Message from the Headteacher
As we come to the end of another busy and festive half-term, our school has been filled with lots of excitement and laughter. It has been a wonderfully full few weeks, and I would like to begin by saying a huge thank you to all of our teachers and support staff for their hard work, dedication and commitment to our children. Their care, creativity and professionalism ensure that our pupils continue to thrive, even during the busiest time of the year.
I would also like to offer a heartfelt thank you to our fantastic PTA, whose tireless efforts have helped to make the lead-up to Christmas so special for our whole school community. The Family Bingo Night, Santa’s Grotto – where every child received a gift generously funded by the PTA – the Christmas Bazaar, Christmas Movie Nights, and the Mince Pie and Raffle Evening have created memorable experiences for our families and brought plenty of festive cheer.
I am incredibly proud of all of the children who took part in our Christmas Nativity performances. Their confidence, enthusiasm and teamwork were a joy to watch, and they truly shone on stage, making these performances so special for everyone who attended.
We hope you enjoy reading this newsletter and catching up on all that’s been going on in school over the past half-term. Do be sure to read the individual year group blog posts to see what your child’s year group have been doing.
As the term draws to a close, I would like to wish all of our pupils, families and staff a very happy and restful Christmas break. I hope you enjoy spending precious time with your loved ones, making special memories and taking time to relax and recharge.
We look forward to welcoming everyone back in January, ready for an exciting new term ahead.
Return to School After the Christmas Break
Pupils return to school on Tuesday 6th January 2025 (Monday 5th is a Staff Professional Learning Day).
Attendance at School
This graph shows the percentage of children who have excellent attendance and the percentage of those who have poor attendance. In some cases, we are aware of genuine reasons for school absence.
This graph shows our whole school attendance across the first half-term.
School Attendance
School attendance continues to be a key priority for the Welsh Government, the Local Authority and St Julian’s Primary School, as regular attendance is closely linked to stronger progress, wellbeing and achievement. We do, of course, fully understand that there are genuine and unavoidable reasons for absence, such as illness, and these are always treated with sensitivity. However, research consistently shows that pupils with attendance above 95% are far more likely to reach expected outcomes, while missing just 10 days of school can have a significant impact on learning over a year. Well done to all the children who achieved 100% attendance throughout the Autumn term, not missing a single session. We also need to remind families that the Education Welfare Service has issued a number of Fixed Penalty Notices, which can be given for unauthorised absences, term-time holidays, persistent lateness and failure to secure regular attendance. As a positive incentive, classes that achieve over 97% attendance each week are rewarded with extra playtime, which pupils are always keen to earn. Thank you, as always, to parents and carers for your continued support in ensuring children attend school regularly and on time – it really does make a difference.
School Development Priorities
The school has a Development Plan which sets out clear priorities for improvement each year. As a reminder, these are the four main priorities we are focusing on this year to help make learning and wellbeing even better for everyone at St Julian’s Primary School.
A bit of Christmas Singing
We do a lot of singing at Christmas and still believe it’s important for children to learn some of the traditional Christmas Carols. Enjoy a big of Hark the Herald Angels sing from our junior assembly.
Chartwells Christmas Dinner
This week, children thoroughly enjoyed their festive Christmas dinner, which was beautifully prepared and served by the Chartwells catering team. The hall was filled with smiles as pupils tucked into a traditional Christmas meal. Staff dressed up, put up decorations and turned on the Christmas music as children enjoyed their meal. Thank you to the Chartwells staff for their hard work.
Visit to Downing Street
We were absolutely delighted to take our Pupil Parliament leaders to Downing Street on UK Budget Day for what turned out to be a truly unforgettable experience. We were originally due to visit the Houses of Parliament, but unfortunately the visit had to be cancelled at short notice due to industrial action by parliamentary security staff. Thankfully, one of our parents managed to arrange an incredibly special alternative visit – directly into the Prime Minister’s home at 10 Downing Street.
The children were given a fascinating tour, where they learned about the building’s history and viewed many of the historic items and furniture. They were then able to hold their own ‘parliament meeting’ in the Cabinet Room and even take part in a press conference in the White Drawing Room. It was a phenomenal experience that brought democracy and citizenship to life and one that our pupils will remember for many years to come.
Crazy Hair Day
On Friday 21st November, we proudly supported Children in Need. Children were invited to donate £1 and come to school sporting some wonderfully crazy hair-dos! The creativity on show was fantastic, and it was lovely to see everyone getting involved to help raise money for such an important cause. Thank you to our pupils and families for their generosity and support. We are always blown away by your creativity on Crazy Hair Day!
School Leaders for the Afternoon
One of the funniest and most memorable moments from our Nativity performances this year came in the Reception and Year 4 plays, where children took on the roles of Mr Mansfield, Mr Jones and Mrs Hill. It is slightly scary just how well children pick up our mannerisms and traits – but we absolutely loved seeing ourselves brought to life on stage by our brilliant little actors! On the final day of term, the two pupils who played Mr Mansfield and Mr Jones in the Year 4 performance decided to take things one step further and “take over” the school for the afternoon. They kicked Mr Mansfield out of his office, put out their own tannoy announcement to the whole school to let everyone know they were now in charge, visited classrooms to reward good behaviour, made some decisions and helped out in the infant school. They were fantastic role models and showed excellent leadership – and by the last day of term, Mr Jones and I didn’t have the energy to stop them!
Cluster Christmas Concert
Children in Years 5 and 6 were invited to perform as part of a cluster Christmas concert, alongside pupils from St Julian’s High School and Glan Usk Primary School. Our choir performed a festive Christmas medley including Where Are You Christmas, Underneath the Tree and the Home Alone classic Somewhere in My Memory, before joining together with the other schools for a rousing performance of We Wish You a Merry Christmas. Although there were a few issues with sound and microphones on the night, the children performed brilliantly throughout and represented our school superbly. We were incredibly proud of them.
Singing at Local Care Homes
One of the highlights of the Christmas period for us is always singing at our local care homes. This year, our children visited two local care homes, and the residents absolutely loved having us there. It was a wonderful opportunity for the children to spread some festive cheer and bring smiles to members of our local community.
Singing at Sainsburys
The Choir have been so busy this half-term, but they managed to find time to squeeze in a quick gig at Sainsburys, where we raised just under £200 to go towards food and presents for those in need this Christmas.
Wellbeing Check-in App
At the beginning of this half-term, members of our Department for Health and Wellbeing (also known as the Wellbeing Warriors) came to me with a fantastic idea they had designed themselves. They wanted to create a Wellbeing App that would allow children to electronically request a wellbeing check-in from a member of staff, as well as send kind and encouraging messages to others.
Within just two weeks, we worked together to turn their idea into reality, and we now have a fully functioning Wellbeing App built by us. Children in the junior school can use the iPad in our main entrance to request a wellbeing check-in, ask for support with their learning, suggest improvements for the school, take on a kindness challenge, share a kind message, or even be connected with a new friend. The children have absolutely loved using the app, and we hope it has been a really helpful and positive way for them to feel supported and heard.
Support at Christmas
We would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to the members of St Julian’s Baptist Church for their incredibly generous donation of over £800, which enabled us to purchase Christmas meal hampers for families in need of extra support this Christmas. As well as funding the food hampers, they also very kindly donated some truly lovely presents for our children, helping to ensure that every child felt remembered and valued at this special time of year. Their generosity has made a real difference to many of our families.
We would also like to thank the members of St Julian’s Methodist Church on Caerleon Road for their ongoing support throughout the year, regularly donating food parcels to help families within our school community. In addition, they generously contributed money towards Christmas hampers to provide extra support over the festive period. They also arranged a very special Christmas Craft session for some of our pupils! We are extremely grateful for the kindness, care and continued support shown by our local community – it truly reflects the spirit of working together and supporting one another.
Finally, we would like to express our sincere gratitude to the Beechwood Ward Councillors – Cllr Davies, Cllr Spencer and Cllr Pimm, for their generous donation of a Christmas food hamper and several toys for one of our families. Their thoughtfulness and support at this time of year have been greatly appreciated, and once again demonstrate the strength and compassion of our local community.
Merry Makers Family Event
Thank you to all the families who signed up to take part in our Merry Makers Christmas Craft event. The children created some wonderful festive crafts, and we were so impressed with the creativity and effort on display. We are sorry that we did not have enough capacity for everyone who wished to attend, but there will be more events like this in the coming year. A special thank you to Mrs Howells and Mrs Walshe for all their hard work in organising and hosting such a lovely event.
Goodbye Tree
Sadly, the tree outside the junior main entrance had to be cut down this month. It was extremely old and affected by disease, which meant that the branches were becoming unsafe. The tree had stood there for many, many years and holds special memories for past pupils – if you attended St Julian’s Primary and remember the tree, we would love to hear from you.
Santa Visits
Santa has visited St Julian’s Primary a few times throughout December. The PTA arranged for every child to visit his Grotto and have a special present at the beginning of the month, and then he reappeared this week with some extra chocolate coins because he had heard how wonderful our children had been. Enjoy the infant children’s reaction as they hear bells in assembly!
Carol Service
Our annual Carol Service was a truly wonderful occasion – our choirs performed several Christmas songs, the congregation joined in enthusiastically with a number of traditional carols, and pupils confidently read the Christmas story, reminding us of the true meaning of the season. We were also treated to festive fun from Mr Mansfield, who demonstrated some of this year’s most popular toys and games, alongside a range of Christmas sketches and poems performed brilliantly by our pupils. We are incredibly proud of everyone who took part and very grateful to all who attended to support the children. A particular thank you goes to Lee and Michele, the leaders at St Julian’s Baptist Church, for so kindly hosting us and making the evening so special.
Nativity Concerts
I absolutely loved watching all of our Christmas Nativity plays this year and I am incredibly proud of every single child who took part. From Nursery through to Year 4, we had a fantastic seven Nativity performances (and that’s not even counting the dress rehearsals!) – each one was truly wonderful and showcased the confidence, enthusiasm and joy of our children.
A huge thank you goes to our amazing staff, who put in so much time and effort to organise, rehearse and produce these special performances. I am also grateful to families for supporting the photo and video sales; the money raised goes directly towards purchasing costumes and props each year, meaning we don’t need to ask parents to fund these at a time when there are already so many other expenses.
PTA Bingo Night
Our PTA Bingo Night was a huge success, with the junior hall packed full of families enjoying a fantastic evening together. PTA members did a brilliant job serving pizza, nachos and ice cream, keeping everyone well fed while the games got underway. A special thank you to Mr Jones and Miss Shepherd for calling the bingo numbers and keeping the atmosphere buzzing. With an amazing range of prizes up for grabs, including Celtic Manor vouchers, Google Home Hubs and lots more, it was a thoroughly enjoyable night. Thank you to everyone who came along and helped make the evening such a success.
Year 4 Christmas Meal
At St Julian’s Primary School, we have designed a REAL curriculum, meaning that we aim to make learning as real, meaningful and authentic as possible, so that children can apply their knowledge and skills in practical, purposeful contexts. A wonderful example of this was seen in Year 4, where the children had a fantastic time planning, researching, budgeting for, shopping for and then cooking their own Christmas meal. Through this experience, they developed valuable life skills alongside their learning in maths, literacy and teamwork – and they even made enough to share with Mr Mansfield… it was delicious!
Christmas Bazaar
We are grateful to the PTA who organised a wonderful Christmas Bazaar for our families. There were lots of stalls, including sweet stalls, gift stalls and games. We were also really grateful that ‘Just Sing’, a local choir involving many of our past-pupils entertained on stage as people shopped. We managed to raise just under £500 for the PTA.
Proud of Two of our Pupils
We are proud of all our pupils, but two pupils have really impressed us this half-term. One pupil in Year 1 has been getting sponsorship to fly on an extremely fast zip-wire in order to raise money for a special charity. Another of our pupils in Year 2 has been packing lots of toiletry bags to give to people in need over Christmas. We are so proud of these ethical, informed citizens who are showing care for others.
Stay Safe Online
At this time of year, many children will be receiving electronic devices for Christmas, whether that’s a laptop, Chromebook, smartphone or tablet. While these can be fantastic tools for learning and entertainment, we kindly remind parents and carers of the importance of keeping children safe online. We recommend setting up parental controls, checking privacy settings, agreeing clear screen-time rules and talking regularly with your child about what they are doing online and who they are communicating with. Helpful advice, age-appropriate reviews and family guides can be found on the Common Sense Media website, as well as Internet Matters, NSPCC, and ThinkUKnow. Working together, we can help ensure our children enjoy their new devices safely and responsibly.
Say Something in Welsh Over Christmas!
Here are some Christmassy Welsh Phrases from our ‘Criw Cymraeg’ which you and your family can enjoy using over the Christmas period…
Christmas Greetings
- Nadolig Llawen! – Merry Christmas!
- Nadolig Llawen i bawb! – Merry Christmas everyone!
- Blwyddyn Newydd Dda! – Happy New Year!
Festive Feelings
- Dw i’n hoffi’r Nadolig. – I like Christmas.
- Mae’r Nadolig yn hwyl! – Christmas is fun!
- Dw i’n gyffrous am y Nadolig! – I am excited about Christmas!
- Dw i’n hapus iawn. – I am very happy.
Christmas Characters & Things
- Siôn Corn – Santa Claus
- Coeden Nadolig – Christmas tree
- Anrheg – Present
- Seren – Star
- Angel – Angel
- Rudolf y Carw – Rudolph the Reindeer
Christmas Treats
- Bisgedi Nadolig – Christmas biscuits
- Siocled poeth – Hot chocolate
- Pwdin Nadolig – Christmas pudding
Simple Polite Phrases
- Diolch yn fawr. – Thank you very much.
- Os gwelwch yn dda. – Please.
- Croeso. – You’re welcome.
Upcoming Dates
- Monday 5th January – Staff Training Day
- Tuesday 6th January – Pupils Return to School
- February 16th – 20th – Half Term Break
PTA School Equipment for Sale
The PTA are selling school-branded equipment. You can purchase them on ParentPay or from the school office.
Online Suggestion Box
Thanks to those of you who submitted suggestions to improve our school in the last couple of newsletters! The suggestions we received so far are:
- Host a family BBQ ✅
- Open up the school field in the summer break to let children meet up with each other to play. (We’re looking into this one. Obviously, we would need staff available and willing but will keep you posted if we can make something work!)
- Let younger children join in the colour run on the last day ✅
- Get more play equipment on junior yard for older children – (we’re working on increasing the equipment – we’ve purchased sheds and lots of equipment, but a fair bit has been damaged since it was bought at Easter)
- Hold a 3d printing workshop for kids and parents – (look out for this, it will be coming soon)
If you have any ideas on what we need to work on or improve as a school, please do let us know! If we adopt your idea, we’ll buy you a box of chocolates! You can use this link.
School Essentials Grant Information
If you’re in receipt of certain benefits, you may be eligible for the School Essentials grant. More information can be found here.
Online Office
Don’t forget that you can access our online office whenever you need, with searchable information, absence reporting forms and lots of other information too!
Safeguarding
Schools have a legal duty to safeguard and protect all pupils from harm. This means that staff are trained to recognise any signs that a child may be at risk and to take prompt action to keep them safe. Parents and carers can find out more about how schools keep children safe in the Keeping Learners Safe leaflet.
Please also see this leaflet which explains that physical chastisement (smacking or hitting a child) is against the law in Wales, and provides helpful guidance for parents on positive and safe ways to support children’s behaviour.
Helping Hands
Visit our Help at Home page for general ideas and tips for helping children with their learning at home.
Your child can access the online lessons we’ve created with key information linked to the learning themes in our school curriculum.
Contact our Family Support Worker for support with a range of things.
Browse our online parenting leaflets or visit the Welsh Government’s Parenting-Give-It-Time resources.
National Eisteddfod Coming to Newport
The Urdd National Eisteddfod will be held in Newport in 2027, at the grounds of Tredegar House. This will be the first time the youth festival has visited the city, with specific dates and organisers still to be confirmed, though it typically coincides with the spring half term.
Class Dojo – Main Communication Platform
We want to remind all parents and carers that Class Dojo is our main communication tool for sharing important school updates and class news. Through the app, you can receive whole school announcements, as well as specific updates from your child’s class teacher. Make sure that you can see both the Whole School Story Feed as well as your child’s classroom feeds. It’s a great way to stay informed about events, learning activities, and key reminders. We also use the online calendar which notifies parents of upcoming events. You can control the notification settings in the app to increase the number of reminders or reduce them. Please note that we don’t use the private messaging feature of the App, so don’t message us using that as we won’t see it.
If you haven’t already, please make sure you have the app and are connected to your child’s class.
Updates from Each Year Group
Reception Autumn B Update
Reception have had a very busy and exciting half term, packed full of learning, experiences and festive fun! We began the half term by exploring Bonfire Night, where the children…
Nursery Autumn B Update
We have had such a wonderful Autumn B term, filled with learning, creativity and festive excitement. The children have become increasingly independent, especially during snack time, confidently choosing their food,…
Year 3 Autumn B Update
What a fantastic term it has been in Year 3! As we reach the end of our autumn adventures and head into the Christmas break, we’ve been looking back at…
Year 5 Autumn B
During our theme, children used historical evidence, such as the 1842 census and burial records in Llanover, to understand how tough life was in Blaenavon – Iron Town. Families experienced…
Year 6 Autumn B Update
As we come to the end of another busy and exciting half term in Year 6, we would like to share some highlights of all the fantastic learning that has…
Year 2 Autumn B update
This term, we have been busy learning about space and astronauts as part of our ‘Newport under the stars’ theme. We made some tasty star biscuits by being very clever…
Year 1 Autumn B Update
Wow! What a busy half term we have had in Year 1! Year 1 have had a very busy and exciting time at school! We have been learning about Evil…
Year 4 Autumn B
Year 4 – What a Busy and Brilliant Term! Our Year 4 children have had an exciting and creative term full of learning and memorable experiences! In English and History,…
