Dear Parents,

Summer Term Newsletter No. 8

FOA SUMMER FETE TOMORROW

It looks like being a bright and breezy summer’s day tomorrow for our annual FOA Summer Fete. As you know, the theme this year is the seaside so we look forward to seeing lots of knotted handkerchiefs and garish summer shorts and t-shirts. The FOA committee has been working extremely hard to get everything ready for the day and with your support, it promises to be a great afternoon. As you will know, the FOA has funded a considerable number of year group activities this year, for which we are extremely grateful. Their generous donations are based on successful FOA events such as tomorrow so we really do hope to see as many of you there as possible and please bring family and friends with you, too.

YEAR 1 GO OFF TO THE SEASIDE!

As you can imagine, the children in Year 1 were extremely excited this morning to be travelling down to the South Coast to spend the day by the seaside as part of their topic enquiry on ‘Why do we like to be beside the seaside?’ The weather will no doubt be bracing, but the thrill of being by the sea, exploring the marine life, paddling in the salty water, making sandcastles and eating sandy sandwiches will certainly make it all worthwhile. A big thank you to all the parents who joined in the fun.

YEAR 5 VISIT THE V&A MUSEUM – ARTHUR CLACK REPORTS

Today, Year 5′s Owl Class have been on a trip to the V&A museum in London, where they have been doing a workshop learning how to make pop-up books. Kestrel Class will be going on Monday to do exactly the same activity – we are really looking forward to it! Over the next two weeks, the children in Year 5 will be creating their own pop-up books for the Greek myths they have been writing linked to their Ancient Greece topic of learning.

YEAR 3 GO TO WEST END COMMON

Year 3 went to West End Common today to broaden their learning about trees and the woodlands for their topic enquiry; “Why are the trees around us so important?” The children came prepared for rain, shine and stinging nettles in order to find out more. Their session on the common included doing a bit of tree ageing and collecting seeds to discover how they are carried away and why. While we were there, Hannah from the Link-Up with Nature team, clarified the need to manage the woods, specifically why we cut down trees and keep dead wood in the woodlands. She also explained about a project to restore heathland to an area of land in Elmbridge. Everyone had a great time in the outdoors and came back suitably tired, but refreshed. The children will be applying their new learning to their enquiry in school and around the Ashley School grounds.

YEAR 6 INTER-SCHOOLS ROUNDERS TOURNAMENT

Ashley School attended the Year 6 rounders tournament yesterday at Cardinal Newman School. On a windy afternoon the children played 3 group games against Cleves, Cardinal Newman and Thorpe Lea. Our first match was against Thorpe Lea School. The children started off rather nervously as there are many rules in rounders. They ended up drawing 6v6. Next we came up against a very good Cardinal Newman side and unfortunately were beaten by the better team. This led us into our last game against Cleves, who were unbeaten at that point. After a stern chat from Mr Phil on how they could win the game, we played fantastically well and came away victorious by 1.5 rounders! Everyone played brilliantly in the last game. It was a shame the team didn’t perform to that high standard throughout as I am sure we would have progressed through to the final. Catch of the day goes to Victoria – Cleves best player smashed the ball that was heading straight towards her at a very fast pace, but with a great catching technique she held on to the ball with a huge smile on her face! Well done, Year 6.

YEAR 4 AND THE BATTLE OF THE BOOKS BY DANIEL PIPER AND BEN MCKENNA

On Tuesday, six children from Year 4 – Tilly Alty, Alice Cope, Jessica Gainsborough, Ben McKenna, Daniel Piper and Ian Volkov – participated in the inter-schools Battle of the Books competition. This year the theme was heroes and the text our Ashley representatives chose was Romeo and Juliet. We wrote our own version of the play as well as a poem and song, and after much preparation we were ready for the competition. Cardinal Newman won first place with their presentation about Boudica and our Ashley team came second! This was an emotionally gratifying experience and the teachers and the team were thrilled!

KWIK CRICKET TOURNAMENT ON MONDAY – MR PHIL REPORTS

Ashley School Year 6 competed in their first ever Kwik Cricket Tournament on Monday against local schools in Elmbridge. The children were selected on their attendance to Cricket Club, where they have all become very confident Kwik Cricket players. There was a boys tournament and a girls tournament, and both teams came up against some very stiff competition. The girls were the first to win a game, beating Cardinal Newman by over 50 runs! The girls finished 3rd overall with some excellent batting from Grace and Caitlin, both hitting the ball past the boundary plenty of times for 4 runs! Catch of the day for the girls goes to Tayla, who caught out Cleves best player with a very good catch! The boys played against some very well organised and well drilled teams, but were victorious against Cranmere School, not losing a wicket and winning by over 70 runs! Myles hit a great 6 runs, with all the boys scoring 4 runs off one hit! Catch of the day from the boys was Asher, who made an excellent diving catch, ending with a roll on the floor still holding the ball and not a hair out of place! This Kwik Cricket tournament was a great day, with both teams playing some really good cricket. I’m sure we will have further success in cricket in the future with some very talented cricketers coming through in lower years. Well done to all involved.

GOLDEN BOOT CHALLENGE – HALF-TIME SCORES

Over the past week, Ashley School has taken part in the Surrey Golden Boot Challenge. It has been great to see so many of our children and families travelling to school by a sustainable means. We are delighted to report that midway through our two week challenge Ashley School is averaging over 90% green travel, based on the children’s feedback. However there is one class leading the competition; Eagle Class, who are averaging 96%. So, while we are away, it’s up to the rest of the school to catch them Mr Cadman.

YEAR 6 JOURNEY TO CHAMONIX

On Monday morning, shortly after 6am, the Year 6 children will journey from school to St Pancras to Paris to Annecy and finally to Chamonix in the Alps. They will spend the week there, learning about what well-being means for us as individuals, for a team or community and for our world. They will understand that when all three are well, we live in harmony. The week away has another strong focus, that of leadership. During the course of the week we will expect the children to take on the leadership role for what they do and how they interact. The adults will be there to guide and help them, to participate with them, but we want them to lead. What we hope is that over the course of the week, the children will grow as individuals and as a team and will return transformed by their experiences and time away. You can find out how we are getting on by clicking on the Ashley blog page for 2013 on the following website: www.newleadersinsustainability.com Bring it on!

PARENT LUNCHES AT ASHLEY

With Year 6 out of school next week, we look forward to welcoming lots of you to school to sample an Ashley School lunch. The parent lunch sessions run from Tuesday to Friday and we would be very interested to get your feedback at the end on how you found the lunch experience. We currently have around 67% children eating school lunches. We want to get that figure above 70% for September so any thoughts you have would be much appreciated.

JUNIOR SCHOOL DAY FROM SEPTEMBER

We are considering moving the end of the junior school day forward by 10 minutes to 3.10pm. The main reason for doing this is to enable the junior children and indeed staff to have a full hour at lunchtime as they currently only have 50 minutes. Nearly all our clubs are separate infant or junior clubs so it should not affect them. It should also give a little bit more space at the end of the day for parents to come in and out of school. As we think through this possible change, we would like to hear your views. If you have any comments, please email them to the office.

COMMUNITY PICNIC – THURSDAY, 4th JULY AT MIDDAY

Please would you note in your diary Thursday, 4th July for a community picnic lunch. Our Feeling Good Week, which starts on Monday, 1st July, will focus very much on the feel-good of being and learning outside. To this end, we thought it would be great to invite any of you who are available to join us for a picnic lunch out on the school field. If you are around or could re-jig your work hours, we would be delighted to have you with us. You are welcome to arrive from midday. We will conclude the community picnic at 1pm, when the children go back to class. No need to reply, but if you can make it, please note the date.

See you tomorrow, everyone!

Yours sincerely,

Richard Dunne

Headteacher

Dear Parents,

Summer Term Newsletter No. 8

 FOA SUMMER FETE TOMORROW

It looks like being a bright and breezy summer’s day tomorrow for our annual FOA Summer Fete.  As you know, the theme this year is the seaside so we look forward to seeing lots of knotted handkerchiefs and garish summer shorts and t-shirts.  The FOA committee has been working extremely hard to get everything ready for the day and with your support, it promises to be a great afternoon.  As you will know, the FOA has funded a considerable number of year group activities this year, for which we are extremely grateful.  Their generous donations are based on successful FOA events such as tomorrow so we really do hope to see as many of you there as possible and please bring family and friends with you, too.

 YEAR 1 GO OFF TO THE SEASIDE!

As you can imagine, the children in Year 1 were extremely excited this morning to be travelling down to the SouthCoast to spend the day by the seaside as part of their topic enquiry on ‘Why do we like to be beside the seaside?’  The weather will no doubt be bracing, but the thrill of being by the sea, exploring the marine life, paddling in the salty water, making sandcastles and eating sandy sandwiches will certainly make it all worthwhile.  A big thank you to all the parents who joined in the fun.

 YEAR 5 VISIT THE V&A MUSEUM – ARTHUR CLACK REPORTS

Today, Year 5′s Owl Class have been on a trip to the V&A museum in London, where they have been doing a workshop learning how to make pop-up books. Kestrel Class will be going on Monday to do exactly the same activity – we are really looking forward to it! Over the next two weeks, the children in Year 5 will be creating their own pop-up books for the Greek myths they have been writing linked to their Ancient Greece topic of learning.

 YEAR 3 GO TO WEST END COMMON

Year 3 went to West End Common today to broaden their learning about trees and the woodlands for their topic enquiry; “Why are the trees around us so important?”  The children came prepared for rain, shine and stinging nettles in order to find out more.  Their session on the common included doing a bit of tree ageing and collecting seeds to discover how they are carried away and why.  While we were there, Hannah from the Link-Up with Nature team, clarified the need to manage the woods, specifically why we cut down trees and keep dead wood in the woodlands.  She also explained about a project to restore heathland to an area of land in Elmbridge.  Everyone had a great time in the outdoors and came back suitably tired, but refreshed.  The children will be applying their new learning to their enquiry in school and around the AshleySchool grounds.

 YEAR 6 INTER-SCHOOLS ROUNDERS TOURNAMENT

AshleySchool attended the Year 6 rounders tournament yesterday at CardinalNewmanSchool. On a windy afternoon the children played 3 group games against Cleves, Cardinal Newman and Thorpe Lea. Our first match was against ThorpeLeaSchool. The children started off rather nervously as there are many rules in rounders. They ended up drawing 6v6. Next we came up against a very good Cardinal Newman side and unfortunately were beaten by the better team. This led us into our last game against Cleves, who were unbeaten at that point. After a stern chat from Mr Phil on how they could win the game, we played fantastically well and came away victorious by 1.5 rounders! Everyone played brilliantly in the last game.  It was a shame the team didn’t perform to that high standard throughout as I am sure we would have progressed through to the final. Catch of the day goes to Victoria – Cleves best player smashed the ball that was heading straight towards her at a very fast pace, but with a great catching technique she held on to the ball with a huge smile on her face! Well done, Year 6.

 YEAR 4 AND THE BATTLE OF THE BOOKS BY DANIEL PIPER AND BEN MCKENNA

On Tuesday, six children from Year 4 – Tilly Alty, Alice Cope, Jessica Gainsborough, Ben McKenna, Daniel Piper and Ian Volkov – participated in the inter-schools Battle of the Books competition.  This year the theme was heroes and the text our Ashley representatives chose was Romeo and Juliet.  We wrote our own version of the play as well as a poem and song, and after much preparation we were ready for the competition. Cardinal Newman won first place with their presentation about Boudica and our Ashley team came second! This was an emotionally gratifying experience and the teachers and the team were thrilled!

 KWIK CRICKET TOURNAMENT ON MONDAY – MR PHIL REPORTS

Ashley School Year 6 competed in their first ever Kwik Cricket Tournament on Monday against local schools in Elmbridge. The children were selected on their attendance to Cricket Club, where they have all become very confident Kwik Cricket players. There was a boys tournament and a girls tournament, and both teams came up against some very stiff competition. The girls were the first to win a game, beating Cardinal Newman by over 50 runs! The girls finished 3rd overall with some excellent batting from Grace and Caitlin, both hitting the ball past the boundary plenty of times for 4 runs! Catch of the day for the girls goes to Tayla, who caught out Cleves best player with a very good catch!  The boys played against some very well organised and well drilled teams, but were victorious against CranmereSchool, not losing a wicket and winning by over 70 runs! Myles hit a great 6 runs, with all the boys scoring 4 runs off one hit! Catch of the day from the boys was Asher, who made an excellent diving catch, ending with a roll on the floor still holding the ball and not a hair out of place!  This Kwik Cricket tournament was a great day, with both teams playing some really good cricket. I’m sure we will have further success in cricket in the future with some very talented cricketers coming through in lower years. Well done to all involved.

 GOLDEN BOOT CHALLENGE – HALF-TIME SCORES

Over the past week, AshleySchool has taken part in the Surrey Golden Boot Challenge.  It has been great to see so many of our children and families travelling to school by a sustainable means.  We are delighted to report that midway through our two week challenge AshleySchool is averaging over 90% green travel, based on the children’s feedback.  However there is one class leading the competition; Eagle Class, who are averaging 96%.  So, while we are away, it’s up to the rest of the school to catch them J  Mr Cadman.

 YEAR 6 JOURNEY TO CHAMONIX

On Monday morning, shortly after 6am, the Year 6 children will journey from school to St Pancras to Paris to Annecy and finally to Chamonix in the Alps.  They will spend the week there, learning about what well-being means for us as individuals, for a team or community and for our world.  They will understand that when all three are well, we live in harmony.  The week away has another strong focus, that of leadership.  During the course of the week we will expect the children to take on the leadership role for what they do and how they interact.  The adults will be there to guide and help them, to participate with them, but we want them to lead.  What we hope is that over the course of the week, the children will grow as individuals and as a team and will return transformed by their experiences and time away.  You can find out how we are getting on by clicking on the Ashley blog page for 2013 on the following website: www.newleadersinsustainability.com  Bring it on!

 PARENT LUNCHES AT ASHLEY

With Year 6 out of school next week, we look forward to welcoming lots of you to school to sample an AshleySchool lunch.  The parent lunch sessions run from Tuesday to Friday and we would be very interested to get your feedback at the end on how you found the lunch experience.  We currently have around 67% children eating school lunches.  We want to get that figure above 70% for September so any thoughts you have would be much appreciated. 

JUNIOR SCHOOL DAY FROM SEPTEMBER

We are considering moving the end of the junior school day forward by 10 minutes to 3.10pm.  The main reason for doing this is to enable the junior children and indeed staff to have a full hour at lunchtime as they currently only have 50 minutes.  Nearly all our clubs are separate infant or junior clubs so it should not affect them.  It should also give a little bit more space at the end of the day for parents to come in and out of school.  As we think through this possible change, we would like to hear your views.  If you have any comments, please email them to the office.

 COMMUNITY PICNIC – THURSDAY, 4^th JULY AT MIDDAY

Please would you note in your diary Thursday, 4^th July for a community picnic lunch.  Our Feeling Good Week, which starts on Monday, 1^st July, will focus very much on the feel-good of being and learning outside.  To this end, we thought it would be great to invite any of you who are available to join us for a picnic lunch out on the school field.  If you are around or could re-jig your work hours, we would be delighted to have you with us.  You are welcome to arrive from midday.  We will conclude the community picnic at 1pm, when the children go back to class.  No need to reply, but if you can make it, please note the date.

See you tomorrow, everyone!

Yours sincerely,

Richard Dunne

Headteacher

Follow the Ashley 2013 Year Six blog on http://newleadersinsustainability.com

On Monday morning Year Six depart for Chamonix, France, for their Inspire Alpine Expedition. The children are spending the week investigating individual, team and global well-being. They will experience the dramatic effects of climate change on the glaciers in Chamonix, whilst reflecting on their role in our changing world. This half term Year Six’s learning enquiry is ‘How can I make a difference?’ and upon their return, the five carbon enquiry groups (energy, transport, water, food and waste) will make suggestions to improve the life of current and future generations of Ashley children, as well as thinking about how they can positively impact their community and secondary schools.

The children and adults would love it if everyone followed their progress in the mountains.

Dear Parents,

Summer Term Newsletter No. 7

FINAL HALF-TERM OF THE YEAR

Welcome back to the final half term of the academic year. We hope you had a good week last week. What a treat to return to a week of glorious sunshine! Wasn’t today meant to be sunny, too?! We have certainly been making the most of it with lots of the learning taking place on the playground and the school field.

As you will be aware, we have some key events coming up during this second half of term and hope that many of you will be there to support them, especially our FOA Summer Fete a week tomorrow 

YEAR 6 ELMBRIDGE JUNIOR CITIZENS

This afternoon, Year 6 visited Walton Fire Station to participate in the Elmbridge Junior Citizen workshop, along with a group from Bell Farm School. The children learnt a variety of skills on how to be safe in our community including: fire safety, calling the emergency services, stranger danger and helping someone who needs an ambulance. This was a worthwhile experience for the children as they come closer to secondary school and leading more independent lives. It was also nice mixing with children from Bell Farm. A huge thank you to our parents who supported our walk to the station and the FOA whose funding paid for this opportunity.

VALUES GARDEN OPENS

On Wednesday afternoon, two of our Year 5 children, Leah Cox and Connor McCarthy represented the school at the official opening of the Values Garden just behind the Riverhouse Barn. The opening was attended by children and teachers from all of the Values Schools in this area and it was a chance to see for the first time the beautiful mosaic pool and mirrors that have been built into the garden. If you are ever passing by the garden, which is at the back of the Riverhouse Barn car park, do have a look at the mosaics. They really had added a colourful new dimension to the greenery.

GOLDEN BOOT CHALLENGE – MONDAY, 10th TO FRIDAY, 21st JUNE

Starting next week, Ashley School will be participating in the Golden Boot Challenge; the biggest school travel competition in the country! The challenge is designed to encourage children, parents and staff to choose sustainable alternatives to the car on school journeys. The class with the best sustainable travel percentage over the two weeks will win a prize, as well as the coveted Golden Boot. This year, following the Olympic legacy, there is an emphasis on cycling. We are aiming to make 10% of our journeys by bike. If we achieve this, Ashley will be awarded a gold medal! So please do your best and travel to school using a sustainable means…and get cycling!

BATTLE OF THE BOOKS

Some of our more able readers and writers in Year 4 will be taking part in a Battle of the Books event that Ashley School will be hosting next week. The competition involves groups of children from the six participating schools bringing to life a text of their choosing. Our creative Year 4 team will be acting out their very own version of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Love will certainly be in the air!

FOA SUMMER FETE – SEASIDE THEME

A week tomorrow the FOA Summer Fete takes place with its seaside theme. We very much look forward to seeing a fantastic turn-out for this major FOA event. Weather permitting everyone will be setting up gazebos, tables and chairs on the school field on Friday afternoon from 3pm. The committee would appreciate as much help as possible. If any dads are available to help as well it would be fantastic! As the saying goes, Many Hands Make Light Work! If you are able to lend us your gazebos for the fete, please bring them with you next Friday. If you cannot attend, but can still lend us your gazebo please let Sharon Bates know on 07813 084958.

Very excitingly, the fete committee has organised for the Brightwater Brewery from Claygate to provide their Daisy Gold ale at the fete. There will be two kegs of 72 pints each and, as well as selling by the pint on the day, take outs of one, two and four pints will be available to purchase to take home. As a result the committee has asked that you save and bring in any plastic one, two and four pint washed containers which can be used for this purpose on the day. Don’t forget your buckets and spades and your swimming costume, too!

YEAR 6 HEAD TO CHAMONIX – MONDAY, 17th JUNE

On Monday, 17th June, our Year 6 children will head up to London to take the Eurostar from London St Pancras to Paris and from there down to Annecy and into the mountains to their final destination of Chamonix. The week away will be a culmination of seven years of learning at Ashley. It is a truly transformational experience in the stunning mountains of the Alps. You will be able to read about our time away on our blog, which can be found on the New Leaders in Sustainability website as follows:

www.newleadersinsustainability.com

SCHOOL INSET DAY AND DFC CONFERENCE – MONDAY, 24th JUNE

We have our final Inset Day Closure of the year on Monday, 24th June. The focus for the Inset Day will be Design for Change and we hope to have close to 20 local schools here to learn more about this programme of change. Jackie Stevens and Ruth Bardel have been working hard to co-ordinate the day and the Ashley staff team will be on hand to assist with the smooth running of this inaugural event. We are excited to have Joost and Michiel, who came over from Holland to run the Cycle for Water event, back with us. We also have two friends from Taiwan, who run the programme over there, joining us for this special day.

So here’s to a very happy and fulfilling final few weeks of the year. Enjoy the sunshine this weekend!

Yours sincerely,

Richard Dunne

Headteacher

So far the children have carried out general hive inspections and used a queen cage to catch and mark the queen, in order to monitor how healthy she is. This week they found varroa mites in the hive. These can effect the health of the bees so the children covered the frames in sugar to solve the problem. The sugar irritates the bees so that they begin to shake, causing the nasty varroa mites to drop to the bottom of the hive.

Well done Year 2 for looking after the bees in such a confident and caring way.

Dear Parents,

Summer Term Newsletter No. 6

THANKSGIVING SERVICES

What joyful occasions our Thanksgiving Services at St Mary’s were this week. The children’s singing and performances lit up the church as we celebrated both our Church School status and the learning that we are doing this half-term linked to the world outside our classroom. From Reception Year’s ‘Please don’t squish me!’ to Year 6’s foot tappingly good ‘Zippity Do Dah!’ the children kept us entertained throughout and we particularly loved their singing of ‘I like the flowers’. Many thanks to the staff for preparing the children so well, to Katharine Scott, who co-ordinated the services, and to all of you who were able to be there and enjoy the occasion. The new AV system at St Mary’s certainly added an interesting new dimension 

YEAR 2 UGLY BUG BALL PERFORMANCES

Well done to all our Year 2 children who, class by class, put on their Ugly Bug Ball dance performances this afternoon. They looked stunning in their minibeast costumes – thank you, parents, for all your fantastic support! – and everyone who came along thought it was a wonderful show.

RECEPTION YEAR LINK UP WITH NATURE

On Monday Reception Year put on their wellies and headed over to Esher Woods to spend a session with Link Up with Nature. Here’s what Hedgehogs thought of their visit:

‘We went pond dipping. We enjoyed catching tadpoles. They were massive! We saw lots of other things, too;

water shrimps, snails, sticklebacks and something that looked like a stick! We had a great time.’

YEAR 4 ALICE IN WONDERLAND PARTNERSHIP WITH THE EMBER PLAYERS – TILDA JAMES

On Friday and Saturday children from Year 4 went to see Alice in Wonderland at The Cecil Hepworth Playhouse in Walton. It was great to see all the work we had done up on display in the playhouse. At the matinée we got to go on the stage and meet the actors and ask them questions. The show was really funny and I loved it.

CHAMONIX SPORTS FUN DAY

My legs are still aching from last weekend’s Chamonix Sports Fun Day!!! Both the netball rally, won by the Mums of Squirrel Class, and the football tournament, where the Ashley Old Boys beat the Ashley School Staff and Partners – much to their irrepressible delight!!! – were a great success. The Old Boys are sure to dine out on that one for many years to come  With good food and drinks available throughout the afternoon and plenty of spectators in attendance too, the event certainly lived up to its name as a Fun Day. Most pleasingly, the Year 6 parents, who worked so hard to make it happen, can now announce that they raised £2,200 and are within touching distance of their Chamonix fundraising target. Thank you to all of you who came along. It really was Ashley School community at its very best.

FRIENDS OF ASHLEY SUMMER FETE – SATURDAY, 15th JUNE

This week the School Council voted on the prize winners for the cover competition for the FOA Summer Fete. There were some lovely, bright, colourful designs on the seaside theme and it was a difficult decision for the School Council to narrow down their choices to two runners-up and one winner for the infants and the juniors. But their choices have now been made and here are the results:

• Infant Winner – Imogen Thomas

• Runners-Up – Grace Elkins and Eden Foxhall

• Junior Winner – Tom Smith

• Runners-Up – Frazer Taylor and Jack Bates

Looking ahead to the Summer Fete itself, every family will receive 2 books of 5 raffle tickets to sell for the fete. As well as the cash prizes, there will be some bonus prizes this year which will be announced at the Summer Fete. Please return the stubs and payment in the envelope provided to the FOA post box by Monday 10th June. Please be sure to write ‘Raffle’ on the envelope and also return any unsold raffle tickets. If you would like more raffle tickets to sell, then please go to Enrica in the School Office. Good Luck and thank you for your support.

RHS WISLEY PROJECT

We welcomed Jim Arbury, one of the head gardeners from RHS Wisley, to Ashley School this week. Jim is working with four of our year groups; Years 1, 2, 3 and 5 on a Living Lab project, during which the children will learn about and record the rich diversity of plants and food on our school site. You will remember that the school was awarded a grant from the Royal Society for this work and we are delighted to have Jim’s many years of experience as a gardener at RHS Wisley to guide and inform this learning. Jim will be working with us this term, next term and next summer, too.

ENERGY MATTERS

You may be interested to know that our children continue to monitor and manage our energy at the school. A team of Year 6 children share with the school each Friday in assembly whether or not each of the school blocks has achieved its energy target. Our most energy efficient block is the Jubilee Block, where Years 5 and 6 are based. As an example of how well the block runs, we have consumed just 150kWhs / £15 of electricity this half-term and we have generated 400kWhs of clean solar energy. Because we are linked into the feed-in tariff for renewable energy, this amount of 400kWhs equates to £160 of money for the school. Not a bad profit over half a term!

INSET DAY TOMORROW AND SECOND HALF OF TERM

As you will all be aware, this newsletter is out a day early as tomorrow is an Inset Day School Closure. We are back at the usual time on Monday, 3rd June. As highlighted above, we have our FOA Summer Fete on Saturday, 15th June from 12-3pm. In addition to that:

• Our Year 6s head to Chamonix for the week on Monday, 17th June.

• We have our final Inset Day School Closure on Monday, 24th June, when our staff and a selection of Ashley children will be hosting the first ever UK inter-schools Design for Change conference.

• Our Funky Friday is on Friday, 5th July at the end of our Feeling Good Week, when we will be aiming to do lots of outdoor learning.

• Monday, 8th July is our Ashley Flower Show. Please bring in any produce you are growing at home.

• Friday, 12th July is the day your child’s school report comes out.

• Saturday, 13th to Sunday, 14th July is our annual Ashstock camping event on the school field.

• Sports Day is on Tuesday, 16th July. Parents are invited to join us for the afternoon at 1pm.

• Term ends at 2pm on Wednesday, 24th July.

Happy half-term, everyone!

Yours sincerely,

Richard Dunne

Headteacher

P.S. For those of you who attended the May Ball, this is the link to view and purchase the event’s photos:

http://www.bonitophotography.co.uk/apball2013   (Just over £1500 was raised from this event).

Waitrose hope to enable and inspire primary school children with life skill activities such as growing and selling their own produce, educating and appreciating farm to plate and the importance of healthy diet choice and living an active lifestyle.

The Business In The Community (BITC) Give and Gain Global Volunteering Day – 17th May; Healthy Eating for Schools Initiative allowed Waitrose Walton-on-Thames to partner  with Ashley C of E Primary School to work together to achieve some of these aims.

Focusing on the ‘healthy eating’ theme, the Walton-On-Thames Waitrose provided:

1. Grow packs including seeds from the Waitrose Leckford Estate.
2. A small grant to purchase equipment for future food growing endeavours.
3. Staff to help out as volunteer in the school gardens on 17th May.

The aim is to offer an activity which involves teamwork to inspire and motivate children.

Children are given reinforcement with where their food comes from as well as an understanding of investment by allowing the opportunity to sell their produce outside the Walton-On-Thames store once produced.

Waitrose aim to support more than 200,000 children in our communities every year and hope that this is just the beginning of a strong partnership with Ashley School

Waitrose is committed to bringing people together to create healthier, happier communities. We respect the interests of all the people touched by our business and believe that building strong relationships is key to delivering our vision for sustainability.

Dear Parents,

Summer Term Newsletter No. 5

YEAR 6 SATS COMPLETED

Yesterday our Year 6 children completed their end of Key Stage 2 SATs assessments. The children took tests in Reading Comprehension, Grammar, Punctuation and Spelling, Mental Maths and Maths x 2. We also had a small group of children who took the Level 6 tests for English and Maths. The children have worked extremely hard both in preparation for these tests and during the course of this week. We are sure they will do well.

SQUIRREL CLASS ASSEMBLY

On Wednesday morning, Squirrel Class shared with us a delightful class assembly all about the miraculous transformation of a caterpillar into a butterfly. The children sang and performed beautifully and we thoroughly enjoyed watching them present their learning so confidently in their bug outfits and antennae. We all joined in for a sing-a-long of 5 blue bottles at the end! Well done for such a great assembly, Squirrels 

FOA MAY BALL

The Ashley parents who attended last Saturday’s excellent May Ball at the Oatlands Park Hotel certainly had a great night out. The evening, co-ordinated so well by Sam Fagg, Shereen Meragh and Danielle Nash, was a huge success with drinks on arrival, a three course meal with wine and plenty of strutting on the dancefloor. The only question now is who took the Daniel Craig cut-out home?! Thank you to everyone who made it such a fun night.

FINAL FRENCH CAFÉ

Thank you to all of you who came along to support the final French café of the season this morning. What an outstanding turn-out it was! We have had four French cafés since January and they have all been well attended and most enjoyable. A special thank you to the Year 6 parents and children for their hard work planning, co-ordinating and running these communal café sessions. The café season is now closed until 2014.

YEAR 1 LEARN TO BE FLORISTS – MOLLY, KATY AND SETH REPORT

Today we made flower arrangements. Mrs Hart came to help us. She is a florist. We cut different flowers and poked them into an oasis. They look beautiful and we had lots of fun making them. Thank you, Mrs Hart.

YEAR 1 GREEN STALL – TODAY

And many thanks to the Year 1 parents, who have contributed so much to today’s fantastic Green Stall. The produce for this half-term’s stall and linked to Year 1’s learning about wildflowers includes delicious home-made flower, insect, apricot and chocolate cakes, gingerbread men and butterfly biscuits, rhubarb and ginger compote, packets of wildflower seeds and hand-painted flower pots to grow your wildflowers in. What a lot of care has gone into preparing the Green Stall donations. We really appreciate the time and effort you have put into the stall, Yr 1.

CHAMONIX SPORTS FUN DAY – TOMORROW FROM MIDDAY

The final event for the Chamonix fundraising is tomorrow’s Sports Fun Day. The main focus is the 5-a-side football and we think we have at least 7 teams now participating. Can we make that 10 by tomorrow?! Alongside the football, there will a netball tournament with several teams involved and several other activities for children and adults alike. The gates open at midday, there will be cheerleading at 12.30pm and the first matches will kick off at 1.30pm. With good food and drink available throughout the afternoon and the weather looking like it will remain dry, it promises to be a highly sociable and healthily competitive occasion. Please do come.

PLANTING, SEWING, WEEDING AND WATERING

With all this sunshine and rain, it is the perfect time to be sewing seeds and planting out for the summer. With our Ashley Flower Show on July 8th, we hope that lots of you will join us in growing food and flowers this summer.

Each of our year groups is focusing on a different area of growing during the Summer Term. If you would like to link into that theme, here are the areas of focus:

• Reception Any growing theme

• Year 1 Wildflowers

• Year 2 Bee attracting plants

• Year 3 Fruit plants and trees

• Year 4 Berries and currants

• Year 5 Herbs and salads

• Year 6 Vegetables

THANKSGIVING SERVICES NEXT TUESDAY AND WEDNESDAY

Next week on Tuesday and Wednesday we have our Thanksgiving Services at St Mary’s Church, starting at 10.30am. The short service – we anticipate it will last 30-40 minutes – is an opportunity for us to give thanks for our Church School status. We hope a good number of you will be able to join us. The children will all be performing on both days. If any of you can assist with walking the children to and from the church, please do let your child’s class teacher know.

WAITROSE VOLUNTEERS SUPPORT ASHLEY SCHOOL

We have had four Waitrose volunteers from the local Walton branch in school today, providing manual labour out on the school field, where they have been tidying up our vegetable beds. It is part of a Waitrose initiative whereby each branch across the country supports a local school in its summer food growing. We hope to have further volunteers visiting us each week for the rest of term, lending valuable support to the school.

HOLIDAY REQUESTS

Please be clear that holiday requests should not be made during term-time. If there is an exceptional circumstance such as a funeral or a family wedding, authorisation can be given, but there is a very strong directive from County now that any holiday time out of the school term should not be authorised. We hope you will all support us in ensuring your children are in school during term-time, not on holiday.

INSET DAY NEXT FRIDAY

We break up for half-term a day early next week on Thursday, 23rd May as Friday, 24th May is an Inset Day School Closure. We return after half-term on Monday, 3rd June at the usual time.

Here’s hoping that tomorrow will be dry and that we have a really good turn-out for the Chamonix Sports Fun Day. If you just want to come along and watch, please do. The fun starts at midday. See you there.

Yours sincerely,

Richard Dunne

Headteacher