The Disney Extravaganza

Photographs of the Disney Extravaganza are available to view on the School Gallery site. A DVD of the concert will be available in September. We have arranged that Mr Smith, (formally Deputy Head teacher at Ton Pentre Juniors) will video the rehearsal and evening performance and will edit it over the summer holidays and produce a DVD package that will include individual and group photographs of the pupils. He will display these in the hall during our open evenings in mid September. Further details will be available in the letter outlining our plans at the beginning of next term.

The 2010 Leaver's Ball

The 2010 Leaver's Ball took place at the Ton Pentre Football Club on Wednesday 7th July. As usual, our Year 6 pupils dressed in their gowns and suits and looked the part. We had a special mystery guest this year. Mr Nigel Owens, the international rugby referee, broke into his very busy schedule to present our awards. This year's winners were - The Sports Personality was Jenna; The Lifetime award went to Michael; The Achievement award to Keira and the children voted Jack L as their Star of the Year. Congratulations to them, but they were all winners as ever. Mrs Smith our official photographer is editing the photos as I type and she will make them available to parents on our Gallery site early next week. In the meantime here are some casual photos taken by Miss Hatch. Our thanks, as ever, go to Mrs Sims and the PTA for arranging the evening and decorating the Hall in the Football Club so beautifully.

Click HERE to visit our Gallery site.

The Inaugural Gelli Primary School Whole School Sports Day

Mrs Carly and Miss Hatch, our PESS leaders, organised the first whole school sports day this year. In previous years Junior and Infant Sports have been organised separately and after the successful pilot of taking the Junior Sports to the Pentre AstroTurf last year they decided to invite the Foundation phase along this year. The school was divided into four house teams, Buddug, Caradog, Gwenllian, and Owain.
There were a good variety of races and games for the children from nursery to Year 6 to participate in and it was pleasing to see every child in Gelli Primary being involved. Few schools can boast this achievement. The winning house was Caradog and they were presented with a brand new cup donated by the PTA.
Click here to follow the link to our gallery site to see the photographs taken.

Sorry we've been away

Our technical difficulties have now been resolved and we are open for business as usual. We have a great deal of catching up to do so look out for frequent updates about activities that have occured since half term such as some of our sporting achievements, the 2010 Leavers Ball, the first whole school sports day and the Disney extravaganza. Come back soon.

Transition Music Activity

Every year a member of the music department at Treorchy Comprehensive School works with our Year Six pupils on a transition module. The work undertaken will be the first module that the children will study at Treorchy next September. Mrs. Marks taught the children an ostinato and wove the African melody Banwa over it in a number of parts. They used pitched and unpitched instruments to make this arrangement and Mrs Marks accompanied them on the piano. We hope you enjoy their performance.

Old Gelli football kit lands up in Africa

Earlier this year a party of teachers from Rhondda Cynon Taff visited our partner school in Mbale. They took with them some old football and rugby kit and other items. The photographs show how delighted the children were to be able to play in our kit.

Headline news from our ESTYN inspection.

We have received very positive and encouraging verbal feedback from the Registered Inspector following last week's ESTYN inspection. Their judgement is the Gelli Primary is a good school with no important shortcomings but has some outstanding features in many areas.
Mr Alan Walters, the registered inspector reported back his preliminary findings to the staff and Governing body on Thursday evening. The full report will be produced within 45 days and will contain seven grades against the key questions in the inspection framework. The main findings were that they judged standards to be good overall with many outstanding features in many areas of teaching and learning. The inspectors saw sector leading practice in the areas of behaviour along with the care, guidance and support we offer the children. Leadership and Management were also judged as outstanding features, particularly the model of distributed leadership along with our use of available resources.
I am delighted for the staff as they have worked constantly over the last three years with me to raise standards. They commented very favourably about the team ethos that the school has. I'm also very pleased for the community who now have official verification that we have a school that the village can be proud of. I also feel that with time we can continue to develop the areas and identify outstanding practice in other areas.
The main stars of the week, however, were the children, who were singled out by the Inspectors as confident, polite, hard working and a credit to all of us. They commented that everyone succeeds at Gelli Primary in their own way.
The full and short report of parents will be published before the summer holidays. I am sure that you will enjoy reading about our achievements.