FIRE, FIRE…JUST A VISIT On 24th September, classes 3/4B, 3C and 3P had a visit from Devon Fire and Rescue Service to talk about fire safety. They discussed fire hazards at home, making a fire escape plan at home, the role of smoke alarms, and the “stop, drop and roll” technique. The best part, of course, was dressing up in the fire-fighter’s uniform!

RHIANNON HAS A BUMPER CROP! Congratulations and well done to Rhiannon Pett from 5H who took home the trophy for the potato growing competition with a fantastic 1776g of potatoes.

FUN AT THE ZOO FOR YEAR THREE Residential trips at Bluecoat Primary started with Year Three children visiting Paignton. During their trip the children visited Living Coasts, had a tour of the caves at Kents Cavern and enjoyed visits to Paignton Zoo both during the day and the evening. Things got off to an interesting start when the bus broke down on the first day but no-one let this or the weather dampen their spirits and a great time was had by all. A trip to Woodlands finished the week off with both children and staff getting soggy on the rides!

MON 28 OCT - FRI 1 NOV 2013 Half– Term MON 4 NOV - FRI 8 NOV 2013 Parent Consultation Week THURSDAY 14 DECEMBER 2013 FoTB Cake Sale FRIDAY 13 DECEMBER 2013 FoTB Christmas Fayre FRIDAY 20 DECEMBER 2013 Last Day of Term

WELCOME BACK TO GREAT TORRINGTON BLUECOAT PRIMARY SCHOOL What a fantastic start we have got off to at our new primary school. In just this half term we have had three residential trips, a visit from a magician, children and staff dressing up for evacuee day, enjoyed our harvest celebrations and been treated to a fantastic performance by Theatre Alibi. All of these activities have been linked to some brilliant and enthusiastic learning for your children.

Chairperson: Sue Kavanagh

Vice Chairperson: Laura Ward Treasurer: Anthea Sussex Secretary: Kay Holloway

You can now contact us via our new email address – fotb@bluecoat-primary.org

Friends of Torrington Bluecoat kicked off the year with a complete review of our fundraising activities as, following the amalgamation, we would like to ensure we provide a broad range of events that engage pupils of all ages. Here is an update for you:

FAYRES We will be continuing with our annual Christmas and Summer Fayres and our Easter Eggstravaganza event as these prove to be very popular and raise fantastic funds for the school. This year’s Christmas Fayre will be held on Friday 13th December.

COFFEE AFTERNOONS / CAKE SALES Coffee afternoons will continue for the lower school and to give you more opportunities to attend we will be alternating between in school and after school sessions. Our October event raised an amazing £133.30 – thank you so much for the wonderful parent volunteers who helped make this such a success. We will be holding an after-school event along with a cake sale on Thursday 14th November – look out for details nearer the time.

DISCOS We have decided to consolidate the old style infant and junior discos and reduce their frequency to ensure we

can add some new events to our annual calendar. There will now be a Harvest / Barn Dance, Valentine and Summer disco and the format of these will be slightly more interactive – watch this space! For the upper school disco we will be working closely with the school to ensure

we respect the Healthy School initiative to provide a broader range of snacks for your children to enjoy. There will still be some confectionery but healthy options will be on offer too.

BINGO We will continue with our successful bingo events with a Christmas, Easter and Sum-mer session. We have set a provisional date for the Christmas Bingo of Tuesday 3rd December and we hope to confirm this shortly.

CHRISTMAS CARD PROJECT Children across the whole school have been busy creating their Christmas card designs for this year’s project and you will be receiving order forms in November so you can purchase personalised cards. This year you will also have the opportunity to buy gift tags and mugs in the same design. The mugs would be a perfect stocking filler for grandparents and the cards are always a delight to receive. So, there is no need to stock up on your Christmas cards yet – hang fire for your child’s creative design!

NEW EVENTS We would like to add some new events to the annual fundraising calendar and at our last meeting a range of ideas were put forward including, a race night, a sports night incorporating the Fun Run, a games night including children’s bingo, a treasure hunt, photography competi-tion, quiz sheets, looking at recycling opportunities and commission shopping. We hope to run with some of these ideas in 2014.

As mentioned in the last newsletter 60% of all funds raised will now go towards supplying ICT equipment across the school for your children with the remaining funds continuing to pay for visits, like the recent magician in the lower school, and subsidising trips and activities across all year groups.

As always we are keen to have new volunteers so if you can spare a couple of hours here and there or help at any of our events please get in touch via our email fotb@bluecoat-primary.org or leave a message for us at school reception.

Thank you for your support. FoTB Committee

YEAR ONE CHILDREN HELP TO RAISE MONEY FOR THE PLOUGH Year One classes 1M and 1T visited the Plough theatre to enjoy a showing of Toy Story and at the same time helped to raise money for the Plough. Not only did the children have a fabulous time, it also helped them with their learning back in the classroom as their topic this half-term was ‘Toys’.

Coffee afternoons will continue for the lower school and to give you more opportunities to attend we will be

A brief look at some of the events

coming up in Torrington!

(and surrounding areas) OCTOBER HALF-TERM FUN AT ROSEMOOR

Autumn is a great time to get out and about!

Enjoy the colours of the season, and put all of

your senses to the test with our fun workshops.

All activities are FREE with normal garden admission.

Woodcraft weekend including Pumpkin Day 26th & 27th October (10am - 3pm)

Get ready for Halloween by carving your own pumpkin at

our lantern making workshops (pumpkins supplied at £1

each).

Jungle necklaces workshop

28th October (11am, 12pm, 2pm or 3pm)

Make your own camouflage paper from crazy colours to

turn into beads fit for a chief. Thread these together with

a mix of other materials to make your very own jungle

necklace.

Autumn sense-ometer machine workshop

29th October (11am, 12pm, 2pm or 3pm)

Build your own machine to help you experience autumn

at Rosemoor with all your senses - sight, sound, smell and

touch. Then, test out your machine in the garden!

Autumn sensory walks

30th October (11am, 12pm, 2pm or 3pm)

Join a walk of discovery through the colourful woods and

crunchy fallen leaves of Rosemoor’s beautiful garden. Fun

for the whole family and good exercise too! Wear your

wellies and wrap up warm.

Autumn colour hangings workshop

31st October (11am, 12pm, 2pm or 3pm)

As the countryside starts to change colour, come and take

a closer look at the wonders of nature. Mrs Recycle will

help you make colourful hangings using autumn sweep-

ings and foraged finds.

Sense-ational autumn artwork workshop

1st November (11am, 12pm, 2pm or 3pm)

Join the Education team and have fun making your own

artwork using autumnal colours and natural materials

gathered from the garden.

SAFETY AND NUMBERS FOR RECEPTION CHILDREN The Reception children have been thinking about numbers. Whilst thinking about number four they realised that cars and lorries have four wheels. They then started to think about how to cross the road safely and so invited Charlie the lollipop man to come and talk to them. He talked about how to be safe when out and about; where to walk to be safe and how to cross the road. Thank you Charlie! He even let us dress up in his reflective coat and hold the lollipop to stop the traffic. The children were inspired and made their own crossing in school and practiced being safe and stopping the traffic. Look out for Charlie the next time you are crossing New Road.

A big Thank You to all those of you who came to the reading volunteer meeting and are now supporting our children with their reading - we still have

classes of all age groups who would benefit from support so please contact Rebecca Hallett if you think you can help.

NOTICES AND REMINDERS The Foundation team would like to have some

long, floor number lines made out of hessian. If there are any willing volunteers with a robust/ industrial sewing machine, who would be able to sew some hessian please speak to Mrs Tucker. Thank you.

Please remember the school has a policy of no dogs on site, this includes being tied to the school gates. Also Scooters must be dismounted before entering the school site.

YEAR SIX HEAD OFF TO BUDE Many of the Year Six children set off for a trip sure to excite and exhaust! Accompanied by staff they made their way to Adventure International for an action packed week which included events such as surfing, climbing, high roping and mountain boarding to name but a few. No relaxing in the evenings either as activities ranged from football tournaments and tug of war to karaoke and limbo competitions. This together with an early morning run each day made for some very tired, but happy children (and staff) on their return. The children were brilliant and showed great team spirit, en-couraging each other all the way. Well done to Group B who brought the award for Superteam back to Bluecoat Primary. Many thanks to the staff who joined the children and helped to make this trip one the children will remember for years to come.

NEW SCHOOL, NEW WEBSITE Please note that the school now has the new website address of bluecoat-primary.org The website is up and running but please note that some pages are still to be completed. We will regularly update the website with news and events happening across the school. You can also find information on all aspects of the school from the school prospectus to homework information. Please take a look.

A TRIP TO TOWN FOR THE NURSERY After reading the Very Hungry Caterpillar Nursery children went shopping in the town. A big Thank You to Sarah from John Patts for donating some lovely fruit for the fruit salad we made and to Sandfords Bakery who showed us the ovens and dough mixers so we could find out about Harvest and how bread is made.

A MAGICAL START TO THE YEAR FOR YEAR TWO! Year Two began their new Magical Me topic with workshops from magician Hat McCool. All Year Twos had to take the secret magic oath and swear to only share their newly learned tricks with fellow magicians. The children had previously made their own Harry Potter wands, collected from Forest School, and painted them with their own designs. They learnt the magical phrase 'smelly jelly' for any magical mischief with their wands. During the workshops, the children learnt how to make a bead disappear from inside a cup and also how to make magic coins appear in their palms. The school hall was filled with gasps from amazed children... and teachers! Not only did the children learn how to perform these tricks, they also watched Hat McCool do up his own shoe laces without touching them! Year Two would like to thank FOTB for funding such a wonderful

learning experience to kick-off our new term!