Fulbourn Primary School
Dare to Discover
Friday 18th June 2021
Our Learning This Week
A new era
As you will be aware from the Governor Bulletin today, at the end of the Autumn Term I will be embarking on a new learning adventure. This is a long while off and I am excited to be continuing to lead the school with Mrs McCaughran through its recovery from the impact of the pandemic. I am really looking forward to being able to see you all in person, reconnect, and share my plans for the future - both for the school, and personally.
Mrs Pickard
Parental controls
Unfortunately this week we have been made aware of children accessing some extremely inappropriate material at home while online. The following website offers excellent advice on how to set up parental controls for any electronic devices, home internet and Wifi that your children might access:
https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/online-safety/parental-controls/
To find out more about age restrictions and age appropriateness of apps, please refer to this website:
https://parentzone.org.uk/advice/parent-guides
We also recommend that monitoring your child’s search history if you think that they may have had unsupervised access to the internet would be a sensible step.
Mobile phones and smart watches
A polite reminder that only children who walk to and from school unaccompanied should bring mobile phones to school. These must be handed to class teachers who will keep them securely until the end of the day. Please can we also ask that children do not wear smart watches to school. We have been aware that children have been using smart watches to monitor messages whilst in school. As is the case for mobile phones, smart watches will need to be held securely by the class teacher if brought into school.
Year 5 Maths Challenge winners
Yesterday afternoon, Felicity, Neel, Jack and Luke took part in a Year 5 Cambridgeshire maths challenge heat. They worked brilliantly together and came joint first with two other schools! This means that they are automatically through to the final on 5th July - very exciting news indeed! Congratulations and good luck in the final!
School Car Park
Please remember that the school car park is not to be used by parents/carers at drop-off & pick-up times unless they have a disabled badge and are parking in the allocated disabled spaces. We also ask that no cars are parked across the entrance to the school car park as full access is always required.
Parent Forums
We held our first parent forums on Wednesday and it was great to be able to meet together in person. Our current Parent Forum members are Deepti Gurdasani, Dawn Stewart, Jade Pollock, Vicki Simons, Sarah Davies, Katie Morrish, Sian McKillop, Kim Howell, Sarah Boyd, Anila Joseph and Sarah Medley. The parent forums will meet on a regular basis and all parents and carers will be invited to share any discussion points they would like to raise in advance of the meetings. More details will follow.
Vacancies
We will shortly be advertising to recruit two lunchtime Play Leaders and a part time Child and Family Worker. Information will be posted on our website.
Coats
Last week’s newsletter mentioned sun hats and sun cream, today we have had some children who came to school without a coat. Please do send your child to school with a coat if the weather is cold or there is chance of rain.
Covid-19 symptoms and self-isolation
Can we remind families that if anyone in your immediate family (including any support bubble) shows one of the three Covid symptoms (loss/change to taste or smell, new, continuous cough or a high temperature), everyone is required to self-isolate and the symptomatic person must get an in-person PCR test (drive-in and walk-in centres give the quickest results). You must not use a rapid test (Lateral Flow Device) on anyone who is displaying symptoms. It would be most helpful if you could send us confirmation of the test result to the school office so we can update our records.
If a pupil develops symptoms in school, we will contact parents/guardians to come and immediately collect the pupil (plus any siblings). The symptomatic child must get an in-person PCR test and the family must self-isolate until confirmation of a negative test result or the period of isolation as advised by NHS track and trace has elapsed.
If your child tests positive for Covid, please email the School Office immediately (regardless of the time of the day/night or the day of the week/weekend. Please tell us your child’s name, the date that symptoms began, the date of the test and the date you received the result.
Community Covid Testing
We would like to strongly encourage all of our families (anyone 11 or older) to do regular rapid testing to monitor asymptomatic transmission of COVID-19. Test kits can be ordered online for free home delivery or can be picked up for free from a number of locations including the Village Pharmacy and Fulbourn Tesco. Community testing in Fulbourn is currently very low. Please remember that if you (or anyone in your household) has a new & continuous cough, loss/change to taste and/or smell or a high temperature, you must get an in person COVID test – rapid tests are only for those people not showing any symptoms.
School Uniform
Just a reminder that our school uniform supplier Big Fish is now offering free delivery of uniform to school on a fortnightly basis.
Username: Fulbourn
Password: PatchworkHorse
Last Order Date Delivery to school (approx)
20th June 23rd June
11th July 14th July
Notifying us of your child’s absence
For any student absence, can we ask that you fill in the student absence form on the school website. There is now a quick link button on the home page.
If you choose to email, the more information you can provide, the more helpful it is to the office team. Please do not use Seesaw or any other email address to report absence.
Free School Meals
The Cambridgeshire County Council has redesigned their online form for families wishing to check their free school meal (FSM) and Pupil Premium eligibility. Significant improvements made to the online application process enable parents/carers (in most cases) to get an instant result of the outcome of their application.
It is not necessary for parents of children who currently receive FSM to reapply; this entitlement is protected until the end of March 2022. However, applications do need to be made for younger siblings who are starting school.
The form is quick and simple to complete. Once an application has been submitted for a child, if the family do not qualify at that point, we will continue to check for future entitlement throughout that child’s school life, informing parents if they become eligible. It is vital, therefore, that schools/families inform us of any changes to their name or address.
Families can access the online application here. The Education Welfare Benefits Team are happy to answer any queries and can be contacted on 01223 703200 or ewb.fsm@cambridgeshire.gov.uk.
Fulbourn Community Aid
Fulbourn Community Aid are continuing to offer support during the pandemic. They can:
- Help with shopping
- Collect prescriptions
- Lend a friendly ear if you just need a chat
- Put you in contact with support organisations who can provide a hot meal or financial assistance
- Assist with other needs where they can
Contact them via:
- Phone: 01223 665 051
- Email: fulbourncommunityaid@gmail.com
- Facebook: Fulbourn Community Aid
- Or, find out more at their website:
PTfA Update
Upcoming events:
This Weekend - Open Gardens:
A handful of gardens will be opened (following Government guidelines) as part of this wonderful community event. Visitors are welcome to explore and enjoy some of the wonderful village.
Ways to support fundraising:
- The Fulbourn School Lottery is now up and running. To be in with a chance of winning a local prize, a £100 B&Q gift card or even the £25,000 jackpot, please visit: www.yourschoollottery.co.uk and search for ‘Fulbourn Primary’ to take part.
- Please select Fulbourn Primary PTfA as your charity when shopping online with EasyFundraising or Amazon Smile. A percentage of your spend comes directly to the PTfA and it can make a huge difference:
- Direct donations to the PTfA Justgiving Page
Athletics & Netball Summer Camps
Please find attached details of 2 camps being run by South Cambridgeshire District Council in late July.