April 2010 - Scholastic Book Fair

CONGRATULTIONS
Your Scholastic Book fair has raised £1181 in FREE books for the school
Click here for the certificate

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March 10 - Get Going, Get Growing - Saturday 24th April

HELP NEEDED - YOUR CUTTINGS OR PLANTS
Do you have any plants that need dividing or that cuttings could be taken from?
Or maybe your neighbours or relatives might have some cuttings they could donate.
We are looking for a variety of plants that can be sold at our
Get Going, Get Growing Day on Saturday 24th April.
Please bring any plants into school during the first week of term after the holidays.
Thank you.

March 10: Spring into Action Roadshow
Change 4 Life
full of facts and acitivities relating to health and fitness
Spring into Action Roadshow: March 22nd:
click for more information

March 10: Planting a Forest
We had a delivery of 3 boxes of trees this week from the Woodland Trust. A team of children and helpers spent a sunny morning planting them in the Forest Schools pond area.
Click here to see the photos
We are delighted because they are all hedgerow trees which will grow up into super habitats for lots of different creatures from spiders to small birds. We can also use the fallen twigs and leaves in Forest School activities. Thank you to everyone who helped with the planting morning.
Click here for woodland activities you can do at home.

January 2010:
The Gambia for Voluntary Services Overseas

Charity Club organised a non uniform day for Emma Shannon who worked at Red Oaks for two years. She is now working in The Gambia for Voluntary Services Overseas as a teacher trainer. Emma has to raise her own finances in order to work in The Gambia.
There are not enough teachers in The Gambia and a lot of the teachers have never had any formal teacher training.

She and a colleague visit the local schools and assess their needs then, they either run a workshop for the teachers or work alongside them in the classroom, in order to raise educational standards.

Click here to see the PowerPoint Presentation (5.3MB)
(and here for the PDF version)

Wow! What an amazing number of cakes you donated to raise money for Haiti.
An enormous thank you. Watch the video here

January 2010: Snow!!!
Pictures from pupils taken out and about at home plus photos by Mrs M of snow at school. Click to view

Red Oaks' first Harvest Show was a huge success this week with more than 75 entries in 10 categories.
We had huge marrows, a 6kg pumpkin, enormous runner beans, ugly carrots and hilarious vegesauruses! It was hard work trying to choose winners in each category. Everyone who entered deserves to feel very proud of themselves, even if they didn't win a rosette. It's great to see that so many families in north Swindon are growing their own.
Well done everyone! Click here to view all the images

What's been growing in your garden this summer? Anything huge? Anything ugly? Can you use some fruit and vegetables (that don't have to have been grown in your garden) to make a vegetable monster, a Vegesaurus? Bring along your produce to the Harvest Show on Wednesday 23rd September. There will be prizes for the best entry in each category.
Categories:
1. 3 straight carrots
2. 5 potatoes
3. 3 tomatoes - on a vine or separate
4. A selection of 3 root vegetables
5. Longest runner bean
6. Heaviest pumpkin
7. Largest courgette or marrow
8. Most unusual vegetable
9. Ugliest vegetable
10. Vegesaurus - an animal made entirely from fruit and vegetables

Can you do better than Miss Menzies and create a fabulous vegesaurus for the Harvest Show next week?

Notes:

• All vegetables (apart from the vegesaurus ingredients) must have been grown in your garden, house or allotment or that of one of your friends or family members.
• You can display your vegetables in a dish, plate or bowl or bring them in in a bag for us to display.
• Each category will be judged by a team of staff and children.

Please see Miss Menzies if you have any queries.

In addition as part of our Harvest Celebration, Red Oaks School Charity Club has decided to support 2 charities. A local one, Swindon Foodbank, and our South African link school:
click here to find out how you can help

Wednesday 16th September is the Red Oaks bike ride to Lydiard.
We will all meet up at the big oak tree pot at the main entrance. The departure time is 3:25pm. We look forward to seeing you. If you have not yet signed up for this exciting event you can collect a form from the school office.
(In the unfortunate event that this bike ride is cancelled we will contact you by text message.)