Please see the latest information below from the Department for Education who are emailing educational settings daily to update us on the government’s response to COVID-19 (Coronavirus).

The importance of hygiene

Personal hygiene is the most important way we can tackle COVID-19, especially washing hands more; and the catch it, bin it, kill it strategy for those with coughs and sneezes.

Wash your hands more often for 20 seconds with soap and hot water.

In addition to handwashing before eating and after sneezing, both children and staff should also wash hands after using toilets and after travelling on public transport.

Please help us in sharing simple and effective hand hygiene messages:

Public Health England has a dedicated webpage with a range of posters and digital materials at:

Sign up is quick, free and means you will be alerted as more resources are made available.

Educational resources

The e-Bug project is led by Public Health England and has a dedicated webpage for learning resources on hand washing and respiratory hygiene.

Resources are currently available for KS1, KS2 and KS3 and can be used in various settings including schools:

Updated travel advice for travellers returning from Italy

The advice remains the same for travellers returning from the lockdown areas of Italy, that you should self-isolate even if you are not showing symptoms. The advice for other parts of Italy has been expanded to cover the whole country: if you have returned from anywhere else in Italy outside of the lockdown areas, you should self-isolate if you develop symptoms and call NHS 111.

The latest travel guidance can be found here:

Further information on what you should do if you are asked to self-isolate can be found here:

Department for Education coronavirus helpline

The Department for Education coronavirus helpline is now available to answer questions about COVID-19 relating to education and children’s social care. Staff, parents and young people can contact this helpline as follows:

Phone: 0800 046 8687
Email: DfE.coronavirushelpline@education.gov.uk
Opening hours: 8am to 6pm (Monday to Friday)

Where to find the latest information

Updates on COVID-19:

Guidance for educational settings:

Travel advice for those travelling and living overseas:

Latest Department for Education information:

On Wednesdays, we are now offering a handwork club after school from 3:15 to 4:30. This will initially be for children in Years 3 to 6 who want to learn skills such as knitting. Thank you to Mrs Jeffries for kindly organising and running this club.

We are aware that some of our KS2 pupils are accessing social networks and apps such as Instagram and Tik Tok, both of which require users to be 13 before they can create an account (Instagram) or use the app (TikTok).

To help keep your child safe online, please visit the following website for information  https://www.net-aware.org.uk/

We have a member of staff who is off work with mumps. Please click on the link below for more information about the infection and if you have any further questions please do not hesitate to speak to me.

https://www.nhsdirect.wales.nhs.uk/encyclopaedia/m/article/mumps

We have had a great start to the spring term and the children have quickly settled back into school and nursery after the Christmas break.

Whole-school Value

Our whole-school worship theme this half term is one of our school values – perseverance – and we have had lots of discussion about our personal goals and aims and how we can achieve these.  The children have been very keen to share what they would like to get better at e.g. neater handwriting, getting more writing done in the lesson, or working more independently in maths, and we have discussed who can help us to achieve our goals and the importance of persevering when things are a bit tricky.

Fundraising News

As you may already be aware, FOBS have arranged a ‘Welcome Back’ disco for Friday 31st January from 3:15  to 5:00, which is open to all children who attend Bicton School or Nursery.

We also have a new idea for fundraising which we hope you will be able to support us with.  We are looking for things which children could buy for Mother’s Day or Father’s Day,so if you have any unwanted gifts e.g. toiletries, etc, that we could sell for 50p/£1 we would be very grateful for any donations.

Reading at Home

We are in the process of putting together a newsletter about reading developments in school and ways to help your child at home. In the meantime, please could we ask that children bring their reading book and reading record book to school every day. Thank you in advance for your support.

Hope you have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Johnson