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PTAs tell us about their recent community success stories…
‘We received messages from all over the world!’ ‘With the school closed, we were looking for new ways to reach out to the children to let them know we were thinking about them. Parent governor and chair of the Friends of Burnopfield, Melanie Meadows, suggested we buy a teddy bear for every child to keep them company. We thought it was a great way to support the children’s wellbeing and hoped the furry friends would bring comfort until we could all be back together. We purchased the bears from school-
bears.co.uk and asked them to add our school logo. Our 390 bears cost £1,300. When they arrived, I placed them in rows in the school hall as if they were
their bears to take home straight away. Staff living nearby delivered some to the children at home, and parents collected others at allocated times. The Facebook post was unbelievably
having an assembly. I took photos and posted them to our social media pages with this message: ‘Something “beary” exciting is happening at school today... we have some new pupils who are very excited to meet you all. There is a “Buddy the Burnopfield Bear” for every one of you, to keep you company until we are all back together.’ Staff then took cheeky photos of the bears all around the school. We gave the children attending school
popular. We had close to 1.4 million views and 4,700 shares, plus messages of support from all over the world! The positive impact on our school
community has been immeasurable, and the feedback we received from parents was overwhelmingly positive and grateful. The children loved the bears, and we received lots of photos of them together.’ Cath Thompson, acting co-head teacher, Burnopfield Primary School, Newcastle upon Tyne (390 pupils)
‘A picture quiz made us giggle’
‘One of our PTA team had the idea of making a school picture quiz as a fun activity for children, families and staff during half-term. We included elements of school life, such as core values, house names, and objects representing staff names. Some were easy to represent graphically, while some were more tenuous! Our designer put together the quiz image, and it was published on Google Classroom and our website before half-term. The teachers had a real giggle spotting themselves and their colleagues in the graphic.’ Sarah Everson, secretary, Friends of Halsford Park School, East Grinstead, West Sussex (415 pupils)
58 SUMMER 2021
pta.co.uk
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