Happy New Year! Please see the newsletter below to find out what we'll be learning about this term.

December has been a wonderfully rich and creative month in school, filled with exciting learning experiences across the curriculum as we headed towards the festive season.

In English, the children enjoyed studying the much-loved story The Mousehole Cat. We focused on using adverbs to add detail and bring actions to life, as well as learning how to organise our writing clearly using paragraphs. The children impressed us with how they applied these skills to their own pieces of writing, showing growing confidence and creativity. We made a strong link with Design and Technology, where pupils designed and created beautiful lanterns, inspired by those in The Mousehole Cat. These lanterns were proudly displayed during our end-of-term Christingle service, creating a warm and magical atmosphere that everyone enjoyed.

In Art, we explored the technique of collage, experimenting with a range of different materials and mediums. As part of this learning, we took a brief look at the work of artist Hannah Höch, discussing her use of collage and how artists can combine materials to create meaning and interest.

During PE, children consolidated and refined their gymnastics skills, exploring different ways of moving on and off apparatus. They practiced linking movements smoothly, both independently and with a partner, demonstrating teamwork, balance, and control.

In RE, we learned about the Holy Trinity and its significance for Christians, particularly in relation to baptism. Thoughtful discussions helped deepen understanding of this important belief.

Our French lessons focused on speaking about activities using the verb "Je peux", building confidence in simple conversational language.

Finally, in Science and Geography, we explored rocks and volcanoes, learning how rocks are formed and how the movement of the Earth's tectonic plates can affect human life. It has been a fantastic end to the term, and we are very proud of all the children's hard work and enthusiasm.

Children from Duloe can be seen performing one of their songs from the Christmas production at 15 minutes and 55 seconds, followed by a flute solo from Bryher. Our thanks go to Sally Butlin for supporting the children with their music, and to Reverend Richard for inviting the children to take part.

As we come to the end of the autumn term, we would like to take a moment to reflect on what a truly special few months it has been for our Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 children.

It has been a joy to welcome so many new faces into our school community. The children have settled beautifully into our way of life and it has been lovely to see them grow in confidence day by day. Across all three year groups, the children have demonstrated our school values through their kindness, respect and resilience, alongside a real curiosity, love of learning and enthusiasm for everything they do. They have shown great bravery in taking risks, trying new things and challenging themselves, and as a result have made wonderful progress both socially and academically.

This week has yet again been a very busy one, filled with festive cheer. From decorating amazing crowns ready for our Christmas dinner, to enjoying a special assembly led by Reverend Richard, the children have embraced every moment. Our Christmas craft day was truly magical, with lots of glitter, creativity and goodwill, and we ended the week on a high with our much-anticipated Christmas party.

Thank you so much for organising food to bring in and help make the party extra special. We have also been blown away by your generosity and the incredibly kind and thoughtful gifts we have received - thank you, it really does mean so much to us.

We would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. We hope you enjoy making magical memories together and spending some well-deserved family time. We look forward to hearing all about what you get up to in 2026 and welcoming the children back for another exciting term ahead.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all of the Penhallow Team

Friday 19th December-End Of Term!

WoW!!! Here we are at the end of a fantastic term in Foundation!

The children have grown and progressed so well already! It always amazes us just how well the children progress in the first term!

 Soo, we just want to say that we wish you all a wonderfully happy Christmas and we look forward to seeing all the children back to school on the 6^th January 2026

The Foundation Team 

Merry Christmas!

We have made it to the end of a very long Autumn Term! Landaviddy have had a great final week, with crown making on Tuesday. This was lots of fun and got us into the festive spirit, ready for Christmas Gift Shop and Christmas lunch on Wednesday. But the fun did not stop there! On Thursday, we had our annual Christmas Art Day, where we made a bunch of different christmas themed crafts. Needless to say, it has been a busy week at school and we are all feeling ready for Christmas! 

Our final lesson of Art as part of our enquiry 'What was new about the Stone Age?', saw us collaborate to create handprints upon a cave wall. We created negative and positive images of our hands and enjoyed experimenting with colours. In English, we have been working on shape poetry and building up to writing our own versions about a snowflake. We explored similes, alliteration and personification. During Maths, we were finding complements to 100, which required us to apply our knowledge of addition carefully. 

Thank you to everyone for your kind gifts and christmas well wishes.  We hope you have a magical Christmas and look forward to welcoming you back into school on Tuesday 6th January 2026. 

Mrs Wilkie, Mrs Lister and Miss Colton

TALLAND'S BLOG 19.12.25

And here it is - Talland's last blog for 2025! It's been a magical week kickstarting it with Talland and Chaipel's Christmas Production... WOW! What an incredible job they did! Thank you so much for helping them learn their lines and look the part! We've also had the Christmas fayre, Christmas Jumper Day, Christmas dinner and finished off with a festive movie today - it really has been wonderful! 

CONGRATULATIONS to Harley, Amelia and Benjamin this week for passing their next round in 99 club. WELL DONE to George for being noticed for an outstanding performance in the our Christmas show and fantastic work from Amber for being noticed for her brilliant learning behaviours, kind personality and for being a great member of Talland class.

That's all from us in Talland this YEAR. We wish you a MERRY CHRISTMAS and a  HAPPY NEW YEAR. We can't wait to see you all in 2026!

Signing off from Mr. Langley and Mr. Bishop.

The children have enjoyed a wonderfully busy week, rounding off their enquiries and taking part in a range of festive activities. These included Reverend Richard's Christmas assembly on Tuesday, Christmas Lunch on Wednesday, Christmas Art Day on Thursday, and class parties today. Talland and Chaipel Classes' Christmas performances on Monday were spectacular and provided a fantastic finale to a brilliant series of performances from all of the children.

House Points Our house captains have totalled the house points for this term. House Points are awarded to children who demonstrate our school values: Curious, Creative, Excellent, Responsible, Determined, and Enthusiastic. This half term, our focus has been on being Curious. Congratulations to Oak, who are currently in the lead with 100 points, followed by Willow with 88 points, Ash with 75 points, and Chestnut with 70 points.

Clubs The Girls' Football Club for pupils in Years 3-6 will begin on Tuesday 13th January. We will contact you during the first week of next term with details of other clubs available for the upcoming half term.

Fundraising We are delighted that our Christmas Gift Shop on Monday raised over £250. A huge thank you to FOPS for all of the organising and wrapping. We also raised £67 for Save the Children on Christmas Jumper Day and £139.51 for Cornwall Hospice Care, our School Council's chosen charity, from kind donations after each of the class performances.

Keeping Your Child Safe Online - Parental Controls Guides To help keep children safe online, we encourage parents and carers to set up parental controls on all devices your child uses. Please use this link https://www.internetmatters.org/parental-controls/ to access easy, step-by-step guides showing how to activate parental controls on a wide range of devices, apps and online platforms. These tools can help you manage screen time, privacy settings and the content your child can access, creating a safer online experience. This information is particularly helpful at this time of year, as many children may receive new devices for Christmas such as: smart devices (e.g. TVs, speakers like Alexa); mobile phones (Android or iPhone); games consoles; tablets, laptops, or PCs. Taking a few minutes to set up parental controls can make a big difference in keeping your child safe online.

Dates The new term starts on Tuesday 6th January. Half term will be from Monday 16th February - Friday 20th February with an INSET Day on Friday 13th February. The last day of the Spring term is Thursday 2nd April and the Summer Term starts on Monday 20th April.

A huge thank you for all of your support so far this academic year. The children have worked incredibly hard and all deserve a wonderful Christmas break.

Wishing you all a very Happy Christmas

Anthea Hillman and all of the staff at Polperro Primary Academy

How amazing were our little performing Stars!  We are so proud of them learning a dance and performing it on stage to a very packed audience in the church.  We also enjoyed watching the older children's dazzling performances.  The whole school were just brilliant!

The whole team wish all our Pre-School families an amazing Christmas, and a happy and healthy New Year!

We look forward to welcoming back the children on Tuesday 6th January 2026.

We have ended the year wrapped in Christmas magic at Storytellers..

Our celebrations began with a Christmas party filled with laughter, games, snowy play, Santa's mysterious footsteps and a delicious party lunch that set the scene for something very special.

Then came the adventure.. a walk through the valley, where excitement buzzed in the air as we followed the path to Santa's house, hidden deep among the trees. Sharp ears quickly heard the gentle jingle of Santa's bell, and before long, we were greeted by Santa himself, who welcomed the children inside his cosy home.

Santa spoke to the children about the important work still to be done before Christmas, and together they practised a wonderfully festive Santa laugh - hands pressed on bellies, laughter echoing through the trees!  Each child had their own special moment with Santa and was gifted a magical bell to take home, a keepsake filled with Christmas wonder.

After many waves and smiles goodbye, the magic continued as we gathered around the fire pit to enjoy warm, toasty marshmallows before our walk back. 

The children behaved impeccably throughout the day, and witnessing the awe, excitement and pure belief in Christmas through their eyes was nothing short of magical.

A huge thank you to our incredible Storytellers, families, and friends for your continued support throughout the year, and a very special thank you to Santa and his family for creating such a truly enchanting experience that the children will remember forever. 

What a full and festive final couple of weeks we have had. Here's just some of the highlights.

Family Carol Service
It was wonderful to see so many families in a very full Egloshayle Church last week for our Carol Service. Well done to our string group, choir and readers for what was a lovely occasion.

Christmas Fun Run
Thank you and congratulations to everyone for raising a staggering £1030 for Children's Hospice South West in our recent Christmas Fun Run.

Christmas Raffle and Winter Fayre
FOWPA would like to thank all parents and carers for their support with the Christmas Raffle. We raised over £700 to help fund school improvements, trips and supplies. All winners have been contacted to collect their great prizes, mostly donated by local businesses of Wadebridge and Camelford, including: Williams Butchers; Party PA; The Molesworth; Hendra; Bodmin Railway; Ann's Cottage; Cheeses at Wadebridge; Vision's Hair Salon; The Nuthatch; Kiln Craft; Trevathan Farm; Wadebridge Sports and Leisure Centre; Camelford Leisure Centre; Wadebridge Computers; Steve Heard Butchers; Pencarrow House and Camelford Hardware Shop.

We hope everyone enjoyed this year's Winter Fayre, which is fast becoming a WPA festive tradition! We were pleased to see so many families attend. With your support we raised over £800 to support improvements to the school and fund equipment and trips that benefit the children. We couldn't do it without you, so thank you!

Nursery and Reception Singalong
Well done to all the children in Nursery and Reception for their spectacular sing along this week. The hall was packed to hear some well-known festive tunes, performed so brilliantly by the youngest children of the school. KS1 Nativity Performing to over 300 family members in just one day, our KS1 children certainly shone. Congratulations to all the children (and staff) for their amazing performance of A Bundle of Joy.

Cinema Trip
Thank you to Wadebridge Cinema for hosting us on two occasions this week - the children enjoyed watching the films. Thank you to the parents who supported walking the children down and back up(!) the hill.

English Success
We are incredibly proud of our young writers in Year 6B who have taken part in the Young Writers poetry competition, "I Have a Dream." A fantastic number of children from the class have had their poems selected for publication, which is a wonderful achievement and a testament to their creativity, imagination, and hard work. Their poems will be included in an anthology due to be published in February next year, and we are very much looking forward to receiving and sharing our copy in school. This is an exciting opportunity for our pupils to see their writing in print and to celebrate their voices as young poets. Well done to everyone involved!

Our Reading Ambassadors recently organised a wonderful creative competition - a "book in a diorama." Pupils were challenged to bring their favourite stories to life, and the results were truly impressive. The Reading Ambassadors joined Miss Johnston in judging the entries and were amazed by the effort and imagination on display. We saw fantastic dioramas inspired by stories such as Harry Potter, Commotion in the Ocean, Paddington Bear, The Secret Seven and The Christmas Story, to name just a few. Some entries were incredibly detailed - we even had real water used in one of the designs! A huge well done to everyone who took part (including parent participation). The Reading Ambassadors are already looking forward to organising the next competition, so watch this space!
From Emma Johnston (English Lead)

House Points Congratulations to this week's winners, Puffins. Well done to everyone for earning House points this term. The overall winning House this term is Choughs. As their reward, all children in Choughs get to have a non-uniform day on Friday 9th January 2026.

Choughs - 5311
Puffins - 4719
Swans - 4468
Cormorants - 4079

PE Days from January 2026
Please note your child's PE day from January 2026.
Nursery: Monday & Tuesday
Reception: Friday
Year 1: Friday
Year 2: Thursday
Year 3: Friday
Year 4: Tuesday
Year 5: Wednesday
Year 6: Thursday

Parent Cafe with Autism in Schools Team - Wednesday 7th January 2pm
On Wednesday 7th January at 2pm, there will be a Parent Cafe with Vanessa from the Autism in Schools Team. Please meet arrive at reception by 1:55pm. She will be available to answer any questions as well as providing information around managing anxiety. All are welcome. Please contact Jonathan Smith at jsmith@bridgeschools.co.uk if you are able to attend.


And finally.. Today we hosted our annual WPA staff pantomime for the children. It was a particularly moving event (and that's not just the staff dancing) as it marked the 20th anniversary of the same pantomime Mr Langton first performed all those years ago. We ended the panto with a very special farewell to a wonderful member of staff. We will miss you Mr Langton and wish you all the very best. It's certainly been a very long term, with so many memorable learning and enrichment opportunities. Thank you for all your continued support and to our dedicated staff for all their hard work throughout such a busy term.

I wish you all a restful and enjoyable Christmas break and a very Happy New Year!
We look forward to seeing you back at school on Tuesday 6th January 2026. 

Best wishes,
Chris

9th December 2025

Just like that, we have reached the end of the Autumn term! The weather hasn't exactly been Christmassy but the songs and festive cheer have been felt in school! The children have been enjoying their final week with some learning and fun Christmas activities. The Pirate Game is always a hit in KS2 and Class 1 have been making some amazing crafts, Christmas lunch was again superb on Wednesday - Thank you to Anna for putting on such a delicious spread! The children had great fun with their parties yesterday. Thank-you to the PTFA for providing the food - there was so much that we were able to enjoy a snack this morning! Is was a sad day yesterday as we wished Miss Bawden well as she left for the next stage of her journey. We know she will be missed but has promised to come and see us all in the new year. All that is left for me is to wish you all a merry Christmas and a happy new year from everyone at Darite. Whatever you do and wherever you go, we hope you have time to relax with family and friends over the festive period. We are looking forward to welcoming the children back to school on Tuesday the 6th January 2026!