The Chronicle

Dear Parents

Welcome back from half term!  I hope that you and your family enjoyed a restful time.  I was sorry to learn that, unfortunately, some families and staff had part of their half term disrupted by COVID which is a great shame.  

I was delighted to see so much sport taking place this week.  We have had teams participating in hockey, rugby and swimming fixtures, involving children across various year groups.  Mr and Mrs Vaughan and Mrs Wheatley accompanied our team to the ISA Swimming competition in Walsall yesterday, where we fared very well.  Results will be published shortly. Well done to everyone who took part and my thanks to all staff involved in transporting and coaching the children.  There are more fixtures and tournaments next week and I look forward to hearing the results.

I have also been pleased to see so many Junior da Vinci’s awarded today for History and Science.  These awards are carefully considered, and children need to meet the required criteria across 3 areas. My congratulations are extended to Sara, Alexa, Sienna, Elora, Molly and Jenson for their work in history and to Isabella, Ralph, Georgie and Penny for their science project.  Certificates and badges are on their way to you.

I’d appeal to all pupils and parents to remember that being in a new school year, we can’t wear any badges that were awarded last academic year. We tend to allow leniency on this during the first half-term as some pupils receive badges very late on in the previous academic year.

In assembly this morning, Star of the Week certificates were ‘presented’ to Sebastian, May, Jessica, Lillyrose, Joshua, Thomas, Malachi, Diya, Patrick, Ben, Matilda, Alex and the whole of Junior 6.  Following assembly, Isaac in Junior 4, entertained us with his wonderful performance from Oliver.  Well done everyone for your super efforts this week.

 I visited our Junior 6 children today to wish them well for their Princethorpe entrance examination tomorrow.  The Junior 6 team have prepared the children very well and, with the excellent home support they receive, I am sure that they will perform to the best of their ability tomorrow.    When they return next week, they will be able to benefit an amended timetable which includes some wonderful activities.

Next week Mrs Vaughan will be taking a hockey team to London to compete in the ISA U11 National tournament, the PTA will be supplying cakes, as one of their fundraisers on Friday and there will also be the annual Headmaster’s quiz to look forward to in the evening - I hope to see you there.

We are supporting the British Legion by way of our annual poppy sale (and other paraphernalia) to raise funds and awareness. Pupils will be able to support this charity by purchasing their item from the student council members next week.  We will be holding a remembrance service outside, from 10:50 to 11:05 on Thursday next week.  We remember all our loved ones, now departed, at all times and particularly in the month of November.

I should like to wish everyone a happy Diwali or Band Chhor Diwas and a happy and restful weekend.  There is some interesting cricket, football and rugby being played this weekend.

God bless,

Mr Duigan

Just to confirm that the revised date for the Flu Vaccinations will be Thursday 18 November 2021.

More details will be sent out shortly.

Our Stars of the Week this week are:

Congratulations to them all!

As in previous years, we are supporting The Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal and have various poppy products in school for the children to purchase.

The Year 6 School Council members will be selling these items during break times next week. 

The products available:

• Poppy- suggested donation 50p
• Small Zip Pull  in various colours - suggested donation 50p
• Poppy Reflector - suggested donation 50p
• Silicon wristband in various colours - suggested donation £1.00
• Snap Band in various colours - suggested donation £1.50

Please note that no change will be available so please discuss with your child beforehand and send in exact money for their chosen items.

Could the children all wear odd socks on Monday 15 November please as we will taking part in Odd Socks Day as part of Anti-Bullying Week.

Odd Socks Day celebrates that we are all unique, and the day sends an important message to all pupils that they should be allowed to be themselves,  free from bullying, and helps us celebrate Anti-Bullying Week in a fun and positive way. 

Last year over 13,000 schools took part in Odd Socks Day and once again Andy Day (Cbeebies/CBBC) and his band Andy and the Odd Socks are supporting the Anti-Bullying Alliance to help bring Odd Socks Day to life again this year. Have a listen to the brilliant song they have recorded especially for Anti-Bullying Week, One Kind Word.

Each year at our Prize Giving during the Trinity Term we present book prizes to the children in each class who the teachers feel are most deserving of recognition.

What with the COVID challenges, we were unable to take photos at Prize Giving as we normally do, so we are very please to now share some of the children's pictures with their choice of book.

Well done to all of them!

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Hardwick's class is Hugo

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Burley's class is Jess 

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Glen-Root's class is Joshua

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Van Zyl's class is Joseph

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Holmes class is Jessie

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Robert's class is Arthur

Mathlete of the week for Mr Stedeford's class is Hollie

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Wildey's group is Oliver

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Lammas's group is Georgie

Well done all!

Thursday 18 November 2021 - 7.00pm to 8.00pm 

Crackley Hall and Little Crackers are holding a Nursery and Reception Open Evening on Thursday 18 November 2021 from 7.00pm to 8.00pm.

This is an opportunity to gain an insight into the Early Years at Crackley Hall and Little Crackers.  Parents will be able to visit the Nursery and Reception classes, see examples of children's work and activities and talk to the Headmaster, Rob Duigan, and Assistant Head Early Years and Key Stage 1, Susan Glen-Roots and meet members of the Nursery and Reception Team. 

To book your place click here.

If you can't make the Open Evening but would like to look around the school, please call our Admissions Secretary, Mrs Jenny Vaughan on 01926 514410 or alternatively email admissions@crackleyhall.co.uk and come on a day to suit you.

For more information visit www.crackleyhall.co.uk.

This week in Junior 6 we have been working extremely hard preparing for our entrance examinations on Saturday.  We have been focusing on managing our time in exam style tasks and sustaining our focus for long periods of time, while quickly switching between different subjects.  We have practised reading comprehensions and lots of descriptive writing, as well as lots of different maths problems.  We are looking forward to showing off how good we are on Saturday!

Junior 5 have been immersed in The Tempest by William Shakespeare for many weeks now and this week we have made the fabulous cast of characters come to life! After discussing the traits and personalities of the characters on the island so far in the story, we arranged ourselves into groups and chose one to become and then created a ‘family’ portrait style photograph. Along with our drama skills of communicating through body language, facial expression and staging, our techniques of co-operation and collaboration were put to the test by Mrs Wildey and many of us were rewarded with the pink star of Archimedes the Ant! Take a look at our portraits and see if you can spot which characters we were trying to portray?

Our J4 pupils have had an exciting week combining literacy skills with science and art. To conclude the work on our class book, The Cloud Tea Monkeys by Elspeth Graham and Mal Peet, which tells the tale of a young girl called Tashi whose mother is an impoverished tea-picker who becomes ill and Tashi tries to continue her mother's job. Ridiculed by the bad-tempered Overseer, Tashi seeks solace where the local monkeys regularly share her fruit, and her generosity is repaid as they pick the highest and best tea to fill her basket. The children picked leaves and made their own tea in Science and tasted a range of herbal teas to help ‘infuse’ them with wow words in English! Their task was to decorate their own box for their own tea and use slogans, rhetorical questions and persuasive language to describe their unique tea. Using examples from a range of tea boxes, they were able to extend their vocabulary by magpieing descriptive phrases from tea-makers. It was tea-rific!

Junior 3 have returned with aplomb to their learning after the half-term break. We were very excited to start our new Geography topic on Kenya and have been delighted with the fantastic efforts the children made with their project work over the holiday. Pupils have taken turns to be our ‘Kenya correspondent’ and took us on a tour of the country through their informative and attractive presentations. We have heard about the wildebeest of the Masai Mara, the beautiful silver beaches of Mombasa and the tantalizing tribe of the Turkana. We are so well informed that our teachers are now going to have to think carefully about what else they can teach us! We have also been putting our alphabetical skills to good use and learning how to navigate a dictionary in our search for the meaning of some adventurous new vocabulary. A special mention to Henry in J3H for his wonderful contribution to the on-going Poppy collection; he made a stunning vase of poppies to mark this important historical occasion.

Year 2 have returned from half-term with renewed vigour! In Maths, they have been working hard on adding and subtracting two-digit numbers with exchanging. Can you believe that we are doing column addition and subtraction in Year 2?! This has involved lots of concrete work with equipment so that they understand why we need to exchange ones for tens. In English, we read a fabulous book about a very brave and bold Rapunzel who showed great resilience to escape and defeat the wicked witch. We went on to continue the story and we came up with some fantastic ideas focusing on using different sentence starters to make our writing interesting for the reader. Over half-term, the children were set the task of researching their local area and creating a presentation for their class. We have been so impressed with their work and have taken great pleasure in awarding many Da Vincis. Well done, Year 2!  

After a lovely half term rest Junior 1 have come back with revitalised energy and enthusiasm. Cinderella is our new book in English and a different, Mexican, version was introduced to the class. We went back in time to Queen Victoria in History to find out some interesting facts about this famous queen. Did you know she was the person who introduced Christmas trees and Easter eggs to our country? We had to cast our minds back to before the half-term holiday for Geography, as we were using the information we gathered about what vehicles travel on the main road outside our school to plot onto a chart. This helped us see clearly that cars were the most popular vehicles and the least popular were motorbikes and emergency vehicles.

After a lovely half-term break, Reception have returned to school full of beans and eager to learn. This week we have been discovering how to stay safe on Bonfire Night, in addition to writing some super firework sounds too. We were very lucky to have Mrs Verma visit us and explain how Diwali is celebrated and we even tried some traditional Indian food – it was delicious! In Maths we investigated fewer and more than 1, 2, and 3 and learnt that a number can be made up of different numbers. Although it’s been a blustery week, we blew away the cobwebs with plenty of fresh air in PE and Ball Skills; what a lot of fun we’ve had!

J3V had a wonderful treat on Wednesday afternoon as Daiya, Diya and Josh, all Junior 3 pupils, led the RE lesson for Mrs Jackson-Mayne. All three pupils wanted to share their excitement about the Hindu and Sikh festival of Diwali, the five-day festival of light celebrated by millions across the world.

Diya and Josh received ‘learning’ and ‘enthusiasm’ Crackley Compass Stars for their fantastic props and detailed explanations of the Hindu story of Rama and Sita. The class lit candles and each pupil was given a bindi by Diya.

Daiya was awarded a full Da Vinci for her short video, which you can watch here, in which she presented a PowerPoint to the class retelling the Sikh story of Guru Hargobind and the 52 princes.

"It was a super learning experience for us all" said Mrs Jackson-Mayne, "I was delighted with the way all three pupils shared their beliefs and stories and explained how they would be celebrating Diwali, this year."

This year Diwali began on Thursday 4 November, and we wish Happy Diwali to everyone who is celebrating.

Each week Mrs Jackson-Mayne leads a ‘Prayer and Meditation’ workshop with a class.

On Monday the whole school ventured outside and endured wind and sunshine to listen to Mr Duigan deliver his Assembly on All Saints’ Day. We remembered all the Saints who are in heaven and those people who could become saints by demonstrating kindness and care in their daily lives today. We listened to Mr Duigan remind the pupils about our four house saints – St John Henry Newman is our most recent Saint, who is the house saint for Venus; followed by St Joseph for Mars; St Francis for Saturn and St Therese of Lisieux for Jupiter. We heard how each of them became Saints through their work and dedication to caring for others.  We continue to pray for our saints as we try to follow the right path and to give us warm and loving hearts.

Over the holidays the Junior 4 pupils had the task to research the charity CAFOD. Vaughan produced a powerpoint and information booklet and Ria and Sebastian have made an information poster.

Please find information below:

Childrens Liturgy

Activity Sheet

Please click on the link below for this week's weekly mission:

Weekly Mission - 1 November

Weekly Mission - 8 November

Sports Clubs will finish at 4.30 from Monday 8 November, pick up from field/school will remain the same.

The only exception for this next ek is J5/J6 Hockey Club on Monday 8 November which will finish at 4.45pm.

Huge congratulations to all our swimmers who represented us so well at the ISA Midlands Regional Swimming Championships yesterday.

Crackley Hall did really well finishing in second place overall. A full write up will be shared in the next edition of the Chronicle.

U11A Hockey vs Warwick Prep

On Wednesday 3 November, the U11A hockey team played Warwick Prep. It was a tough match against their A team. Olivia played her first match as goal keeper and was fantastic. The score was 2-0 to Warwick. In our second match we played a lot better against the B team. We passed more and marked better. We drew 0-0.

Player of the match was Olivia Burley.

Elle Weir (Captain).

U11B hockey vs Warwick Prep:

On Wednesday the U11B hockey team played against Warwick Prep. In the first game we lost 1-0 and in the second match we drew 0-0. Players of the match were Kyra Khanna and Willow Rochford. Willow was great at defending and Lily was strong up front.

Kyra Khanna (B team captain).

Please be advised the Junior 2 Football Club is cancelled on Tuesday 9 November.

Why not start the festive countdown by building your very own Lego Advent Calendar?  That’s exactly what we did in Lego Club this week!  Packed with inspirational thinking, excitement and wonderful surprises, we decided to base our Calendar on a Star Wars theme, with turtles and seals making the odd appearance.  We built a stormtrooper, a Tusken Raider, a starfighter plane with blaster powers, a festive looking Bo the seal, and Darth Vader looking less mean than usual dressed up as Santa Claus. However, the undeniable highlight was on the 24th window where we had an adorable minifigure of Baby Yoda, in a festive jumper, lying in its own red pram.   We even wrote our own easy-to-follow building instructions to go behind each window.  Who said Advent Calendars were just made of chocolate?! To be continued… 

Welcome back everyone!  It’s been a busy week at Little Crackers as we swing back into a full compliment of children again.  This has been a week of Autumnal celebrations, with plenty of Diwali fun taking place.  The children have dressed up in Miss Anupa’s beautiful saris, we have been making Rangoli patterns both inside and outside and have listened to stories of how children, and the Mr Men, celebrate Diwali!  Our youngest children, in the Dormouse room, have been exploring the wonderful colours and shapes of autumn leaves through printing and painting, and we have been spotting the signs of autumn all around us.  We would like to wish you all a very Happy Diwali and if you are out and about this weekend we hope you all enjoy a safe and exciting Bonfire Night.

Newsletter

On Friday 12 November, all children are invited to take part in the PTA cake sale. This year cakes can be pre-ordered and the PTA will deliver fresh Krispy Kreme original glazed donuts to school during the Friday morning. If you do not wish to order a Krispy Kreme there is an alternative choice of popcorn or an apple.

This is a fund raiser for the School PTA and by consenting to this event you will be confirming that £1.00 will be added to your Lent term invoice. We do hope that you are able to support this event and ask that you respond to the Evolve email sent to you by Wednesday 10 November.

We are excited to join The Big PTA Christmas Raffle. This raffle was so successful last year, the tickets sold out!

For every ticket purchased, you will have 12 chances to win up to £5,000! At the same time, we will raise 50% from every ticket sold supporting our PTA. It's a fantastic way to bring parents, carers, teachers and the wider community together, in partnership with our PTA, and at the same time give something back. We hope to raise funds that can support and enrich the education of our children – we aim to provide extra resources for the children, improve the school environment, as well as run extracurricular activities such as music, art and sport.
Your support is greatly appreciated and we wish you good luck!

https://www.bigptaraffle.co.uk/support/crackley-hall-pta-cv8

Friday 12 November - 6.30pm to 8.30pm

The Crackley Hall PTA Headmaster's Quiz is back once again and will take place on Friday 12 November from 6.30pm to 8.30pm. One family ticket will cost £5. This will be an online quiz through Microsoft Teams and Kahoot.it.  Mr. Duigan and the PTA hope you will enjoy this time with your family.  

This year's theme is creative face masks (painted, made or bought) for the whole family, they can be anything you like but must be in your child's house colour.  We can't wait to see how creative you can be with your family!  Saturn - Yellow, Venus - Green, Mars - Red, Jupiter - Blue.

100% of your donations will help raise funds for the PTA that will directly go back to your child and the school. There will be prizes and house points for top scoring teams, most creative family face masks and raffle!  I hear a Headmaster's award may be given out as well! Good luck! 

Please click here to purchase your tickets: https://www.pta-events.co.uk/crackleyhall/index.cfm#.YW

Your children should all have come home with their Christmas card design. The deadline for ordering the cards is Wednesday 10 November.

Please click here to place your orders: https://www.pta-events.co.uk/crackleyhall/index.cfm#.YW

Crackley’s Christmas Light Trail is set to return on Friday 3 December this year but we need more volunteers in order to make this event possible! It was such a wonderful sight last year, we would absolutely love to make it happen again!

We still need a few more households to volunteer their Christmas Light Displays at their houses to be included on the map. The display can be as simple or as flamboyant as you like so don't be shy!

If any households in the Kenilworth area would be willing to have their Christmas lights included in the trail map please get in touch with Jo Ward - jofoskett21@hotmail.com - we can’t wait to hear from you!

November Flash Sale on Jumpers and Winter Coats!

Jumpers £5 and Winter Coats £12.50.

Many sizes available at this reduced price.

To order email:uniform@pta.Crackleyhall.co.uk 

All other stock available at the usual amazing discount!

Parents, please ensure that all items of school uniform and sports kits are named.

Could you please regularly check all uniform and sports kits at home – if it does not belong to your child, please return it to the School Office as soon as possible.

-----------------------------------------------------

 Ben (J4S) has lost his named school cap 

William (J2B) has lost his named tie

Ivy (J4S) has lost her black gloves with green on them