North East Book Award

10th March 2017L Dickinson
  • Are you an enthusiastic and mature reader?
  • Do you enjoy talking about what you are reading?
  • Are you interested in meeting authors and getting your books autographed?
  • If so, we would you like to help select this year’s winner of The North East Book Award

We have roughly 10 weeks to read and discuss all 5 shortlisted books before voting! Obviously, there’s more to say – and disagree about – as the weeks progress and more people have read more of the books!  As we read, we post reviews and comments on the NEBA website, which is closely monitored by the shortlisted authors. Extracts are used for giant promotional posters that the authors like to take home as souvenirs. (You can see some outside the library.)

When all participating schools have voted, we attend an evening prize giving at The Centre for Life.  We talk to the authors, get our books signed and generally have a good time.  The ceremony will be held in June.

Visit the NEBA website for more information – http://northeastbookaward.wordpress.com/

Click ‘continue reading’ to find out more about our meetings and which books are involved.

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Admissions to The Three Rivers Learning Trust

10th March 2017Mrs K Shutler

As the new housing developments in Morpeth begin to take shape, we are anticipating greater demand for places within the schools of the Learning Trust and across the Morpeth Partnership.  We are working closely with our partnership schools and with Northumberland County Council to ensure a school place for all who live in the catchment area.

The Board of Directors is clear that it is our responsibility to educate students who live in the catchment or move into the catchment area, and those who are already in  partnership schools from an early age. Whilst this will provide some challenges in the next few years, we are confident that through effective partnership working we will be able to meet that aspiration.

The recent admissions consultation for entry in September 2018 to Chantry, Newminster and King Edward’s is closed.  The proposed change from our previous policy was the criteria for  the tie breaker.

There were two stages to the consultation, and a total of 42 responses were received.  Of the responses,  24 were in favour of the amendment, 12 were against, 2 partly agreed and a further 4 made comments only.  Thank you to all who contributed to the consultation.  The revised policy is available here, and the Policies page of the website.

Celebrating World Book Day

9th March 2017L Dickinson

IMG_0208 (1)We collected £339.66 to support the work of Book Aid International in getting books to children in parts of the world that have none. Thank you to all those who supported this worthwhile charity which makes it possible for children in desperate need to learn to read, the first step towards helping themselves out of poverty.

The number of students spending the day in character this World Book Day was truly staggering and a real pleasure to witness!

90 students put themselves forward for judging, which had to be done in batches, occupied two members of staff and took a complete lesson!  You can see from the photographs what a difficult job it was. In the end 12 students, whose costumes were judged to display the most ingenuity and originality, were selected. They were each invited to choose a book prize from the Fair and the rest won privilege passes.

The prize winners!

Thank you to everyone who dressed up, whether or not you made your own costume, because your efforts contributed to making World Book Day special – and that’s what it’s all about!

Enormous thanks to Iona Lane, Anna Jakubovics, Will Cottiss in Year 6 and Ellen Davison in Year 7 – for patiently naming more than 500 World Book Day tokens so everyone could be sure of getting one.

Book Fair

9th March 2017L Dickinson

Thanks to your tremendous support and generosity, our annual Book Fair was another record breaking success, exceeding last year’s total and raising a magnificent £1,362 in commission!

This will be spent on books to stimulate English lessons and promote a love of reading throughout all key stages.

Everyone is involved in making our Fairs a success: our customers (of course!) but also our student Fair Makers. A big thank you goes to three groups of students:

Iona Lane, Anna Jakubovics and Ellen Davison who, between them, gave up every lunchtime in February to staple together more than 500 letters and Fair fliers publicising our Fair; Eve Haines, Charlotte Rae, Iona Lane, Ellen Davison and Will Cottiss who provided lots of support at break times during Fair Week and Sophie Bell and Anna Jakubovics who helped to tidy up on the last day. We couldn’t have done this without you!

Masterclass Poetry Workshop

7th March 2017L Dickinson

Members of Newminster’s ‘Writer’s Club’ took part in a fabulous Masterclass Poetry Workshop on Monday 6th March. The writing session took place in the Northern Poetry Library, at The Chantry in Morpeth. Our budding writers worked with the poet, John Challis, who provided a themed writing morning, based on the concept of ‘Place.’

Mr Challis began with examples of work by Seamus Heaney, Philip Larkin and Katrina Porteous and led the pupils through a series of fascinating writing challenges; including ‘a braided poem.’ Students were encouraged to explore different writing techniques and consider poetry as a ‘way of talking to a past time and recreating things we have lost.’ The morning concluded with pupils selecting a book from the poetry collection, picking out words or lines which appealed to them and creating a poetry ‘collage.’

Grateful thanks to the staff of the ‘Northern Poetry Library’ and John Challis for providing a wonderfully creative experience for our students.

Trout Ticklers Workshops

6th March 2017Mrs K Shutler

trout ticklersThank you to those students and parents who attended the Trout Ticklers Workshop and learnt the skill of fly tying last week.

There will be further workshops on Tuesday 7th, Tuesday 14th and Tuesday 21st March from 6.30pm – 8.00pm with Sid, Lance, Barry and Bob. There is a some charge of £3 per session to cover the letting of the room and resources. Please report to Chantry Main Entrance at 6.30pm.

We are hoping to arrange some fishing events on Saturday 8th April and Saturday 6th May – watch this space for further details.

Ski Trip

3rd March 2017Mrs K Shutler

Follow the updates from Alpe d’Huez here:


Cashless catering issues

27th February 2017Mrs K Shutler

SchoolLunchPlease accept our apologies, but we are continuing to have problems with the Cashless Catering system balances that are showing on accounts. We are trying to resolve this issue as soon as possible but please be reassured that no child will be refused a lunch.

Thank you for your ongoing support.

Book Fair 2017

24th February 2017Mrs K Shutler

Just a reminder that our annual Book Fair is on now and will remain in school all week!

For every £1 we spend, 60p comes back to school for spending directly on our children to help promote a lifelong love of reading!

Take a look at the books on sale by visi
ting the Fair after school on Tuesday or Thursday until 4:15pm and check out the new specialist teenage case for our oldest students. There is something for everyone!

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