Well, what a bumper couple of weeks we have had! Apologies that last weeks blog didn’t make it as far as being published, but there was a slight technical hitch…I didn’t press ‘send’! I’m writing this one whilst on my way to Stevenage to watch the football!
We will work our way through the classes this week, starting with Mrs Fisher and Class 1. The children have been working really hard at trying to master the concept of division. They have used cubes and counters to support their mental strategies and have benefitted from this approach. Being ‘hands on’ and being able to actually see how the number is shared into different groups, has helped them to understand and to check their answers, allowing them to work more independently.
During history lessons, we have been learning about the Tudor Times and explorers of the period. Class 1 were finding out about pirates too and how they would have lived. They made some ‘ship biscuits’ using basic ingredients, which also allowed them to practise reading instructions, weighing and measuring as well as working well with their peers.
Following the cooking theme, they’ve also had a go at making their own pizzas – you can see Szymon and Kaiden tucking into theirs here….they smelt delicious!
Classes 1 & 2 have been involved in a very exciting project in recent weeks with a company called Digital Blast. As you are aware, being an iPad school has opened up some amazing learning opportunities for our pupils and this is another one. They have set us the challenge of creating some web content that we can develop and publish on our school site. The pupils would like to create a Welcome Booklet for prospective new pupils and their families. As part of the project they will learn how to build a brand, create eye-catching logos, conduct and record interviews, edit films, build websites…the list is endless! Just think of how many skills they will learn? To start the project, all 16 pupils spent the day in the Digital Blast offices in Manchester to experience a real life business environment. A week later, the team came to work with us at school and we had another really productive day. We are now at the stage where the children will be practising the skills and designing the content they want to produce. Watch out Digit4ll, you might have some competition!
Class 2 have shared some of their photos from the whole school trip to Chester Zoo we went on a couple of weeks back. The zoo were keen to promote the conservation work to schools in the North West and their generous offer of free tickets to primary age school trips meant this was an offer we couldn’t refuse. We virtually had the zoo to ourselves and it was a great day. We saw the baby elephants, bears and even an Orangutan that was only two weeks old – very cute indeed! We timed the visit to the jaguars perfectly as raw meat had just been hung from a tree and we saw how powerful these big cats were as they jumped and swung from the branches to feed. An amazing day.
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Another exciting week at school saw the arrival of some new equipment to support our computing curriculum. Spheros are a fun way to learn about coding and thanks to Mrs Coulbeck, we got a great price on these meaning we could buy a full class set 🙂 Mr Bright has once again been super supportive by teaching the techniques to the staff and then popping in to classes to get them up and running with them. Like all things technical, the children were soon showing us what to do!! Lots of great things to come with these and I look forward to seeing everyone’s skillset develop.
Class 2 have had a couple of trips out recently too. Firstly, they represented school at the Man City schools tournament at Etihad and we received great feedback about them – thank you. They won every game they played and Ellie certainly shocked some of the opposition who thought we had put a girl in the net because she couldn’t play. No such thing, she plays for Curzon Ashton ladies at weekends, not usually in goal, but she was immense at the tournament. Well done all of you.
They have also ventured over to Heptonstall for a walk and some fresh air – isn’t it beautiful? We really are so lucky to live where we do and I love it when families come to pick Mr Cruz’s brain about a good walk to go on!
On to Class 3 and lots of great Maths learning. They have learned about multiplication in many different ways – arrays, concrete apparatus, playing shop – even sharing out the donations we receive from Gregg’s each week!
They have made Ziggy models from eggboxes to support their learning in PSHE.
An area that Mrs Pulman has been really pleased about is the progress and engagement with the Yoga in the last two weeks. This has been an area that some have found challenging but something has ‘clicked’ this week and they all got through the whole session without incident and found it very relaxing. Kobi actually fell asleep!! Now they have seen the benefits, they’ve brought the learning back to the classrooms and have been using guided meditations to aid transitions – who would have thought it?!
Finally, here are some photos of Class 3 celebrating Chinese New Year – they found out lots of facts and made some beautiful food in the afternoon.
Class 4 have been trying hard to learn about how each child has their own particular likes and dislikes and how they can help each other to learn. Our children can be very aware of what they themselves find difficult, but can’t always transfer this understanding to their friends in class. Helping them to develop the empathy they need to work co-operatively and collaboratively is crucial in preparing them for life as an adult. They have been choosing to play ping pong at playtime and are getting quite good!
They have also worked together to make some ‘pirate slime’. You can see Zoe here (from class 1) who came to not only teach them how to make the slime, but also taught them step by step how to record and photograph what they were doing and then use the images to make an I-movie. Well done Zoe, you did a fantastic job – a teacher in the making perhaps??
Class 5 have been as busy as ever. The number of KS1 pupils has doubled in recent weeks so there has been a period of settling in and embedding new routines. It is so lovely having younger ones around school and they do make me laugh frequently. You will see they have been doing lots of fab maths learning, ordering numbers and events, learning about number factors and becoming experts on Purple Mash.
They have been learning and having fun outside..
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..ventured to Heaton Park..
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..Tyler has been a detective looking for “nk” words..
..and Joseph and Tommy have become good friends. The most exciting news this week however is that Tommy R has become a big brother!! Welcome to baby Bobby – Tommy tells us he is “very little and cute” and pulls a funny face when he cries.
All the children have enjoyed doing Parkour with Mr Hopkins – you should see the speed of them going round the gym, my heart is in my mouth!
We also welcomed a very special visitor to school this week, Mr Paul Broadbent (known as Beans), an athlete mentor who represented Great Britain at Rugby and lifted the Challenge Cup at Wembley when he captained Sheffield. He worked with every class and told us during assembly about how he had struggled himself at school. He spoke about how he wasn’t the best rugby player but got the opportunities he did because he made a conscious decision to be a good person and always try hard. Valuable lessons indeed. He is coming back to see us next month and we look forward to learning more from him.
Well, that’s it from me for now! I hope you all have a great holiday and will see you soon.
Take care,
Miss Thomason
Head of School
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