Realising potential through partnership

FAoS—HIGHLIGHTS—EDITION 7

Watchfield

Retirement of David Wilson: Executive Headteacher of the

Faringdon Academy of Schools

It is with mixed emotions that we announce that, after 23 years, David Wilson is retiring at the end of this

academic year.

Dave Wilson has been an integral part of Faringdon Academy of Schools for many years. Firstly as Head

Teacher at Faringdon Community College - until 2016 - and, since 2012, holding the role of Executive Head for

the Trust.

He was an extraordinary leader for the College and has been, most recently, for the Trust. During his time

with FAoS he has shaped the educational experience of so many students who have attended the college and

our students who have attended the primary schools. He has been a dedicated and inspirational leader

across the Trust, and will be sorely missed.

He is leaving the Trust in a strong position, and we sincerely thank him for his contribution and leadership

during his time with us.

Liz Holmes

Chair of Directors, Faringdon Academy of Schools

Message from David

I just wish to thank all my colleagues who work within the FAoS and all the pupils who make up our very

special Academy. Together they have made my role as Executive Headteacher such a rewarding one.

It has been a pleasure to watch the Academy develop and grow over the last 4 years. I feel proud that I leave

it in such a positive position with all the Academy schools either good or outstanding in terms of Ofsted

grades and with a very capable, enthusiastic group of Headteachers looking after them.

The success of the Academy however is not just down to the hard work of the schools themselves but also the

hard work of the Central Academy Team who provide all those essential support services, such as HR and

finance that allow Heads to concentrate on their core roles, improving teaching and learning and supporting

their pupils and staff. I would like to give a special mention to Mr John Banbrook, Academy Business and

Finance Director, who is leaving the Academy at the end of this month. His tireless enthusiasm and expertise

have been key to our success.

I would also like to congratulate Mr Duncan Millard who is taking over from me for at least the next academic

year. I have known Duncan for over 15 years and have complete faith in the fact that he will take the

Academy from strength to strength.

To all in the FAoS, the future is bright, go forward with my very best wishes. I will miss you.

Our Vision: Every child will be an independent, imaginative achiever with excellent life skills.

The whole school performed Joseph and the

Technicolour Dreamcoat at the end of term to a large

audience of family and friends on our outdoor stage.

The children really made us proud. Weeks of

learning lyrics, rehearsing and perfecting were

certainly worth it as the performance was

outstanding! Well done to all the very talented

children we have.

Prayer week in school was very special - every class

experienced a prayer walk and the quiet garden was

magically transformed to a place of reflection and wonder.

The focus was on the Lord’s Prayer and what it means.

Many children are beginning to understand that prayer can

be valuable even if they don’t believe they are talking to

God. The concept of faith is a huge one and we all question

it at different times. The key thing is to be open to new

ideas and accept that we could change our minds. We hope

we teach our children to think like this in everything.

Sycamore and Beech class have visited Abingdon Science Laboratory.

Sycamore were learning about how animals are adapted for survival. This

included meeting a live python and some other not so alive specimens!

Beech scientists were learning

about the parts of plant and observing what

happens when you put iodine on a leaf.

Two reception

children enjoying

some weekly creative

time making pasta

pictures. Normal

school life.

Our Sports day was a super event. We saw some

fantastic achievements and lots of support for

each other.

Faringdon Infant School

It has been a year full of laughing, playing and learning at Faringdon Infant School! We have been thinking about using our

school ‘Learning Muscles’ in everything that we do to become the best learners that we can!

Outdoor learning is important to us and

we make great use of our Woodland Area,

including the whole school taking part in

Outdoor Classroom Day!

We have been making art work in the style of

Franz Marc and Eric Carle; exploring colour and

creating unusual coloured animals!

Reception children have been learning about

mini beasts and had a visit from Zoolab!

They then made some mini beasts of their own!

Faringdon Junior School

As our Year 6 pupils look forward to their transition days to FCC in preparation for their new adventures at

Secondary school, they are also very busy practising for their Leaver’s Performance – 10 Things To Do Before You Leave Primary

School ! Our other classes will be spending the day with their new teachers and we welcome our new Year 3 children to school for

visits for when they start with us in September.

We will be finishing our term with Sports Day, Discos and Leaver’s BBQ - ready for the summer break.

What an exciting year and busy year we have had!

Curriculum

Pupils across the school have also had an opportunity to take part in a variety of enrichment activities

this term. Highlights of the term include::

*Taking part in BCC Radio Oxford’s Schools Week where the children all did a fantastic job and represented the school very well –

explaining their learning, setting a homework question and choosing a Song of the Day for us all to sing along to !

*Visit by Jay Jay, the Author of the Supersaurus books came to visit and entertained us with an assembly and workshop.

* A group of Year 5/6 children were very fortunate to take part in cycling training sessions, concluding with them taking their pro-

ficiency test at the end – gaining very important life skills of learning the rules of the road and also building their confidence.

We have had a very busy (and hot!) summer term here at Faringdon Junior School. The children have

participated in many events, trips and activities to enhance their learning.

Year 3 visited Badbury Clump as part of the Partnership Earth Education Week – taking part in many

activities such as orienteering, den building and bug hunting ! They

also visited Four Kingdoms Animal Park and Coleshill working on

their Farm to Fork theme, visiting the Organic Farm, the working

Watermill and pond dipping.

Year 5 enjoyed a trip to Hill End where they learned about what

life was like for the

Vikings. They had a chance to take part in some of the daily

activities that they would have

participated in during that age.

Year 6 pupils had a fantastic time on their 4 day residential to

Manor Adventure - taking part in lots of team building activities

and developing their own skills.

Our Storytelling Group performed a fantastic version of Shakespeare’s ‘A Mid-

summer Night’s Dream’ – we were very impressed with how hard they had

worked to learn all their lines and their wonderful portrayal of the characters.

Sports News

Our Sports Teams have been very busy representing the school at various Part-

nership events, showing great determination and respect for their opponents;

the Cricketers came 2nd at the Kwik Cricket Tournament, the Rounders team

came 2nd overall at the FCC Tournament and our Footballers played a very hard

fought game against Buckland—drawing 1:1.

John Blandy Primary

John Blandy’s 50th Birthday Celebration Extravaganza!

From dancing through the decades, to 50 years of documented history of the school, and ‘hook-a-duck’ to inflatable

obstacle courses, I think it is true to say that the whole school and our community celebrated our 50th Anniversary

at the end of June n style!

John Blandy School has been operating for a lot longer than 50 years, but it was the boom in local housing in the

area in the late 60’s that saw the need to move from the old Victorian building (now the scout hut) to the sparkly

new building on the Blandy estate which we now call home!

On the anniversary of the school opening, we held a special celebration afternoon, inviting the entire community as

well as ex-members of staff who now live further afield. It was a delight to see so many members of our local

community attend the celebration, and to meet and talk to several members of staff from years gone by. One of our

previous Headteachers, Mr Chesterton who led the school between Mr Platt and Mr Spring, attended and enjoyed

watching all of the children’s dances…however, he cleverly avoided our camera, so sadly we do not have any

pictures of him! We did however manage to capture Joan Weaving and Pam Barling on camera- two teachers who

served the school when it first opened on our current site (See photo below). Our guests joined us on the school

field to see the children perform some well known dances through the last 50 years (YMCA and Macarena

featured!). After the dance performances our guests were invited into school to see how the fabric of the building

has changed over the last 50 years, and to see some excellent work on display in the hall. The art exhibition also

featured some fantastic artefacts from the schools history, which were very popular amongst the guests.

Ahead of the event, we had sent out invitations to the entire community,

We would like to mention the dedication and hard work of all the staff, for planning exciting learning opportunities

for the children on our fabulous two week ‘Time’ topic . This whole school topic saw the children learning about

how technology, popular culture, our local area and politics have changed over the last 50 years. The children also

certainly deserve a special mention, as they worked incredibly hard to produce the fantastic work that was on

display around the entire school and indeed in our art exhibition, and their dances ‘through the decades’ were

fantastic! We were so incredibly proud of them! And, they impressed everyone with their impeccable behaviour

throughout the event.

Lastly, we held our Family Festival, organised by the Friends of the school which was very successful and enjoyed by

all. The amount that was raised was an impressive £1,100, which we look forward to putting towards our

Playground fund, so that all of the children will benefit from an exciting outdoor environment next academic year.

We would like to thank everyone who attended; it was wonderful to see the real life history of our fantastic school.

A special thank you goes to Pat Dando and Kathy Fletcher, along with the entire Longworth and District History

Society, for their support in sorting through and providing us with some wonderful artefacts linked to the opening

of our school in 1968.

Please enjoy some of the photos as a snippet into the fun and frolics of the day!

A fantastic afternoon was had by

all! We will be burying a school

time capsule at the very end of

term to close the celebrations,

which the children are very

excited about! They have enjoyed

writing messages to the future,

and we hope to be invited back in

50years time to watch it be

unearthed!

Shrivenham C of E Primary School We Play, We Learn, We Achieve

Our summer term started with a ‘chirp’ with the arrival of 10 chicken eggs ready to hatch. We

waited with baited breath to see which egg would hatch first and the hatchery was a very

popular place to be for both children and staff! Amazingly, all ten eggs hatched

and the children really enjoyed learning about the chicks and watching them

grow.

We have taken part in numerous sporting events including tennis, basketball,

cricket and swimming with several medals being won including gold! The whole

school also participated in some yoga sessions where they learnt a range of

different poses and had the opportunity to enjoy exercising in a calm and quiet

environment. Reception, year 1 and year 2 also enjoyed a team building

afternoon where they had to work together to overcome a range of challenges, KS2 still have their day to look

forward to.

To celebrate the Royal Wedding we had a Royal Tea Party where all the children came dressed in their party

clothes and enjoyed sharing a picnic tea together. We were also treated to a

performance by our Maypole dancers.

Later on in the term we held an International Day where each class learnt about a

different country, explored their culture and

tasted some traditional food. The children shared

what they had learnt in our assembly and enjoyed

showing the things that they had made.

We were very proud of our Eco Heroes who represented the school at the 10

year anniversary of the Westmill Wind Farm. Not only were they fantastic

ambassadors but also performed their poem ‘The Winds of Change’ which was

very well received.

We have had many exciting trips this term: Our year 3 and 4 classes have been

very lucky to enjoy two trips, one to Oxenwood where they learnt all about

being a Roman Soldier and also a trip to the Natural

History Museum in London. Our year 5 and 6 classes

had a fabulous week on their residential to Cheddar

where they enjoyed caving, climbing, kayaking, skiing,

tobogganing, archery, disc golf and an assault course, all accompanied by glorious

weather. Our Reception class is looking forward to their trip to the Cotswold Wildlife

Park later this term.

Finally we had a visit from author E. R. Reilly who really captured

the children’s imaginations with ideas for their own story

writing. The whole school were entranced by the author’s retelling of his stories and

many purchased his books to find out what will happen next.

Our final treat of the term was our production club’s performance of The Lion King. The

acting, singing and costumes were amazing and the children really enjoyed putting on

their performance, almost as much as the audience enjoyed watching it!

Watchfield Primary School

Our annual Arts Week took place in May and the school was buzzing with

excitement and action! Each year, we aim to provide a week full of new

opportunities to explore a range of skills, find hidden talents and discover a passion

for the arts. This year, Arts Week was based on a book called ‘Only One You’; a sea-

themed book containing lots of valuable and beautiful messages. We welcomed

amazing and varied visitors ranging from sea shanty singers, a seascape artist and

dance teachers to snakes and other animals. Visitors showcased their talents and taught new skills to the children, including clay work,

Zumba, pirate dances, pilates and steelpan drumming. Our staff had been secretly filming their own music

video—lip syncing to Paloma Faith’s ‘Make your own kind of music’. Midweek, we were very excited to receive

a tweet from Paloma, wishing us good luck in our Arts Week! A creative project to develop our school

environment ran alongside these activities: skilled artists worked with all

children, staff and people from the wider school community to create a

beautiful, permanent mural on an outside wall. We are extremely proud of

our completed mural with its title, 'We are each unique and special but

together we create a masterpiece'. A perfect quote for our wonderful

school!

We had a number of School Trips taking place this term. The children in Foundation Stage spent a

wonderful day at Butterfly World. The children had been learning about lifecycles and it was a

super opportunity for them to have first hand experience of caterpillars, chrysalis and butterflies. The

children also met farm animals and held minibeasts. The excitement of a double decker bus made this

day even more perfect and there were many exhausted children fast asleep when we arrived back at

school!

The children of Year One had a fantastic trip to Westonbirt Arboretum where they had the

opportunity to explore the amazing woodlands and find out all about plants and trees. The children

became a human representation of the different parts of a tree, they were

encouraged to use all their senses to experience nature around them and did some good old tree climbing.

They learnt about bees, the life cycle of plants and had the opportunity to plant seeds as well as create their

own woodland headdresses using flowers, grasses, leaves and seeds that they foraged for themselves. The

weather was beautiful and the children really enjoyed the opportunity to be around nature.

Our annual International Week kicked off in style with a fashion show. The whole school watched as

children from 41 countries, proudly wearing their national attire, danced along the catwalk to music from their

country. We were fortunate to experience workshops led by our international parents. These ranged from Poi

dancing to making Indonesian flowers, Japanese Origami to Fijian dancing and learning Spanish songs, plus

many other activities. We held a British Tea Party in the scorching sunshine. The children were entertained by a magician, did maypole

dancing, ate scones with clotted cream and jam, tried bell ringing and played tennis. A great time was had by all! Throughout the week

our international families brought in delicious food for children and staff to sample.

The Defence Academy Language Centre also came to school with 22 adults from 20

countries. Our classes had 5 minutes with each country at a ‘station’ before moving on

to a new country when they heard the bell. They learnt how to write their names in

Arabic and hieroglyphics and sang Frères Jacques in Persian and Swedish. Very

impressive in just 5 minutes! Our week ended with a group of parents showing us their

national dances; we watched in awe as they showed us how to Salsa dance and do an

Italian spider dance called the Tarantella! We had an amazing time celebrating the

diverse school that we attend, and cannot wait until next year for another fun filled

week.

The summer term at Watchfield Primary School is considered by many as the highlight of our school

year, as our annual Arts Week and International Week both take place this term, as well as a whole

host of activities and school trips.

STEM at Faringdon Community College

This is the 10th Anniversary of STEM (Science

Technology Engineering Maths) activities

taking place at our school.

Over the years this has been a positive

experience for both the feed schools taking

part and the teachers involved.

All the staff continue to be impressed with the enthusiasm displayed from all

students in Year 3, 4 and 5.

The photo’s celebrate these activities over the

previous years .

FARINGDON ACADEMY OF SCHOOLS — FESTIVAL OF VOICES 2018

On Wednesday 21st March Faringdon Community College hosted the Academy

Festival of Voices.

This event saw all the schools from the Academy come together and sing ‘The

Greatest Show’ from the Greatest Showman, followed by songs from the individual

schools. The ages ranged from infants through to secondary with all the children

performing together and on their own brilliantly.

Many thanks to all the children, parents, teachers, the FCC tech

team and the FCC Aspiring leaders who helped look after the

children during performances. It made us all very proud to be part

of the Faringdon Academy of Schools and witness the fantastic

talent that we have within it.

Mrs Kenyon, Miss Gammon

SCHOOL GAMES SUCCESS

Congratulations to all our sports teams who took

part in the County School Games last week.

The U13 girls football team played well despite

losing two of their best players and in the swimming

the boys came 3rd overall with Dylan smashing the

50m front crawl.

The Sports hall athletics teams battled to the bitter

end resulting in 3rd place for the Year 7 girls.

Fantastic achievements all round.

PE Department

Lydia

Reuben

Ella

SCHOOL GAMES AQUATHLON

Congratulations to the Year 7

Aquathlon team who won the

Vale competition and qualify

for the County final in July; and

to the U14 team who came

second and also qualify.

All the students battled to the

end with a fantastic and

exciting finish for the U14’s.

Make sure you get lots of

training in before 4th July!!

PE department

Oxfordshire Schools Cricket Association 2020 Cup.

FCC took on King Alfred’s Under15s with a team consisting of

players from Year’s 8, 9 and 10 at Buscot Park on Wednesday

evening.

Having won the toss, KA’s asked FCC to bat. Zak (Year 10)

opened the batting with David (8), both of whom started in

positive fashion. After David offered an easy catch back to the

bowler, Josh (9) went into bat and continued the early

momentum. Josh and Zak batted together throughout the

best part of the innings, Josh finishing on 28 in the 17th over.

Charlie (9) went in to bat and immediately upped the ante,

hitting 26 off of 17 balls. Zak finished with a marvellous 75 not

out, from a team total of 148-3.

Matt (10) and Roan (9) opened the bowling and were miserly

in keeping KA’s to 7-2 from the first 6 overs. Some excellent

fielding, especially from Matt (10), Sam (10), Hamish (10) and

David (8) kept the pressure on KA’s. Eventually this pressure

gave way to wickets and KA’s were soon 34-7 and struggling

to stay in the game, courtesy of great bowling from Jack (9)

and Josh (9).

In the end, following similarly brilliant contributions from

Amelie (8), Henry (9) and David (8), King Alfred’s were bowled

out for 47 in the final over.

COUNTY CROSS COUNTRY

Congratulations to all the cross country teams that took part in the

County School Games Competition on Tuesday 27th March. This was

the final stage of this round of competitions with our students

representing the Vale as well as Faringdon Community College; and

being faced with tough opposition!

All the students ran well, but it was the Year 10 girls who surprised themselves

by coming second in the County headed up by Izzy (second girl in the County).

Mrs Kenyon, Miss Sutton

Kelsey

The Burnet News Club returned to the Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace this week to attend the Economist Educational

Foundation’s annual awards ceremony.

Following on from last year’s successes in both school and student categories, FCC was again nominated for the school award but

it was one student’s triumph that produced the biggest cheer of the night.

Congratulations must go to Hannah Dolman (8SM), who was one of just 10 students out of over 1,000 in news clubs nationwide to

win an award.

Hannah was recognised for her excellent writing skills, conscious and thought-provoking debate on the club’s online hub and

willingness to embrace current affairs and all of the termly topics.

Her night continued with a reading of one of her news club articles – a well-reasoned and mature opinion piece on whether

Fireman Sam should be renamed Firefighter Sam in our gender equality topic. The reading was so impressive that ITV News anchor

Alistair Stewart, who was one of several famous faces invited to the ceremony, sought Hannah out later in the evening to personally congratulate and commend her!

It was another fantastic evening for FCC’s BNC and we hope to continue to create success stories next year. Anyone in Y7-10 is welcome to attend— see Mr Baker for

more details!

Mr Baker

Once again we were invited to participate in Watchfield Primary Schools’ Arts Week. This is the fourth

year we have been involved and this time the theme was ‘Under the Sea’ and music from the

Caribbean. This started us off on the idea of shipwrecks and pirates

which proved to be a hit with the secondary and primary students

alike.

Our FCC students performed a dance routine and then taught it to

the primary students who had just 15 minutes to prepare for a performance of their own. We were so impressed

with how well they did and every group got up on the stage and

gave fantastic pirate performances.

Following this the Watchfield students were given the opportunity to question each of the pirates

including Blackbeard and William Kidd. They found out details from their past and heard about their

interesting life stories. This culminated in a quiz to see who remembered the most information and

could find the coordinates to uncover the buried treasure!

Miss Whenray and Miss Field were so proud of our FCC students who demonstrated fantastic leadership skills and represented our school

perfectly.

NEWS FROM CROFT FARM…..

I've been looking forward to Croft Farm for months and it was better than I expected. If I could do it

again I would.

On Monday morning we met our groups after registration and decorated our hats with our team

name. Our team was called the floating cucumbers. The coach journey was 1 hour 30 minutes and as

soon as we arrived we had our lunch and got changed for our first activity.

During the week we tried sailing, canoeing, kata-canoeing, kayaking, raft building, wind surfing, SUP

and team challenge. My favourites were sailing and the team challenge. During team challenge we played on the pedalos and were allowed to dive off them.

I've been sailing before but I really enjoyed it at Croft Farm because there was a good wind and we could practice capsizing, which is always fun.

Our bedroom had two bunkbeds in it and we had room inspection everyday. Our highest score during the week was 8.9 thanks to Mr Wilson.

The food was lovely. We had English breakfast every morning, a wrap for lunch and a really nice supper every night

During the evening we played different games or had an activity - Cluedo, egg throwing, disco, camp fire and talent show. All the boys got up to perform in

the talent show and we made up a dance called Dab and Jubilation

Thank you Ms Lewis for

organising this trip.