School Services

Food and Drink

The school serves a wide range of high quality dinners, which are planned to provide a balanced and healthy diet with a choice of food every day. All children in school are provided with a cooked meal free of charge through the Government Universal Free School Meals offer. Also as part of this offer, every child is entitled to a free packed lunch when going out of school on an educational visit. In addition to the Universal Free School Meals offer, some families may be eligible for a Pupil Premium Payment to school. You may be eligible if you receive Child Benefit and another benefit such as Income Support or Income based Jobseekers Allowance. If you think your child may be entitled to a Pupil Premium payment to school, please get in touch.

Children not wanting a school dinner can bring a packed lunch to school. As we are an accredited Healthy School, we ask parents to ensure the lunch children bring to school is varied and nutritious. Large chocolate bars, cakes and sweets are therefore not permitted in school. Milk is available to all children in school and is free for all children up to their fifth birthday. After this, parents can choose to pay if they wish their child to still have milk on a daily basis. If you would like to order milk for your child please pick up a registration form from the school office. Snacks are not allowed in school except as part of a packed lunch. Drinks for the children should not be in glass containers or cans, for safety reasons. Fresh water is always available for children and the school provides every child with a drinking bottle to be used during the school day. Also, fruit is provided free of charge for every child and is eaten at playtimes within KS1 and during continuous provision in EYFS.

School Health Service

The School Health Service offers a service in and through school to help with the health and well-being of your child. The nurse from the School Health Service visits school regularly. A medical examination and assessment is offered to a sample of the children in their first year at school. Prior to this, hearing, sight, weight and height checks are made of all children.

Sight and hearing can be checked again at other times at the request of parents, teachers and other professionals. Your child and you can be seen by the nurse at your request or the request of a teacher/other professional. The School Health Service can arrange referral to other clinics or help from other professionals if necessary. The school nurse offers advice on health promotion.

Illness & Absence

If your child is taken ill at school, we will contact you. Children who are unwell will need to be collected from school by a known adult. If your child is absent from school through illness, please contact the school office by telephoning before 9.30am stating the reason for absence. If your child has to attend a dental or medical appointment during the school day, please give the school evidence of this in advance, especially if your child will arrive late on that day.

Headteachers are unable to grant any leave of absence during term time unless there are exceptional circumstances. If you take your child out of school during term time, without the schools authorisation, the Headteacher will make a request to the Local Authority to issue a Fixed Penalty Notice.

Medicine

If a child is fit enough to come to school but has to take a course of medicine, a dose of which has to be taken during the school day, a form may be obtained from the school office to give consent for the medication to be administered by a member of staff. The medication will be kept in a secure container in the medicines box in the office or in the refrigerator in the staffroom.

Where a child has asthma, inhalers are kept in the child’s classroom. These should be clearly named, and will be kept in the class teacher’s cupboard for safety reasons. It must be stressed that any child feeling in need of his/her inhaler, should inform the teacher. No other medicine is to be kept in the classroom.

Please note that any medical condition should be recorded on the admission form, and discussed with the Headteacher and/or the child’s teacher. An action plan can then be identified in dealing with the condition, if necessary.

School Uniform

Our uniform consists of a round-neck sweatshirt or cardigan in kingfisher blue/green, and a dark blue polo shirt, all with our owl logo. A pair of navy blue, black or grey trousers or skirt is acceptable. During the summer, a green checked dress can be worn.

For P.E. children should wear a red T-shirt and black shorts and black pumps, which need to be kept in a drawstring bag on your child’s peg. Please ensure your child’s name is written clearly on all items of clothing. Uniform is available to purchase online and can then be collected from school.

Parent Teacher Association

The school has a flourishing PTA. Its aim is not only to raise funds to buy equipment for the school, but to promote understanding between home and school for the ultimate benefit of the children. Meetings are held each half term, to discuss forthcoming events and share ideas. There is no expectation for everyone to attend every meeting, but you are most welcome to come when you are able, and contribute towards this excellent partnership between home and school.

Throughout the year the PTA organises highly successful social and fundraising events - the Summer Fair perhaps being the most notable. Each year the PTA raise, on average, £2500 which is used to purchase a wide range of resources to support learning throughout school.