This Week's News

Friday 20th March 2026

Dear Parents and Carers,

It has been a wonderful week here at Oatlands, topped off by perfect weather for our Reception Forest School sessions. The children, staff, and parents alike threw themselves into the activities, making the most of the mud kitchen, hammocks, and the sunshine on the field. A special thank you to Mrs Willemse for leading these days, and to every parent volunteer who gave up their time to help us.

Our Spring Term poetry assembly yesterday was another highlight. We were incredibly impressed by the recitals from Bumblebees, Jellyfish, and Leopard classes—well done to everyone involved for such confident performances!

On the practical side, we successfully tested our newly upgraded fire alarm system on Tuesday. The children responded brilliantly, and we managed to evacuate the entire school in just over 3 minutes, which is a fantastic result for our first drill with the new installation.

It was lovely to see so many proud faces at parents’ evening this week. Thank you to everyone who joined us to discuss their child's progress. As a gentle reminder for future sessions, our teachers operate on very tight schedules; if you have an appointment, please ensure you are punctual so that every parent gets their full allocated time.

Year 2 enjoyed a virtual session with author Ellie Jackson this morning. They loved hearing her read and had some brilliant questions about what life is really like as a professional writer. We also said a fond (and slightly relieved!) farewell to our duckling friends today. They have grown so much and become quite smelly in such a short time! We wish them well as they move to their new home.

Finally, as Eid ul Fitr marks the end of Ramadan, we would like to wish all of our Muslim families Eid Mubarak. We hope you have a wonderful time of gratitude, charity, and celebration with your family and friends.

Have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the sunshine.

Tanya Mooney

Key Dates in the Next 2 Weeks

Monday 23rd March                         Year 1 Brooklands Visit

Wednesday 25th March                  3.30-6.00pm Pre-booked parent consultations

Friday 27th March                             9.15-10.00 Reception families- Easter Assembly

Friday 27th March 1.00pm              End of Term- No after school clubs & No afternoon Oscar club

Monday 13th April                             8.50am Back to School

Friday 17th April                                 Class photos

You can also see a full list of key dates for the year so far, on the Term Dates & Calendar pages of the school website HERE

Ellie Jackson Book Order Information – Year 2 Parents

To conclude our World Book Day celebrations, we are excited to share that we have secured a special virtual author visit this Friday 20th March for each Year 2 class. Our focus in English over the next few weeks will be on the 'ocean' books by the environmental author Ellie Jackson. Children will be learning and writing about the different animals featured, the challenges they face, and find out about ways we can help to reduce plastic waste in the seas.

Ellie has also made all her books available to us at a special price of £6 each and she will sign and dedicate each copy if you are interested in purchasing a copy. Each child who orders a book will also receive a free bookmark and postcard.

You can place an order now via the School Shop on Arbor and orders are open until 10pm Sunday 22nd March.

Ellie will then send the books to us to give out after the Easter holidays.

Lost Property

As is tradition at the end of term we have a large amount of lost property! Please pop to the school office to have a look through and claim any lonely items.  If the good weather continues we will put the uniform out on tables in the mornings.

To help avoid lost property the PTA have arranged fundraising partnerships with Stikins and My Name Tags. It will not cost you anything extra, but the PTA will earn a 24-30% commission on any sales if you enter our fundraising ID during the checkout process.
Stikins https://www.stikins.co.uk - ID 14825
My Name Tags http://www.mynametags.com - ID 37152

Safeguarding Notice

If you have any concerns about a child’s safety or wellbeing in the school or community, please speak to one of our Designated Safeguarding Leads (DSL). DSL- Tanya Mooney, Head Teacher.  DSL- Phil Copsey, Deputy Head Teacher or DSL-Kelly Grindle, Nurture Lead.

Updates to the Website

The Mental Health & Wellbeing pages of the school website have been updated. Please click HERE to see lots of helpful resources.

Our latest School Development Plan can be found HERE