Events
PTA Annual General Meeting
🌟 Join Us for Our PTA Annual General Meeting! 🌟
Want to make a real difference in our school community? The PTA AGM is your chance to find out what we do, share your ideas, and get involved!
📅 Date: Wednesday 15th October 2025
🕒 Time: 7pm
📍 Location: Eaton Farm, Long Eaton, NG10 4AW
The AGM is open to all parents, carers, and staff. You don’t need any special skills—just enthusiasm and a willingness to help. Whether you can spare an hour here and there, or take on a bigger role, every bit of support makes a huge impact on our children’s school experience.
We’ll be electing new committee members and always welcome fresh faces. It’s a great way to meet other families, have a say in how PTA funds are spent, and help create fun events for the whole school.
✨ Come along, get involved, and help us make this year our best yet!
Christmas Fair
Saturday 29th November
🎄✨ Step Into the Magic of Christmas at Our School Fair! ✨🎄
🎅🏼 Santa’s getting ready, the lights are twinkling, and we can’t wait to welcome you to our School Christmas Fair! ❄️
💫 Festive Fun Awaits: 💫
🛍️ Christmas Market Stalls – Find gifts, crafts, and seasonal treasures
🍰 Tasty Treats – Mulled Wine, cakes, mince pies & more
🎯 Games & Raffles – Try your luck and win prizes
🎨 Crafty Fun – Create your own festive decorations
🎶 Christmas Cheer – Carols and performances from our pupils
📅 Date: Saturday 29th November
⏰ Time: 11am – 2pm
📍 Location: Dovedale Primary School
🌟 Free Entry for Everyone!
Bring along family and friends to enjoy a magical morning filled with festive spirit, community cheer, and Christmas sparkle.
We can’t wait to celebrate with you — see you there for a joyful start to the season! 🎅🏼🎄
Welcome Party
We would like to welcome all children that joined EYFS at Dovedale Primary School in September by throwing a fun-filled party.
Spooky Disco
Wednesdsay 22nd October
Years 1, 2, 3 3:30pm to 4:30pm
Years 4,5,6 4:45pm to 5:45pm
🎃👻🕸️🕷️✨ SPOOKY DISCO ✨🕷️🕸️👻🎃
🌕 The pumpkins glow, the cobwebs gleam,
👻 It feels just like a ghostly dream!
🎧 The DJ plays a howling tune,
💃 We’ll dance beneath the glowing moon!
🧙♀️ Witches wiggle ~ 💀 Skeletons spin
🧟 Zombies stumble ~ 👹 Goblins grin
🕷️ Spiders shuffle ~ 🦇 Vampires hop
👾 Monsters boogie — they never stop!
💡 The disco lights all flash and flicker,
🧛 Vampires twirl a little quicker…
🎶 Everyone’s got that spooky beat,
Let’s stomp, spin, rattle our feet!
🎩 So grab your mask, your cape, your hat,
🎃 The disco’s calling — fancy that!
✨ It’s spooky fun, no need to fear,
🕸️ The best dance night of all the year! ✨
♦
ABOUT DOVEDALE ASSOCIATION
What is Dovedale Association?
We are Dovedale’s Parent Teacher Association (PTA). A volunteer group of parents/carers and staff who worktogether to organise and run various events for pupils and their families above and beyond the day-to-day schoolactivities. All monies raised go directly back into the school to enhance the experience of pupils through a variety of ways. We are a registered charity (number 1039665) therefore there are “official”committee members, but anyone can be a part of the group
and contribute as little or as much as they feel they are able to.
Would you like to join us?
Your support is valuable to us whether as a volunteer at events, providing fundraising ideas or other background support. We would love to hear from you. Get in touch via the following ways:
Email: DovedaleAssociation@dovedale.derbyshire.sch.uk.
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/dovedaleassociation
Find us at school drop off/pick up.
Or simply turn up to any of our meetings.
The Association is run by a committee of our members who have been elected at our Annual General Meeting (AGM) which is held at the start of each school year.
Chair Rachel Whaley | Honorary Secretary Sophie Clarke | Honorary Treasurer Phil Le Couteur |
Vice Chair Rhiannon Le Couteur | Co-Honorary Secretary Claire Morris | Assistant Honorary Treasurer Scott Marsden |
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In addition we have ordinary committee members who also assist in the important role of decision making.
President of the Association/Head Teacher: Sarah Houseman
Our active members are vital to the Association in making all the fundraising ideas and events to help our school possible.
Why do we need a PTA?
It’s amazing how many people are willing to help out at their child’s pre-school because it is understood that they need financial assistance to operate, but when it comes to school, they think that there is plenty of money available. This is not the case. Government funding covers (but only just) the essential teaching requirements of the school. All extras are not financed by the Government and money needs to be raised for such items.
What does money raised by the PTA buy?
Every year, each class gets a “class allowance” that they
can use for absolutely anything they would like. We fund the first aid training for Year 6 Students.
We contribute towards class trips e.g. partial funding for coaches.Every year we contribute towards year 6 end of SATs celebrations e.g this year we donated all the drinks
Most years we are able to donate at least £1,000 for the bulk purchase of items to help with teaching and for the enjoyment of the children. We have recently purchased 2 storage containers, room dividers, STEM activities, 2 picnic benches made from recycled plastic, book cases for the new library, intervention tables and 60 new chairs to replace old unsuitable ones. In the past we have funded the trim-trail which is located on the playing field, the climbing equipment in the Reception play area, the staging and curtains for the hall, numeracy equipment, musical instruments, globes, book bags, additional chairs for the hall, playground equipment and theatre company visits. The more help we have the more we can do. The more we raise, the more our children gain.
“Aiming High Together!”
Need more information?
Please contact us in any of the following ways:
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/dovedaleassociation
Email: DovedaleAssociation@dovedale.derbyshire.sch.uk
Or find us at school drop off/pick up.
Please contact us directly as the school office are unable to answer PTA queries.
DOVEDALE ASSOCIATION
Here you can find out about Dovedale Association (Dovedale PTA), our upcoming events and news.
The next Dovedale Association meeting is at 7pm on Wednesday 15th October at Eaton Farm. We look forward to seeing you and meeting new members.
Uniform Recycling Scheme
We understand that everything is getting more expensive and we are also conscious about doing our bit for the evironment which is why we have created a new Facebook Page dedicated to recycling any unwanted Clean School Uniform. For more information, take a look for yourself.
https://www.facebook.com/share/LQH5f4uB7vLSGhgM/
NEWS FLASH: NEW WAYS TO HELP OUR SCHOOL
Your School Lottery
Open to all. Check out how it works below and see how easy it is.
Anyone can join so please spread the word.
Each ticket you purchase makes a huge impact.
Dovedale Primary School Lottery
Easyfundraising
Go to The Dovedale Association Long Eaton Fundraising | Easyfundraising
Shopping online? Easyfundraising is the UK's biggest charity shopping fundraising site. Simple to use and free. Go to easyfundraising.org.uk and choose The Dovedale Association Long Eaton as your cause to support then join for free. Visit retailers and then shop online as normal. Dovedale will then receive free donations. Such an easy way to help our school. Check out the site for more details.
Want to help out at our events? Maybe you would like to be a volunteer at one of the school discos or perhaps you're able to lend a hand to help set up an event. Even if you feel that's all you can contribute we need you too. We're all volunteering so we would love any help you could provide. Especially you fabulous bakers. You always make our cake sales a great success. So come on, together let's make our children's experience whilst at Dovedale the best we can. Please consider joining us at our next PTA meeting if you are interested.
NEWS
September 2024 to July 2025 Round up
The annual "Welcome to Dovedale" disco for the new Reception pupils was a huge success. So much fun had playing games, dancing and making new friends!
Our "Spooky Discos" for years 1-3 and 4-6, were FRIGHTfully good. Our professional DJ's from Apollo were playing SPOOKtacular tunes, there were some awesome shapes thrown on the scary dance floor plus some creepy decorations and costumes.
Christmas
We had 2 magical days of Santa visits with our in-house grotto; including a festive gift and photo for all who booked a visit. This was topped off with our very festive Christmas market which included Christmas carolling, lots of games, stalls, external craft and gift stalls and of course lots of refreshments. We were also able to support parents and carers to take part in the National Christmas Jumper Day by adding the very well received pre-loved Christmas jumper rail, using donations from our wonderful Dovedale community.
Easter
We held a fantastic Easter themed movie night for pupils in years 3-6 and the Easter Bunny handed out some treats to all children and Easter Eggs to the winners of the Easter competition.
Board Games Themed Long Eaton Carnival
June saw us take part in the Long Eaton carnival as a float for the 3rd year running. This takes a huge amount of hard work and effort behind the scenes from the PTA and other members of the school community. The float looked amazing as did all participants. This year we came second in the best dressed float competition.
Sports Day/Summer Fair
We finished the year by providing parents and carers with refreshments over both the morning and afternoon sessions for Sports Day. Followed by an incredible Summer Fair.
After the Sports Day this year, the school grounds were converted to an exciting Summer Fair, with games, inflatables, stalls and refreshments. It was a brilliant day and a huge success.
Thank you for your support over the last academic year. We look forward to putting on some more great events for you and your families over the next year.
Future Events
We will be having our Annual General Meeting on Wednesday October 15th at 7pm at the Eaton Farm. All are welcome. It would be great to see lots of new faces.
https://www.pta-events.co.uk/dovedaleprimarylongeatonpta
Any questions about any events, please speak to a member of the PTA or email using the email address DovedaleAssociation@dovedale.derbyshire.sch.uk.
Watch this space for the next big project.
Funded by the PTA
2 New Storage Containers, purchased and built by the PTA and it's volunteers.
STEM Week Activities
Playground Shelter
This fantastic structure has been funded by money raised by the schools PTA over the last few years. Thank you to all the PTA members who work so hard getting events planned and running smoothly. A huge thank you to everyone who has supported us by attending events, baking cakes and donating. Without your support we could not provide these extra things for our school.
The shelter is dedicated in the memory of a former Dovedale pupil, Taylor. Taylor was such a wonderful boy who sadly passed away in 2018. We will never forgot his smile. His brother, along with his mum Gemma, cut the ribbon on 3rd May 2019. It was lovely to see so many friends, family, parents and pupils of our school attending.