As we approach the end of another school year I would like to say a huge thank you to the Dorchester community for the continued support for our wonderful little school. One of our outgoing Year Six children told a visitor ‘We are a small school with a big heart.’

The opportunities offered to us from our community are excellent and some highlights from this year have been the Opera in the Abbey, continued visits to forest school and the fun of the festival with Nick Cope.

We would also like to say a huge thank you to the Hurst Water Meadow Trust who have funded a specialist forest school teacher for us so all our children have had enjoyed regular afternoons out at Forest School this year.

We still have so much to look forward to and we are hoping the weather improves for our upcoming sports day and our summer fete.

Our older children are preparing for their residential trip to Woodlands and are very much looking forward to their week of adventures; climbing, canoeing, caving and making lots of new friends.

We also have trips out to Beale Park and the Ashmolean Museum to look forward to.

Please do take some time to visit ‘Birinox’; the Ox we decorated for the Sobell House Oxtrail over summer. You will find him in Pettits Menswear in Wallingford.

We are really proud of everything being achieved in our school and we would love to welcome you for a tour on the morning of 14^th November if you are looking for a school place in September 2025.

We are very much looking forward to welcoming our new children into our Reception Class in September.

We would also like to wish our Year Six children all the very best as they transition into secondary school in September. We know they are going to do us proud.

We hope everyone has a wonderful summer.

We run a breakfast club and an after-school club. We have places available and if you would like to see what we could offer your child please give us a call to arrange a tour. You can find out more from our website here: https://www.st-birinus-pri.oxon.sch.uk/

https://www.st-birinus-pri.oxon.sch.uk/

Jo Staples
Headteacher

We love being a part of this community and we would like to thank the Dorchester Festival organisers for the wonderful opportunities offered to our school as part of the festival this year. Our Year 3,4 and 5 children absolutely loved taking part in the opera. They made friends from other local schools and were able to sing alongside professional opera singers. They really nailed their Friday afternoon performance and I felt both moved and incredibly proud as I watched our children shine their lights.

We were also able to share the joy with many others as our younger children joined Nick Cope on stage at the end of his show to sing the last couple of songs with him. Once again I felt immense pride as I watched our children take to the stage to perform in front of a packed Abbey.

Recently our children have taken the opportunity to visit Bishop’s Court Farm to see the lambs and other animals and Willow Class took part in a geography field trip to the rec where they created beautiful journey sticks and learned more about our local area.

Our Year 5 and 6 children are looking forward to their residential trip to Woodlands and we are sure they will have lots of amazing stories to tell and memories to cherish.

We have spaces in school and you are welcome to come and visit us to see what we can offer your child. You can find out more from our website here: https://www.st-birinus-pri.oxon.sch.uk/

Jo Staples
Headteacher

Thank you to everyone who joined us for our quiz night in the village hall. Our PTA did a superb job hosting an excellent quiz and serving delicious food. We raised over £700 towards our playground improvements.

There has been such a lot going on in our school recently.

Our younger children enjoyed a trip to the Royal Festival Hall earlier this term. They enjoyed hearing music from the London Philharmonic Orchestra and joined in the singing with great gusto.

Our older children have taken part in visits to the Winchester Science Centre and experience days at the Abbey. They really enjoyed exploring the Last Supper sculpture in the Abbey and creating their own mosaics.

We also took our Year 5 and 6 children over to Didcot recently to join other schools at an inter-school tag rugby tournament. This was a new sport to most of our children and we were proud of the way they all did their best and persevered against some teams who clearly had way more experience!

Our mini ox for the Sobell House Oxtrail has arrived in school. He has been christened Birinox and we are looking forward to decorating him. He will then be placed in a public space over the summer with other mini oxen from schools and community groups around Oxfordshire. The Oxtrail will be taking place over the summer and we are really proud that our little school is playing a part in this fundraiser. We will share photographs and the exact location with you when we know it.

We have spaces in school and you are welcome to come and visit us to see what we can offer your child. You can find out more from our website here: https://www.st-birinus-pri.oxon.sch.uk/

Jo Staples
Headteacher

After a hectic Christmas term, children have settled incredibly well back into school and are busy getting stuck into their Spring term topics; Superheroes for our younger children, Anglo Saxons in Year 3 and 4 and Rivers in Year 5 and 6.

We are also working hard to raise money for our special community event in the summer as we are part of the Sobell House Oxtrail through the city. We will soon be receiving our mini ox to decorate but we need to raise the funds before this can happen.

The children at Dorchester St Birinus Primary school would like to invite you to their very special festival of lights. This will take place in the school hall on Tuesday 6th February at 3pm until approximately 3.30pm. You are welcome to come and join us for some singing and poetry by candlelight with candle holders created by our children. This event has been arranged to raise money for the Sobell House Ox trail that we are taking part in later in the year.

We are suggesting a minimum donation of £2 and we hope you will join us for this important opportunity to raise funds for a fantastic charity: Sobell House Hospice in Oxford. There is no need to book. Just turn up on the day.

We have spaces in school and you are welcome to come and visit us to see what we can offer your child. You can find out more from our website here: https://www.st-birinus-pri.oxon.sch.uk/

Jo Staples
Headteacher