Wonderful Week Two
Another week of checking in and catching up has, again, ended far too soon. It has been a very successful week as everyday children would run though the school gates with huge smiles to greet their friends and teachers with an enthusiastic and cheery “Hello!”.
There were some children who came this week that had not attended the previous week and, although some initially looked a little unsure, as they spotted their friends and teacher waiting for them their faces lit up and any uncertainty vanished. It was delightful to see!
Children were thoroughly engaged in a range of activities across the whole school. Art, music and plenty of outdoor sports and exploration took place this week. The purpose, as always, was the wellbeing of the children and to create a relaxed environment where they could catch up with each other and their teachers.
The weather was not on our side for some of the week, but that didn’t stop us from making the most of our various outdoor areas! Children from the YYD Hub took part in Forest Schools with Mrs Price where they made kites to fly, fires to toast marshmallows and potato stickmen !!
Children attending school also made fantastic use of the Forest Schools area. They climbed and hugged trees, swung on rope swings and hunted among the bushes for minibeasts!
Children enjoyed a variety of sports on the MUGA, both on the grounds of Ysgol y Ddraig as well as the Comprehensive School next door.
Climbing and balancing skills were developed on our timber trail…
…and over on the field, some foundation phase pupils had their own mini sports days, with egg and spoon, running, hopping and walking backwards races!
Reception and year 1 explored the gardens looking for minibeasts…
…and of course we made great use of our classroom outdoor areas, creating tricky obstacle courses!
Our Nursery were back this week! It was so lovely to see them again, they’ve grown so much! They made excellent use of their large outdoor area too, learning skills such as balancing on the new bikes…
…and had a great time learning co operation through play and creating super artwork…
And it wasn’t just in nursery where you could find budding artists creating exciting masterpieces! Across the school, beautiful pieces of art were being created with different themes, inspiration and meanings.
Year 6 were inspired by the work of Picasso..
Year 5 did some super detailed drawings of beetles…
Year 3&4 used online drawing tutorials to create all sorts of characters and animals.
Year 2 took inspiration from a book titled “The Dot” and it’s amazing what the children managed to create from a single dot on their paper.
Year 1 and some of Year 2 read “The Invisible String” and took the meaning from this story to create a picture of the people and animals special to them, connected together with an invisible string of love! Beautiful.
Reception painted their favourite things and were able to talk about why they chose them. So colourful!
In the YYD Hub, children were being very creative with pasta!
Not only was there art but there was music, dancing and singing too!
Follow our Twitter @ysgolyddraig for more pictures daily!
See you all again next week for more checking in, catching up, smiles and laughter 😀
Our First Week Back
Our first week back was a huge success!
It was a great week of catching up and checking in with our children. There were so many happy smiling faces and it was lovely to hear the children laughing and see them taking part in activities with their friends.
Most of the children came in with huge smiles, and those who looked a little unsure as they arrived, left with happy faces and wishing they could stay longer (and we wished we could have had them for longer!!)
Across the school, the activities focussed on the wellbeing of the children. Foundation phase pupils created rainbows and wrote a message for their friends to see when they came in later in the week, or wrote something positive about themselves or a loved one. In KS2, year 3 created some fantastic natural art using materials found outside and year 6 created paintings in the style of Monet, which were so good they belong in an art gallery!
Children enjoyed chatting to their teachers and friends about what they had been up to while away from school and enjoyed listening to stories and playing games.
Everyone made the most of the outdoor areas. Children explored the gardens on a mini beast hunt, the forest area was used to make rope swings and climb trees. Year 6 made use of the MUGA on the comp grounds to do all sorts of different sports while year 4 did the same in our MUGA. The playground was great for playing hoop games for years 2 and 5 and on the field you could find year 3 collecting materials for their natural art!
And of course, our YYD Hub was busy too! The children there created some wonderful art indoors and took part in Forest Schools with Mrs Price where they made bird boxes, climbed trees and chilled out in the hammock! They have been helping Mrs Kirkham with some gardening, preparing soil and planting flowers. Da iawn! It’s looking fabulous!
Here is a roundup of the week! There were lots of wonderful pictures posted to our Twitter feed so make sure to follow us if you’re not already @ysgolyddraig.
Have a great weekend and we hope to all of your smiling faces back again next week!
NewsFlash 03.07.20
ACE News Flash
Click on the image below to view our ACE News Flash 1.6.20
You are ACE
This week, teachers have been VERY busy writing postcards for the pupils in their classes. We hope you all enjoy reading them. We are all thinking of you and miss you all very much! Here are some of those pupils who have already received them!
YYD Music Video!
That’s right…we did it! A video with a special message to all our pupils who we miss very much!
We hope you’re all keeping safe and remember…..
Don’t worry, about a thing
Cos every little thing
is gonna be alright!
Easter Egg Delivery
Super job by all involved in delivering Easter eggs to all the children from Ysgol y Ddraig!
Here are just some of those happy faces!
Via Twitter @Ysgolyddraig @MrsBrockJr
Via Twitter @ysgolyddraig @__Miss_Rose__
Via Twitter @ysgolyddraig @robblake13
Via Twitter @ysgolyddraig @Nic_Farmer
Two Weeks…
Well! What a fortnight! How quickly things can change and then change again, oh and again.
First of all, I’ve got to say how incredibly proud I am to be a part of such an amazing team at Ysgol y Ddraig. Everyone has been dealing with this uncertain and ever-changing situation in the most committed and positive way to help make sure that all pupils of Ysgol y Ddraig, whether they are online or off still feel a part of our school.
Behind the doors there is a lot going on and when you think of what our headteacher and leadership team must be having to do and think about!? How do you even begin to plan for a completely new scenario like this? Let alone carry out that plan when everything can change at the drop of a hat. And yet they have done it and are doing it. They have been as clear and open and honest with us from day 1 as they could possibly be considering how fast it can change.
All the staff have been working so hard to get people access to the online learning platforms, making paper packs for those who can’t access it, planning and setting work to use on the online systems, making sure our school is welcoming, friendly and as clean and safe as possible for children of key workers and staff, delivering free school meals, organising a system to loan our Chromebooks to those who need them and, from Friday 27th March, delivering Easter eggs to every pupil of our school with a personalised message attached!
The children have been just super. They have learnt the importance of handwashing and all have been keeping up their hand hygiene without complaint. They have been engaging with their online learning tasks at school and at home while being responsible, respectful and safe.
It’s not been the easiest time for parents and carers either. Having to help their children learn from home and getting used to the new online learning systems can be very stressful without everything else going on around them. But I have to say, every parent or carer I have spoken to over the last week has been enthusiastic and eager to help their children get online and involved in our cloud based Ysgol y Ddraig.
I particularly admire those people who really find it hard to get to grips with technology, it’s not second nature to many people and yet they have persevered. Well done, seriously!
Those who were having difficulties because their technology was letting them down (Fire tablet, I’m looking at you) told me they had been making their own plans for learning at home and finding work books for their children to complete or requesting paper packs. The commitment to their children’s continued education is truly wonderful.
Our school have begun to loan out Chromebooks to families who most need them, we hope to get as many pupils online as possible, not just for learning purposes but also to maintain contact with the pupils and families who, up until recently, we had been having daily contact with. We miss you all!
Despite the move to online learning, let’s not forget the importance of “real world” learning! Children might learn to bake with a grown up, play board games and card games and generally being in each other’s company at home. During this time of huge change, communicating with our children by simply having a conversation or sharing a joke is so important.
This is a situation none of us have ever experienced or could ever have anticipated. This is an incredibly difficult and unnerving time and yet we pull together.
Miss Rose
Ysgol y Ddraig 