Meet Us, Staff and Governors
The Firs is a very friendly and caring school, which achieves high standards. Our children are happy, polite and enjoy their learning. The school values all stakeholders and has a very hard-working and committed team of staff who work extremely well together.
Our parents enjoy being involved in the school and are very supportive of all we do. Our enthusiastic PTA organises a variety of activities, for both parents and children, throughout the year.
Senior Leadership Team
The school has a very popular 'Kid's Club', which provides care for children before and after school and during holiday periods. Children are also offered a wide variety of extra-curricular experiences, e.g. choir, dance, football, basketball, tennis, chess etc.
The Local Area
The Firs is an active participant in the local community and makes good use of its surroundings to support and enhance the curriculum. We have links with the Leonard Cheshire home, Agate House, Baycroft Care Home and a number of local churches.
The Firs Lower School is situated in the historic market town of Ampthill and shares a very pleasant site with Alameda Middle School at the edge of woodlands. The Firs takes its name from the nearby conservation woodlands and all our classes are named after trees.
Most of our pupils live in Ampthill, although the school also serves the hamlet of Millbrook and a number of our pupils live outside the catchment area.
All our parents have high expectations for their children and are very supportive of the school.
Our Pre-School, The Saplings, admits children from the age of 2 with children joining the main school in September in the academic year they are 5.
We are very excited by the opportunity to develop children's learning from the age of 2 - 9, with all the opportunities this affords for children to make rapid progress in developing learning and social skills. Pupils remain with us until they leave us at the end of year 4, when most of the pupils move on to Alameda. A small number move on to Woodlands Middle School in Flitwick or to one of the Harpur Trust schools in Bedford. The local upper school, Redborne, is close by and all of the local schools in The Redborne Partnership, co-operate very closely and work together positively, in the best interests of all our children.
The Building
The school was built about 40 years ago. It is in a very pleasant setting, with large playing fields bordered by woodlands. The school has a 4+ unit with its own courtyard and outdoor play area. The covered enables us to make best use of our outdoor play provision in Reception, whatever the weather! There are two separate playground areas, (for Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2) and an attractive courtyard area in the middle of the school. The school is centrally placed with corridors leading off to the various classrooms and the admin area.
A new purpose build annex at the rear of our school site is the home of our Pre-school, The Saplings, which adjoins our wraparound care service, Kids Club.
The Firs has a spacious purpose built computer suite with 30 computers, which not only enables us to deliver the Computing curriculum but allows us to use technology to enhance other areas of the curriculum too.
A recently added block of two classrooms, built using the proceeds from our highly successful 'Fund It' campaign, has ensured that our Year 3 pupils have the very best environment in which to learn.
