New Headteacher Appointment

I’m very pleased and proud to be able to introduce the new Headteacher for Kenton Primary, Ms Francesca Toms.

Dear Parents and Carers,
My name is Francesca Toms, and I am truly delighted to be introducing myself as the new permanent Headteacher of Kenton Primary School.
I know that stability and consistency are important to any school community, and what I want to offer is exactly that: a steady, committed presence. I am here for the long term, and I care deeply about creating a school where children feel secure, confident and excited to learn each day.
Although I won’t formally take up post until September, I will be spending as much time as possible in school beforehand. I’ve already had the opportunity to get to know the school, and it’s clear to me that Kenton Primary is a place with a strong sense of community, high expectations, and children who are a real credit to you.
I feel very privileged to be joining you, and I am looking forward to getting to know the children, staff, families and the wider community in the months ahead. Building strong relationships will be at the heart of my work, alongside a clear commitment to excellent teaching and learning, so that every child is supported to achieve their very best. I am confident that, together, we can continue to build on what is already strong and ensure the school continues to grow and thrive for every child.
I hope to meet many of you in person over the coming months, and I am very much looking forward to beginning this journey with you.
Yours sincerely,
Francesca Toms

Thank you for your patience while we have been holding on to this information – we wanted to give Francesca’s current school plenty of time to communicate with their own community in a calm and timely manner.

New Director of Education for Primary

Ivy Trust has made the decision to restructure staffing in Primary to clarify structures and make savings. The role of Executive

Dear Parents and Carers,

I am writing to introduce myself as the Director of Primary Education as of the 1st May for Ivy Education Trust. I will be working closely with the Headteachers from the five primary schools at Kenn, Kenton, Cockwood, Starcross and Teignmouth. I have worked within education for 20 years, and have been a school leader at Teignmouth Primary School since 2011, and more recently an Executive Headteacher across Starcross and Teignmouth Primary Schools.

The Primary Director of Education will provide strategic leadership, oversight, and support for the primary phase across Ivy Education Trust. They will ensure high standards of teaching, learning, and pupil outcomes across the five primary schools, aligning with the Trust’s vision, values, and improvement priorities. Working closely with the Executive Director of Education, and school leaders, they will drive school improvement, strengthen leadership capacity, and ensure compliance with statutory frameworks and Trust policies.
They will aid collaboration and learning from each other to bring about change.

I will be based at Kenton Primary School, but will be visiting each setting regularly to support them on their school improvement journey. I look forward to meeting some of you on the gate and please do come and say hello!

Kind regards,

Annabelle Thomas
Director of Primary Education

Building Update

Work on the new school building has been continuing in the background. While we aren’t seeing work on the ground at the moment, huge amounts is going on behind the scenes and the plans are still to get that building built and Kenton Primary moved into its forever home as soon as possible. I asked for an update and was given this:

“We are at the feasibility stage, where we are exploring the best school design to suit the location and create a concept that can be developed and refined into a final proposal. The design will meet the DfE’s specification requirements, as well as the needs of the Trust and the school. The DfE and the Trust are committed to sustainability; the new school will be designed with sustainability and ecological benefits at its heart. Plans include green spaces and planted areas for pupils, staff, and visitors to enjoy. These outdoor spaces will support wellbeing, learning, and a connection with nature.

As the designs develop, we will share further updates and more details with you.”

 

Bank Holiday

Just to remind you – Monday is a Bank Holiday, there’s no school!

You are, of course, welcome to our May Day Celebration – in fact we hope very much that you will be there.

May Day

This is your final reminder that on Monday we have our May Day Celebration from 12:00 to 4:00 p.m.

There will be lots of fun to be had including games to play, music, dancing, our green man procession and lots more. Mr Finch will be going in the stocks at some point so you can enjoy throwing wet sponges at him. There will be owls, morris dancers, a circus, pizza, a tea tent, a toy stall – it’s going to be a really good day.

It would really help if you bring the money you are intending to spend in cash and, as an especial help, if as much of that could be in smaller denominations as possible, that would be really helpful.

There will be NO PARKING available up here at the school – that will all be needed by traders and stall holders – so please walk if at all possible or, if you need to drive, park in the triangle or at The Victory Hall who are generously letting us use their parking for the day.

Remember that we do not allow any dogs to come on to the school field. Not even very nice ones. I understand that there was some friction over this last time we celebrated a May Day, hopefully there won’t be any this time. Of course guide dogs for the blind are an exception to this but I don’t think there is any other wiggle room – I can’t have children playing on grass which has been recently pooed or weed on.

 

As a sidebar, don’t forget to enter your pets for the competition to pick a mascot for The Dolphin. All creatures great and small are welcome and newts are as likely to win as chinchillas so don’t hold back. The link to enter is here. The closing day is TOMORROW May 2nd, don’t miss your chance!

We Are Ivy Week

This past week, every school in Ivy Trust has been involved in activities of service to build children’s pride in their communities – the community of coastal Devon, the community of our trust and, most clearly, the home communities that we live amongst. Our Willow Class children got busy collecting litter around the village playing fields, Oak Class tidied in the churchyard and cleared some overgrown graves as well as following up the Willow litter pick and Chestnut Class ran a pop up cafe down in the church and welcomed members of the community for a cup of tea and a slice of cake – raising money for local projects in the process.

These activities have ben very happy ones indeed and allowed us to have powerful conversations about caring for where we live and for connections to community. As of right now, my website platform is being very naughty and refusing to let me upload photos. I’ll try to add some as soon as it starts behaving!

Sports Day

Our Sports Day this year will be on Thursday June 11th. As ever, Mr Tyrell will be running a carousel of activities for the children to participate in. As always, he will spend his session with them the week before introducing all those activities so that they aren’t new and overwhelming on the day. We will let you know timings and other details closer to the day.

Swimming

There will be swimming lessons for children in Oak Class after half term. |We are just nailing down the last details regarding minibuses and timings so bear with us. We’ll let you know details as soon as we can.

Jungle Book

Our amazing production of The Jungle Book will take place at the auditorium at Teignmouth College on Tuesday 14th July. All children in Key Stage 2 will be involved. Please, please keep that day free. We will get tickets on sale after half term.

Parking

Once again I have to ask people please to avoid parking on East Town Lane as much as possible and absolutely definitely to avoid parking on the tight corner directly opposite the gates onto the school grounds. We had a horrible situation yesterday when a local resident and a minibus from the school met without any space to pass and with reversing made almost impossible by the traffic piling up behind them. I understand it was a fraught encounter. Personally, I would prefer that the corner opposite the school had double yellow lines as it really is not safe for people to park there and I feel that, if the situation continues as present, it is only a matter of time before we have a serious incident.