It has been a busy start to the spring term at Stepaside CP School (writes Elliot Brown, a Year 4 pupil).

New playgroup: The new playgroup started in the nursery on January 6. The playgroup runs from 12 noon to 3 pm. Currently, 12 children go, but Mrs. Wood, playgroup leader, would like more children to come. It is a great new building with lots of equipment for the children. Mrs. Wood said: "The children love learning through play."

Twenty-five years service for school cook: Mrs. Evans has been a school cook for 25 years and to show our thanks we had a surprise party. At the party, the orchestra played and children sang 'Food Glorious Food'. Mrs. Evans said: "I did not expect the party," and she enjoys her work. Mrs. Evans's favourite meal to cook is roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. The cook's hardest meal to cook is spaghetti bolognese. The best thing about her job is seeing us eat our dinner.

Sports: On Thursday, January 15, our school played a home match. The match was a Pembrokeshire county cup league game. The match was hard and it was very close. The final score was 1-1. The goal scorer for Stepaside was Jake Proctor. Pennar put up an excellent show, as did Stepaside, but as Pennar were the away team, they will go through to the next round. The netball teams and the football B team also played friendly matches against Pennar. The netball score was 8-0 to Pennar. The matches were cut short for the B teams because of bad weather. The goal scorer for the football B team was Nathan Farmiloe and another came off a stunning corner taken by Daniel Gorman, which made it 2-0 to Stepaside for the final score.

On Friday, January 16, the rugby team went away to have a game against Tavernspite. The final score was 49-0 to Tavernspite, but Stepaside boys have stayed positive as this was their first match and hope to do better next time.

On Saturday, January 17, the boys in Stepaside's swimming team went up to Bangor to represent Pembrokeshire in the Urdd competition. They swam against people from all over Wales. They swam as a team in the freestyle and medley relays. Dean Pellington swam in individual races in breaststroke and the individual medley.

Owain Evans, from Stepaside School, is in Year 6. He went to Bristol for a cross country race. He came 13th. The race was hard, but he said he enjoyed it.