The Chronicle

'Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.' – Mark Twain 

Dear Parents

As we prepare for the Coronation it brings back vivid memories of the stories shared by parents and grandparents of gathering around their shared black-and-white TV and communities coming together. My own father, when he was alive in South Africa, had the honour of playing in a band in front of Princess Elizabeth just before she ascended to the throne. For him, it was a huge honour. 
 
A coronation is truly a historic event – perhaps not once in a lifetime for the pupils of Crackley, but the only time they will get to celebrate the crowning of a new monarch in their primary school years. Events like these will be written in the history books and for the children to be able to understand that is a unique opportunity. 
 
Community is important to us as a school, we were thoroughly looking forward to the gathering of families and the local community to celebrate everything that is good about being together on this historic occasion but, in true British style, the weather intervened. However, in true Crackley style, we would not allow the weather to dampen the pupils’ excitement as they gathered in the hall to celebrate and share the stories of their week-long activities of making crowns, writing, and sending cards to Buckingham Palace and creating time capsules. Prior to this, the whole school community enjoyed a street-party style picnic, lovingly prepared by our wonderful catering staff. I appreciate the help given by members of the PTA, by many staff members, including the office and estates staff, but especially Mr Cottrill and Mrs McAloon for their leadership of the event. Thank you to all classroom staff for preparing the pupils so well for their performances. All year groups were exceptional, as was our fantastic choral group! 
  
I am proud to announce we have raised £168.20 towards a chosen Kings Charles III charity and the PTA have taken all food donated from the Coronation celebration to Coventry Cyreniens. 
 
We enjoyed a marathon assembly this morning. This week’s Stars of the Week are Isher from Nursery, Anna RecA, Sebastian RecM, Sherry J1H, Matteo J1G, Harriet J2B, Savannah J3H, Casper J3V, Theo J4R, Manhoor J4S, Elsie J5L, Issy J5W, James J6H and Sebastian J6V.  Well done everyone!  Congratulations, again, to our performance poetry group on their achievement at the Nuneaton Festival, to our Debating Team of Jia, Julia, Leani and Lucas for winning the recent debate and our fantastic mathematicians on their achievement in the Primary Maths Challenge – especially Lucas, who earned a gold medal. Everyone enjoyed beautiful performances from Little Crackers and Arisha J6. 
 
We wish those pupils who are going to the ISA athletics meeting on Wednesday, the very best. 
I would like to wish you all a wonderful, restful and safe Coronation Bank Holiday weekend as we join in prayer that our King enjoys a good and successful reign. Our prayers and thoughts are with King Charles III on the day of his Coronation. 

God bless, 

Rob Duigan 

A reminder for the Trinity Term for carline collections. 

When dropping off and collecting please be as safe and as quick as possible by turning off engines, parking with due consideration and courtesy for other cars and pedestrians as this really helps making these journeys as easy for all. Once you have safely dropped off your child(ren) please vacate the playground as soon as possible as any delays impact on other parents and has a knock on effect on surrounding roads and on our neighbours. 

Please remember to inform us if any of your contact details have changed.

Also, please do advise us of information in relation to your child(ren)'s health, dietary, allergy or medical information so we can update our records here to ensure the correct information is held. 

Please see the attached menus for the first half of Trinity Term.

Week commencing 08/05

Week commencing 15/05

Week commencing 22/05

Crackley pupils took to the hills last Monday at the Kenilworth Runners May Day Mile, Schools Challenge Race, in Abbey Fields.

Children in Years 5 and 6 could enter and represent their school, with some 12 primary schools from Kenilworth, Leamington and Warwick taking part. Crackley put in some great individual performances and finished 4th overall.

A special mention to Leo in Junior 4 who came 2nd overall in the family fun run, out of over 200 runners - well done Leo!

To mark the coronation of His Majesty the King, Crackley Hall pupils sang triumphantly and performed majestically, albeit in the school hall rather than on the fields as originally planned. Adorned in red, white and blue, each year group graciously gave a ceremonious performance:-

Reception - Performed a poem called King Charles III and displayed their paintings of the new King.

Junior 1 - Performed the poem, Buckingham Palace by A A Milne.

Junior 2 - Performed If you're a King and you know it together with a class prayer.

Junior 3 - Sang Street Party after a morning of arts and craft activities.

Junior 4 - Performed a rap of King for a Day penned by Mrs Jackson-Mayne.

Junior 5 - Performed To the Sound of Trumpets and ended with 'God Save the King.'

Junior 6 - Performed I Just Can't Wait to be King from The Lion King.

We hope you all enjoy your own celebrations this weekend. Don't forget that Choral Group is performing at the Choirs At The Castle event on Sunday morning and all are welcome to come and watch them. We wish them good luck - but we know they will be amazing!

The school council were very excited to hear that 11 bags of old school uniform are being sent to Jairos Jiri Harare Children’s Centre, Zimbabwe. This is centre for children with disabilities. We hope they like our uniform and we can’t wait to see some photos of them wearing it!

Our Stars of the Week this week are:

Congratulations to them all!

Wednesday 7 June - 6.30pm - 8.30pm

Princethorpe College's annual Summer Open Evening will take place on Wednesday 7 June from 6.30pm to 8.30pm. This is a perfect opportunity for prospective families looking for a place in September 2024 and beyond to visit the school, for children to take part in departmental activities and for parents to meet and chat to members of staff and pupils.

The Headmaster will also address visitors during the evening. Light refreshments will be available.

Please click here to book your place. 

View gallery to scroll through pictures from our assembly on Friday 5 May 2023.

As part of their journey to ready themselves for secondary school, Junior 6 have been cementing their knowledge about road safety. As lots of the children will be taking new journeys in September, such as travelling by bus or walking themselves, the representative from the local authority talked to the students about how to be aware and sensible around roads. We all learnt a lot about not just road awareness, but how to be mindful of our impulses. For example, we thought about how we could plan our journeys into school to avoid any unneeded stress. It is such a delight to see the children develop as they prepare themselves for the new challenges and opportunities that await them in September. Keep up the hard work Junior 6!

Junior 5W have loved learning about the Tudors, and their final lesson saw them making their own timeline of Elizabeth I’s reign. The children had an array of information, including pictures and captions of information at their disposal, and they had to work together to organise them into a historical timeline. It challenged their collaborative skills as well as the need to apply their previous learning to a different way of presenting information. Junior 5W are certainly going to miss the Tudors, and some of the children are even continuing their learning outside of the classroom to find out even more about this fascinating royal family!

Junior 4 have been busy in Science this week learning a lot and exploring their new topic, 'Electricity.' They have identified the symbols used when drawing circuits and began the topic making a simple circuit, and then they skilfully added more components, such as a range of switches, progressing to adding a buzzer and a motor. In addition, we have a range of 'Snap Science' resources, used as an extension activity, which groups have also explored with enthusiasm.

We had lots of excitement this week as our intrepid scientists explored and investigated different types of soils. We turned the classroom into a full-on laboratory as we used our magnifying glasses to identify different types of soils from all over the county. We looked at rock-types, insect life, decaying matter and plant and animal life within our sample. What do you know? The soils were teeming with tiny life – we learnt there are more living creatures in a handful of soil than people in the world...amazing!

Miss Smith, our resident placement student psychologist, was on hand to support the pupils as they ‘ooohed and aaahed’ happily, budding scientists each one of them. Miss Smith was a pupil at Crackley Hall who recalled the soil's lesson when she was here, so the children loved telling her all about their findings with enthusiasm. We found minuscule snails, microscopic pieces of sedimentary rock, roots, a little seedling 3mm long and a bevy of ladybird eggs. Great fun.

This week we were also treated to a very special visit from a very new and percious person. Mrs Wheatley came to introduce us to little Luca who was born 10 days ago on the 24 April. We were so delighted to finally get to see him, and we had lots of questions such as: will his eyes stay blue, and what will his first foods be? We couldn’t believe how tiny his feet and toes were and how peacefully he slept through all our excitement and questions. He must be familiar with our voices.

Thank you to Mr and Mrs Wheatley for bringing Luca in and making the time to share your joy with us. We are so happy for you. Happy Coronation weekend everyone!

After a long Bank Holiday weekend, the children returned to school ready to learn. In Maths, children have been working hard on fractions. We have been writing character descriptions of the old man in the book we are studying and loved thinking about how he would make a good friend for someone of a similar age based on his characteristics. In Science, we have started our new gardening topic, and children have begun growing beans so that we can look at germination and how the plants' form. Junior 2 are extending their knowledge of a rainforest, looking at the layers and animals that would live within the rainforest. The children have worked hard rehearsing for the Coronation celebration and were excited to perform.

Junior 1 have enjoyed combining their Science and English lessons this week, by beginning the factual writing element of the English curriculum. We have been learning about wildlife in the UK, labelling insects and writing about their habitats. In Geography we have been further afield, discovering different climates around the equator and beyond. Our Maths lessons have been lots of practical fun, with plenty of opportunity to explore halving and sharing equally with shapes and amounts. We have even managed to fit in some practice for our poem for our Coronation Day performance. The children have worked so hard to learn all of the words and actions for Buckingham Palace by A.A Milne. We hope you have a lovely long weekend celebrating such a historic event!

This week Reception have been busy preparing for the King’s Coronation.  They have been learning all about King Charles III and have written their own fact files on him. They have been making crowns to wear at the picnic on the field on Friday. Reception had a go at doing some close observational drawing of the new King using photos and they have painted some incredible portraits of him. They have also been learning a poem to perform to the rest of the school.

Please click here for this week's newsletter 

To welcome the return of the pupils after the Bank Holiday weekend, Mr Duigan spoke about May being the month of Mary and reminded pupils that if the 'r' is taken out of Mary, this will leave May. Mr Duigan spoke about the life of Mary, from holding her son as a baby, to seeing Him die on the cross. He spoke about how Mary helps us all to be better people by the way she led her remarkable life.

Reception children have been learning all about Pentecost this week.  They could retell the story using movement and dance and they used musical instruments to symbolise the mighty rushing wind and the flickering flames. They also thought about how the Holy Spirit helped the disciples speak in different languages so they could tell the world about Jesus.

Please click on the link below for this week's Weekly Mission:

Weekly Mission

Please find information below:

Children's Liturgy

Jesus asks us to believe in and trust Him, because through Him we will come to know God. We reflect on what it means to trust God and other people.

Activity Sheet

On Tuesday after school the children taking part in the Bayleaf extra-curricular cookery club made a sugar snap salad with mange tout!

The children worked carefully following instructions to bring their masterpieces together. They began by mixing their dressings, then moved on to the eye watering task of chopping their onions and peppers before combining all their ingredients together to make their finished salads.

Bayleaf Cookery attracts children of all ages, and it is wonderful to see them working together, developing their interests and learning new skills all while having some fun.

Just look at their smiles, a huge well done to everyone!

Our Young Engineers were hard at work in the Art Room on Tuesday in their after school STEM club. This week's challenge was to build a Hangman - a relaxing swinging hammock and not one of those executioner folk!

Carefully following their instruction booklets, and using their brightly coloured trays of parts, the children were quick to assemble their models and their finished products were really very impressive.

Next week it is Elevators - we reckon that might give everyone a lift!

Star Wars has been with the Force since 1977 and to celebrate Star Wars Day of May the 4th we decided to bring the galaxy far, far away a whole lot closer.  With our favourite characters of Luke Skywalker, Yoda, Grogu, Darth Vader and Princess Leia, we let the battle actions begin with clone troopers and battle droids roaring through the atmosphere.  We invented hidden wheels for creating a hover effect on our tanks, with elevating spring-loaded shooters and a lookout for a clone commander.  Did you know that Star Wars is THE most successful Lego theme ever? So inventing new battles in Lego Club makes Star Wars even more exciting and challenging. But not everyone excels in the Star Wars theme and here in Lego Club we were fully aware of this, which was why some of us celebrated spring by creating flowers and trees galore, with lots of bright green leaves to symbolise the fresh new life of spring. If you don’t feel like saying May the 4th Be With You on Star Wars Day, you can always say it with Lego flowers!

The PTA have organised a raffle, with a beautiful King Charles III Coronation Teddy Bear as first prize, with Beanie Babies and other items as prizes. Please send in some loose change to purchase tickets on Friday 12 May. Thank you!

Just two weeks before our colour run and family picnic take place on Friday 19f May from 4.00pm to 7.00pm on the school playing fields! 

Don’t delay in signing up you and your family as some time slots are now sold out. All children under the age of 16, parents and teachers are welcome to join this family obstacle fun run. 

As always, we need your help to run this event. Please see the link below to sign up as a volunteer if you may have some time to offer.

Don’t forget your family picnic and drinks and we look forward to seeing you and your family soon. For tickets, helping us run the event and more details please see the link.  

Tickets

Check out the flyers for details of upcoming PTA events.

Please follow us on social media to keep updated with our events!

We regularly recruit for a variety of roles, please do share news of the vacancies with interested friends and family. Current vacancies include:

Princethorpe College

• Registrar
• Teacher of Spanish
• Rugby Coach
• Graduate Sports Coach

Further information and application forms on all roles are available on the Foundation's website - www.princethorpe.co.uk/join-us