Community Links
Messy Church
Messy Church is a free activity run jointly by The Churches of St Aidan’s, Summerhill, and John Wesley Memorial Methodist church with volunteer helpers, and is available to all school children and held each Wednesday after school. Messy Church has now been running for over eight years.
St Aidan with St George Church
Fir Tree Lane, St George
Bristol BS5 8TZ
Website: www.staidansbristol.co.uk
We are extremely fortunate to have strong links with our local Church. St Aidens with St George welcome us to services at the Church every Christmas and Easter.
We are always proud to attend the annual St George Community Fair, also held at St Aiden with St George Church in March. This year we displayed information about our wonderful library.
Charity Links
Through the work of Mrs Hennys, our Family Support Worker, we have been building links with local charities who support families in Bristol. We work closely with ERIC, the Children’s Incontinence Charity and were very privileged to be invited to go along to the ERIC headquarters in March when Princess Anne visited them.
We are a collection point for donations to the East Bristol Foodbank and at Christmas we support the Foodbank and Next Link by collating gift bags that have been generously decorated and filled by children and parents from Air Balloon with items such as stationery, toiletries and Christmas food treats. The filled bags are given to families using the Foodbank or living in an emergency refuge over the festive period. At Christmas in 2014 we donated 464 bags and in 2015 we filled over 650. You can find out more about the Foodbank at http://eastbristol.foodbank.org.uk/and http://nextlinkhousing.co.uk/
Silver Stories
Miss Cox has launched a new initiative to reach out to the elderly in our community after visiting Torpoint Infant and Nursery School. Silver Stories is an initiative launched by the Headteacher at Torpoint to make links with the community and build children’s confidence in reading. The idea is that children read a short story or poem over the telephone to an elderly member of the community, perhaps someone who is housebound or lonely.
We are looking for Silver Listeners to be read to over the telephone. If you know of any members of your local community who may benefit from this, please get in touch with Miss Cox. All our Silver Listeners need is a telephone, a listening ear and a comfy chair! The story sessions will take place on Monday afternoons and last about 5 minutes.
If you would like more details or want to let us know about someone you think might benefit from our Silver Stories, please email Miss Cox at bookbuddies@abhps.com
RHS
Our Gardening Club on Tuesdays and school allotment are supported by volunteers from the RHS. Through our work with the RHS and their volunteers, we are able to participate in the annual St George in Bloom competition taking place in the summer. http://stgeorgeinbloom.org.uk/index.html
Book Buddies
We are extremely fortunately to be able to welcome parents, carers and volunteers from the local community to be Book Buddies. Book Buddies is a targeted, time-limited, one-to-one reading intervention co-ordinated by Miss Cox. Volunteers come into school 2 or 3 times a week to read with specific children to help address reading difficulties and boost their reading age. The reading scheme supports the acquisition of good reading skills and is designed to improve the way children read, enabling them to be independent problem-solvers who read with understanding and enjoyment.