Well, that’s a wrap on Kenton Primary for 2025. What a busy year it has been. It’s hard to think now that it’s barely a year since the school moved onto this new site and started putting it’s roots down again. We started the year with some classrooms and our funny little admin hut and we finish it with our new block with it’s meeting room and breakout spaces, and our handsome new hall.

My own first real glimpse of Kenton Primary was the phenomenal production of Matilda at Teignmouth College – that seems a lifetime ago doesn’t it?

Since September we’ve had dozens of brilliant Tuesday Talkers, all sorts of games and sports with Mr Tyrell, groups going to Forest School with Gin, making our foyer display with Darrell Wakelam, the Readathon, drumming workshops, Bikeability, or Nativity, our Carol Concert and so much more. I’ve probably missed something really important in there!

There’s so much to celebrate – and all of that happens with the work of the brilliant staff team that we have here and, of course, the support of our amazing community who help out, make things happen, raise funds and, most important of all, trust us to do our best for the children in our care. Your patience, kindness and respect mean a very great deal to every member of staff.

Thank you.

Building Update

You might have noticed that there is some work going on here at the school again. Over the next week, workers from Portacabin are going to put the finished asphalt down on our parking area which, you will have noticed, has only has a temporary covering since the summer. They will mark it up as a half basketball court so that it can be used out of school hours, they are also remarking the lines for the tennis court on the playground so that the community can use it again. We should be able to facilitate that in the new year – it will be good to have the community tennis courts back in action for the community.

Alarms

We would like to apologise for the inconvenience and stress that the alarms have caused over the past few weeks. We think that we have now sorted this and that we have a safe and secure site but no risk of disturbing our neighbours. We were getting quite a number of false call outs – engineers have now been through the entire site checking sensor by sensor and door by door, checking that the set up is sensitive enough to pick up a problem but not so sensitive that  a drifting spider web can set off an alarm. We think that is all sorted now. We have also set up a protocol so that, after hours, intruder alarms sound for a shorter time and fire alarms alert me, the trust operations team, and the new key holding company but do not blare out to disturb the community. Our new keyholding company are on patrol in the area twenty four hours a day and are able to attend a callout within half an hour. They will be here considerably quicker than I would be if I were at home in bed when an alarm was triggered.

Portacabin understand how disruptive the issues with the system have been and have given me this letter to share with the community. My address book only includes people with children at the school so please do feel welcome to share the letter further if you wish.

Apology Letter – Alarm Sounding

Reverse Advent Calendar

Huge thanks to everyone who donated to our Reverse Advent Calendar. For a small school, we managed to gather a pretty impressive haul.

Our friends from the food bank came up to school earlier today to collect our donation and took time for a quick chat with some of the pupils. Your generosity will make a genuine difference to some people in need. It makes me very proud of our community.

Willow Class Staffing and Provision

Miss Webber was in school all day today working incredibly hard to get the classroom ready for January. You are going to see a bit of a transformation and, hopefully, we’ll be able to really dial up the fun and the learning for the children in Reception, Year One and Year Two. Each week, Mrs Webber will be teaching the class for four days and Mrs Laguna will teach them for one day. The Reception children will continue to mix with our Nursery children but more of their continuous and enhanced provision will be based on the Willow side and this will mean that what’s available in Nursery can be more targeted to the needs of those children. We are so happy to be able to make this adjustment now that lunch service and the library are relocated to the hall.

Most weeks, Mrs Laguna will teach on Monday with Miss Webber taking the class on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Some weeks they might choose to swap the days around – we’ll let you know in advance. On the first week back in January, Mrs Webber has organised to be here on the Monday so that she can welcome the children into the setting and help them get used to it.

We would really welcome any donations you can help us with to make the setting really sing – we would love any rugs you can help us with for example – they make the floor less bangy, make the place feel more welcoming and help us to zone the areas. We would also really welcome pots, pans and plastic kitchen equipment for the home corner. Lego is always welcome as are building blocks or anything that can provoke construction play. We would love some more small world play – little characters for example. I think some of our youngest learners would be especially pleased to see any dinosaurs and animals you might have and, as always, cars and farm equipment would be welcome. If you have anything you can spare at home that you think might enhance our R,1 ,2 provision, please bring it along. If we can’t use it we can always pass it along to a charity shop or a home that can make use of it.

Pantomime

Huge thanks to the KSPA for paying for the coach and the interval ice creams so that we could take the children to see the Pantomime at the Corn Exchange last Monday. The children were stoical about waiting in the rain for half an hour for our very late coach – we still got there in time and it was a treat to see the children settling in – for many of them, this was their very first visit to the theatre. I’m very glad that we were able to work together to make this happen.

Christmas Fayre

The Christmas fayre last Friday was a real treat. I loved watching the children running the stalls they had set up and also seeing them carefully choosing gifts for their loved ones. It was brilliant to see our school hall so full of life and activity – it’s almost starting to feel normal now isn’t it! The event raised about £200 for KSPA but, far more importantly, it put smiles on a lot of faces. Well done everybody.

Have a wonderful Christmas holiday everyone. I think everyone is in need of a bit of a break so I hope that everyone manages to find just a little time to pause, tke a breath, celebrate all their wins over the last year and mentally prepare themselves for the next year. I am looking forward to seeing you all in January.

best wishes,

Ed Finch