Friday 3rd March
Happy Friday!
We hope you all had a lovely half term break. The second half of the spring term is very short, at just five weeks in length, but we have LOTS to fit in that short amount of time.
This week has been as busy as ever! On Monday morning our year five children walked to Leasowes to watch the secondary students perform Oliver, and on Tuesday our year five children started their swimming lessons - it is safe to say that our year five cohort have had lots of exercise this week! Along with the exercise, they have been throwing balls of plasticine into flour (yes, it was very messy) and creating new hair styles as part of their World Book Day art.
In year six the children have been continuing with their SATs revision and we can really see the impact of their learning when it comes to exam technique - well done year six, I know you have enjoyed seeing your scores increase. Year six also found out their new secondary schools earlier this week, it is always a tense moment for the parents as they wait for the email to arrive.
There has been lots of musical activity across the school this week - all of the very noisy kind! Year two have definitely been having a recorder lesson or two; year three have certainly been exploring the percussion instruments and year five have been very successful in their ukulele lessons. Due to a screen malfunction in the hall, our Tuesday singing assembly took place in the classrooms - year one really made themselves heard with their enthusiastic singing.
Thank you to everyone who participated in World Book Day on Thursday. We loved seeing the children coming to school with their wacky hair and fabulous costumes. We had lots of Disney Princesses (although, our children are princesses everyday); many superheroes (who were fantastic when asked to pose like one); enough Hogwarts students to fill, well, Hogwarts; a few Wednesdays; at least one Alice, Matilda and a Dorothy; a huge array of footballers with wacky hair; a frog, a crocodile and some Gruffalo; and some really unique characters from books the children had been reading. We even had a dinosaur encyclopaedia! All of the children were given a book as part of the World Book Day celebrations and we hope they enjoy reading them.
Today, Mr Priest facilitated a very special assembly - the children may have already mentioned it! The assembly was all about memory, and it started off very seriously…however, we then played a version of the generation game which caused lots and lots of laughter. It began with Mrs Stonehouse pushing Miss Saleh into the hall in a shopping trolley! Miss Saleh had her cleaning product with her and was attemting to clean things whilst Mrs Stonehouse ‘tried’ to push the trolley in a straight line; next came a long procession of different school adults, each with a different item:
Miss Richardson thought she was a rock star with her ukulele
Miss Thacker deafened us all with her megaphone
Mrs Higgins though she was on the catwalk with her large hat
Mrs Shinner was waiting for the sun to shine with her oversized sunglasses
Mrs Whitely had the obligatory cuddly toy!
Mrs Hamblett looked like she was returning to PGL with her suitcase
Miss Macaskill waved her flags
Miss Care thought she was on the ski slope with her ski helmet and goggles
Miss Jenkins had taken her clock off the wall and paraded it through the hall
Mrs White had a rubber chicken on her head
Mrs Tansley arrived on a toy tractor
Mrs Parker was not at all sensible with a chair
Miss Walters through she was at the hairdressers and brushed her hair
Miss Grasby had some lovey daffodils, that reminded her of home, and then she threw some at the children
Mrs Collins got her phone out, in front of all the children!
We did need to leave some staff in the hall to look after the children, but I believe they had the best job as they got to see first hand the pure joy on the children’s faces. The school office staff remarked on how they could hear the children laughing. As with everything we do, there is always a purpose, and this was to get the children thinking about how they use their memory. Many of the children have remembered the objects today, but will they remember come Monday? We will certainly be asking them.
The diary is looking very full for next week. Both year two and year six are hosting SATs workshops (letters will have been sent separately; year one are on a trip to Saltwells; year five are back at Leasowes, and we have parent’s evening on Wednesday and Thursday evening.
We hope you have an enjoyable weekend and look forward to seeing you on Monday.