The Chronicle

Junior 6 were able to demonstrate their fantastic leadership skills on Wednesday morning during Key Stage 1 Sports Day. The children rose to the challenge of running the events for the younger children, showing the true spirit and ethos of Crackley Hall in their maturity, kindness, and patience with their younger peers. The Junior 6 children were almost as excited as the younger children to be part of this special day and both KS1 competitors and Junior 6 helpers were an absolute credit to their school and families, demonstrating the spirit of taking part in the fun competition. The Junior 6 children were tired at the end of the morning and, following a couple of hiccups on the activity rotations, we are told that they have a newfound respect for their teachers!

Junior 5 have loved finding more about the layout of the world this week! We found out how much more accurate our knowledge of the world is when we use a globe rather than a flat map. Our miniature globes were well used and inspired so much discovery and learning. It was fascinating to find out places that were the antipodes of any place on earth using the globes. We then checked our observations using a brilliant website which showed us the antipodal point of any country down to their geographical coordinates. What was wonderful was the number of further questions this lesson provoked. We certainly earnt our Sherlock the Meerkat stickers for curiosity this week!

This week Junior 4 have had the opportunity to enjoy learning outside within the natural environment. Junior 4 have been learning about and focussing on the topic of Trees in their English lessons and they have ventured on various learning walks, where they have been able to observe, identify (through leaf shape) and even hug an array of trees. We have also designed our very own, unique tress and have read a variety of tree poetry. What a super week!

This week we were treated to an in-class performance by our very own resident guitar group. Evelyn, Josh, and Gwen delighted their friends, with not just one, but three songs played in beautiful harmony. We are so fortunate to have so many wonderful opportunities in our school and the chance to share our talents with each other. Junior 3 have also been discovering all about ‘angles and lines’ this week in Maths! To inspire us, we have explored the work of Wassily Kandinsky, the Russian abstract artist, who, we found out, loved art, maths, and music, and used his love of these subjects to create wonderful pictures. The pupils had a great time finding out about and creating ‘angle and line’ pictures, using the terms right angle, obtuse, acute and reflex. We loved the use of coloured shapes cut into geometrical patterns to add to our new-found skills. What an inspiration!

Junior 2 have had an exceptionally busy start to this half-term. What with sports day, LAMDA exams and keeping up with their class studies, we recognise that they are nearly ready for Junior 3! We have started our Science topic on plants, and we followed instructions to plant sunflower seeds this week. We know what to do to help them grow into mature plants, so watch this space for some incredibly tall plants! We are studying Anthony Browne books in English, and we have started writing our own version of Silly Billy. We were particularly impressed with the children's ability to use and understand contractions - they love using technical vocabulary. A great week Junior 2 and well done to all who sat their LAMDA exams.

Junior 1 were very busy this week, especially in Design and Technology where they were making their own football game from a box, pegs, sticks and a ping pong ball!! This linked in nicely with our History topic where we found out about toys from the past this week, including toys from the 50s, 60s and 70s. In Science we learnt about birds and what makes them different from other creatures. Did you know that birds are related to dinosaurs? In Computing we have begun to develop our computer skills and we are now learning how to type and change how words look using different fonts and size of letters. We were also busy this week taking our LAMDA exams, where we had to recite a poem and talk about a favourite toy to an examiner. We now must wait to see how well we all got on!

This week Reception have been planning and then writing their own ‘Under the Sea’ story. They have produced some fantastic stories and writing to be very proud of. In Maths this week they have been learning ways to solve subtraction problems and have even been making up some of their own problems for their friends to solve.