a whole school trip to Thetford Forest to celebrate being reunited as a school family, post ‘bubble’ school. We enjoyed a picnic together and groups of children took part in the Gruffalo trail, archery and even completed the Go Ape tree top challenge. We have also appreciated trips to places such as Colchester Castle and Flag Fen archaeology park. It is important to us to provide the children with the wider opportunities they missed during school closures.

We did not anticipate being stopped in our tracks in January 2022 whilst experiencing extremely high cases of COVID-19. Despite restrictions being lifted across the country, it proved to be a very challenging time for us with many of our staff ill and absent from school. Throughout this period, we were supported by kind and encouraging words from our parents.

The partnership we share with our families has illustrated the very essence of kindness and has proved to be one of the important golden chains that most definitely binds us together as a school community. Stephanie Wilcox (Headteacher, Melbourn Primary School)

Chris Thomas

Cambridge Carpet & Upholstery Cleaning

Carpet and upholstery cleaner based in Cambridge. Working in and around Cambridge, Royston, Saffron Walden, Newmarket and Huntingdon.

•Carpet cleaning using Dry Fusion™ system • Hot water extraction cleaning • Host® Dry Cleaning for natural floor coverings • Stain treatment • Upholstery cleaning using Crystal Fusion™ • Curtains cleaned in situ • • Infestation treatment Odour neutralisation using ozone generator

Competitively priced Fully insured with public and product liability Environmentally-friendly products used Mobile: 07830 227138 Landline: 01223 836002 email: christhomascleaning@gmail.com www.carpetcleaningcambridgeuk.com

Rather than ‘Happy New Year’, the start of 2022 was rather ‘more of the same’, due to the Omicron variant. Once again, our priority was to minimise the number of pupils who were missing school by keeping Coronavirus cases as low as possible. Over the first few days of term, our amazing team of community volunteers tested the whole school as we then grappled with the fastchanging government guidance on isolating and masks. Unfortunately, the removal of masks came too early for Cambridgeshire schools, who had been experiencing increasing numbers of cases since the start of term. At the time of writing, pupils are still wearing masks in communal areas, but we hope to be able to remove this requirement soon.

One of the saddest consequences of Coronavirus has been the amount of time and energy it has taken away from other projects at the school. Nonetheless, there are a number of exciting developments underway. Firstly, this term has been the first term where we have been able to make full use of the new Astro-turf, and what an amazing facility it is. It has been a long road to here, with lots of central Cam Academy Trust input and time to oversee the application, planning and building, but we are left with a fantastic pitch for the whole community, underlining the wider role of the village college.

Earlier this term all Year 7 pupils received a personal iPad for their use and are using them to support their learning in class. Initial reaction from both students and staff has been very positive with teachers enjoying trying out new ways of improving and enhancing the learning in their lessons.

Mrs Neville, maths teacher, remarked that “Using the iPads in maths meant I could get instant feedback on how well the pupils were understanding the lesson.”

Jack (Yr7) said: “I like the way that teachers put work on the apps because this makes it really easy to see. Having the iPads, I feel like I am much more independent with my learning.”

As we go forward, we are working closely with other Trust schools that also have iPads, sharing ideas and resources to the benefit of all. We already have plans to expand the scheme and hope it won’t be too long before every pupil at MVC can benefit from having an iPad.

The PE department wasted no time in organising sports fixtures this term. Our U16 football team put together a very strong run in the national English Schools Football Association (ESFA) Small Schools Trophy tournament. This included trips to Hastings and Hemel Hempstead; the latter was the site of a hardfought 5–4 victory, where the team repeatedly showed resilience in coming from behind to snatch victory against Laureate Academy. The U16 girls’ netball team have also been successful, including beating Comberton 24–2 in their first fixture of the season. All 15 pupils in the squad played with passion and determination.

We were also very proud of our Student Support Centre pupils, who were runners up in the Panathlon Challenge at Cambourne Village College on 21st January. After competing in a variety of adapted sports including Boccia, basketball, target practice, bowling and kurling, they came away with individual medals and a silver team trophy!

Extra-curricular clubs have also been back in full swing with lots of options such as table tennis, football, art, Minecraft, Warhammer, running club, basketball, show band, creative writing and electronics. Mr Barnes said “We are delighted that the Warhammer club has started! Pupils have been building and painting their characters, ready for the games to begin.” Thanks to the Warhammer shop in Cambridge who kindly donated the model kit.

One of the things that we are proud of at MVC is our support staff. Teachers often get most of the headlines, but we are very lucky that we have well-qualified support staff with excellent specialist knowledge. This term we have used this expertise in some of our Key Stage 4 Personal, Social, Health and Economics (PSHE) lessons, with contributions from both our Pastoral team and First Aiders, the latter running sessions on how to perform CPR.

At this time of year, thoughts start to turn to the Summer and beyond. Our Year 11 pupils will soon be moving on and have all completed their post-16 applications to local colleges and sixth forms. As well as A-Levels, they have been applying for apprenticeship opportunities in various sectors such as Law, Business, Finance, Engineering, Retail, Advertising, Construction and Hair & Beauty.

This Summer will also hopefully see the next stage of our school facilities improvement, the main focus of which will be an extended and redesigned Food and Nutrition classroom, to support the excellent work done in that area by Ms Giles and Mrs Teversham. We look forward to announcing subsequent developments in due course.

And finally, we have also been getting close to nature with the help of a local Owl Expert who lives near the college. He very kindly donated two owl boxes and helped to identify suitable locations to install them within the school grounds. Owls can often be heard from our site at night, and it is wonderful to be able to care for them with help from the local community.