The Chronicle

Dear Parents

I hope that you will have the opportunity to read some of the interesting news and articles in this week’s Crackley Chronicle.  It has been another busy week in school and this term seems to be increasing pace.  I am delighted to see so many sports fixtures taking place once again, we have recently seen children visit The Croft for rugby, Cambridge for a rugby festival, an ISA National hockey festival and ISA 5-a-side fixtures.

We invited Crescent School’s Junior 6 children to participate in a (appropriately socially distanced) music workshop on Tuesday and, if you have access to our Facebook page, you will be able to watch some of the marvellous performances that took place that day.  My thanks to Mrs Olden for co-ordinating this event and to Mrs Stokes for the guest performance during the day.

Yesterday evening I hosted our Nursery and Reception Open Evening and welcomed a limited number visitors into school, after hours and, once again, with certain arrangements in place.  Thank you to Mrs Glen-Roots, Mrs Jenny Vaughan, Mr Luis, Mr Sansum and the classroom staff for helping to make this event possible.  Mrs Allen, our Class teacher, also visited to say hello to our current Reception C class parents and to meet any prospective parents for next year.  Please do not worry if you were unable to meet Mrs Allen as we will try to arrange another opportunity for you to meet her.

I hope that you were able to enjoy the Joseph Production during the course of last weekend.  There will be a limited number of DVD’s available before the end of this term, if you are interested in purchasing a copy, please contact the school office.

Holiday club will be open from Wednesday 16 December until Thursday 23 December should there be sufficient bookings for each day. If sufficient demand exists, we will also run holiday club on Tuesday 4 January.  Please see details later in this edition and complete the online booking form as soon as possible so that these days maybe confirmed to parents and staffing can be allocated.

Congratulations to all our stars of the week: Ethan, Arjan, Nirvair, Sloane, Edward, Thea, Jacob, Mahnoor, Isaac, Sienna, Lennon, Amalia, Seb and Alfred.  Diya, Junior 3 was also congratulated on completing her bronze award.  I hope that you enjoyed watching assembly, particularly the wonderful performance by Mrs Goode’s Junior 1 singing group; it was enough to brighten any grey winter morning.

The PTA are working hard behind the scenes to organise a spectacular Christmas Fayre for all the children to enjoy on 6 December.  This will take place during school time when each year group will be allocated a time to visit the fayre and see our special guest.  Please keep a look out for further correspondence about this event which I hope that you are able to support.  Thank you very much to the Card family for hosting a most enjoyable quiz last Friday.  Thank you, also to all the families who joined us and congratulations to our winning family, the O’Hallorans.

I have been delighted with the outstanding sports results this week, in particular the excellent wins over Warwick in the U11 rugby festival.  I am not as confident about the Springboks against England this weekend.

I will be attending the Princethorpe Prizegiving this evening and I am looking forward to seeing some of our pupils from previous years.  I am as proud as each parent there when an ex-Crackley Hall pupil takes to the stage to receive their well-deserved prize and very much enjoy this evening of celebration.

I should like to wish everyone a happy and restful weekend.

God bless,

Mr Duigan

Holiday club will run from Wednesday 15 until Thursday 23 December 2021, and then again on Tuesday 4 January 2022.

It will be open from 8.30am to 5.00pm each day, and will cost £30 per child. Hot lunch will be provided.

Holiday club will only operate on the days where there are sufficient numbers to open, therefore it is important for you to book early as we may not be able to accommodate last minute bookings, due to staff ratios and COVID bubbles. If you have booked a day and the numbers attending are not high enough, you will be contacted to either cancel or rearrange the day booked.

Bookings for the Holiday Club are via My School Portal

Thank you

Our Stars of the Week this week are:

Congratulations to them all!

Former Crackley Hall pupil, Millie Lammas, has been awarded first prize in the Independent Schools’ Association’s prestigious National Art Competition. Her impressive entry, Before Going Over The Top, a 3D model, depicting the trenches in World War One, which she produced last year when she was in Junior 6, was placed first in this year’s Key Stage 2 Art 3D Individual class.

The National competition followed on from the Regional Midlands competition which took place back in October where last year’s Junior 1 class also took first prize in the Key Stage 1 Art 3D Group class with their stunning work Town On The Hill.

Many congratulations to Millie and also to last year’s Junior 1, it was another super set of results for our young artists, and we congratulate them all on their success.

Crackley Hall has been taking part in Anti-Bullying Week, and to celebrate that we are all unique on Monday 15 November Crackley Hall joined schools across the country for Odd Socks Day.

Odd Socks Day is an annual event that reminds pupils that they are all allowed to be themselves and helps us all to mark Anti-Bullying Week in a fun and positive way. Around school there were plenty of bright and colourful odd socks, as pupils showcased their individuality.

Together the children have also explored how our words and actions can affect others. The children listened to the One Kind Word song produced by Andy Day (from CBeebies and CBBC) and his band Andy And The Odd Socks especially for Anti-Bullying Week.

During the week, Mrs Burley and Mrs Jackson-Mayne were kept busy making a short, fun film for Friday’s assembly. They interviewed the children and challenged them (Challenge Anneka style) to share their own random acts of kind words around the school.

Kindness is more important today than it has ever been, especially after the isolation of the last year, and the children have responded very well to the serious messages behind all this year’s Anti-Bullying Week's fun.

On Tuesday 16 November, Junior 6 welcomed Year 6 from Crescent School for a fantastic, full day of uplifting and inspiring music. The pupils from both schools worked together under the guidance of Directors of Music, Susan Olden and Julie Barnes, rehearsing, performing, and improvising a mix of vocal and orchestra pieces.

Mrs Olden and Mrs Barnes both agreed that the joint musical initiative had been another very successful day, remarking that, “It is so good to work together, everyone really enjoys themselves, it’s always one of the highlights of the term.”

In the morning, pupils worked on vocal pieces that included the traditional Monday’s Child, that they enjoyed singing alongside professional singing teacher, soprano, Shoshana Stokes. They also had great fun singing Abba’s upbeat Money Money Money with its catchy refrain.

In the afternoon, the pupils worked with their instruments, improvising to Hans Zimmer’s Earth, working together to develop their own stirring and emotive piece. The two orchestras co-operating and complementing each other to deliver an electrifying performance.

Julie Barnes, Director of Music at the Crescent School, continued, “Both schools have such a strong musical tradition, and the children really rise to the occasion, it is great to come over and work together.”

Susan Olden, Director of Music at Crackley Hall, added, “There is real talent within our schools and our music workshops always inspire our pupils.”

The Junior Schools Music Workshops are just one of the many performance opportunities that pupils at the schools take part in.

To listen to the children singing Monday’s Child please click here.

This year's winning Crackley Hall Christmas Card design is by Elizabeth from J4R. Her simple design captures the spirit of the season featuring an angel proclaiming from the roof tops ‘Oh Holy Night’. The design will feature on the front of every card sent out by the Headmaster this advent.

Mr Duigan commented, "Elizabeth’s design was a clear winner, with strength in its simplicity, but the standard overall was high. I was delighted to see so many entries, well done to everybody who took part."

There was an exceptionally strong field of entries this year, so our congratulations also go to the runners up whose designs will feature as cameos on the reverse of the card. Well done Marley(J6V), Blythe (J4S) and Sloane (J1S).

Place2Be, a mental health charity, has just created a website called 'Parenting Smart'.  This is a free online resource featuring practical advice and tried-and-tested tips for parents and carers of primary age children.  You can feel confident that all of the advice has the backing of Place2Be’s clinical experts.  

Parenting Smart is: 

• Created by Place2Be’s parenting experts
• Based on evidence and their experience of working with children and families 
• Designed with busy parents in mind, with short videos and articles  
• Includes topics from meltdowns to friendship difficulties, from anxiety to the transition to secondary school 

You can find out more here. 

Last week Crackley Hall joined over a million other pupils across the country celebrating ‘Maths Week England’, a grassroots movement that aims to share the joy of mathematics with everyone. 

All the year groups at Crackley enjoyed exploring the mathematics that we see all around us and use every day. Have a look in the gallery to see examples of some of the maths fun the children had in school.

The Reception classes thoroughly enjoyed being shape detectives and going on a shape hunt around school. While Junior 1 had fun listening to mathematical stories and thinking hard about the ‘maths’ hidden within them.  After hearing the Spinderella story, they played a game called Incey Wincey Spider, using a die to help them move up or down a drainpipe.

Junior 2 explored the important mathematical matter of finance and created their own amazing moneyboxes decorated with all the things they are saving for. Junior 3 enjoyed an online mathematical story time session from Roma Agrawal, with activities based on her book How Was That Built? 

Junior 4 considered patterns in the times tables and created some wonderful multiplication art. Then Junior 5 explored horizontal symmetry and then considered the properties of a cube and what a ‘net’ is. 

Junior 6 invesitgated maths through an engineering theme, understanding the strength of 3D shapes and how they are used in construction. 

It was a wonderful week of mathematical activities, challenges, stories, and games.

Calling all mathematicians and economists! Here is a chance to think hard about creative ways to save money and what you are saving for, whilst having fun.

Design, draw, colour, then make yourself a moneybox, using the attached template. Take a photo of your moneybox and bring it into school to your form teacher. The moneyboxes will be judged in school and a creative da Vinci awarded to the most inventive.

The top three will then be entered into the national competition, run by the ‘Lifesavers Financial Literacy’ programme. Please bring your entry and photo into school by Wednesday 24 November.

Design a money-box

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

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Burley's class is Eloise and Oscar 

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

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

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Holmes class is Grace

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

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

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

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

Well done all!

This week in Junior 6, we have continued our exciting range of enrichment activities following the children's hard work and preparation in the lead up to their entrance examinations.  We have explored the forest area and had fun building dens and working outside in our teams during Forest School, baked our own bread in the shape of hedgehogs and challenged ourselves while developing our problem-solving skills in Mrs Vaughan's very own escape room.  We also enjoyed watching a movie and savoured our Costa delivery - the treats were delicious!

Junior 5 had plenty of opportunities to demonstrate their kindness as part of Anti-Bullying Week. The children were delighted to receive One Kind Word packs which were written by each member of the class to each other. It became very clear how powerful one kind word or one act of kindness can be and it costs nothing. Junior 5 say NO to bullying and YES to kindness! 

Junior 4 have been working hard again this week whilst excitedly practising for their December Advent Service held today in The Gables. They have been in the hall consolidating and polishing off their speaking, listening and singing skills in preparation for these two important services. In Science lessons, they have continued to eagerly research how animals are adapted to their habitats and their findings were presented very neatly and thoroughly indeed. Well done, J4!

This week Junior 3 have been busy mastering the 3 x table. We have found so many creative ways to represent equal groups of 3 and we have loved learning songs to help us remember all the multiples. We know how to check if a number is a multiple of 3, and have even begun to apply our understanding to dividing by 3 too. We are deep into the retelling of Lila And The Secret Of Rain and are looking forward to using all our ideas when writing our own stories with a climate message next week. In Science, we are finding out all about forces and we have been busy investigating which surfaces cars travel the furthest on. This was a popular investigation for the Lamborghini lovers!

We are especially proud of Leo in J3H this week who was picked for the Under 9s football tournament this week (even though he is only 8!). They played 11 games of 7 minutes and he had a wonderful time. What a great experience! Keep working hard everyone; we are having a smashing half-term.

This week in Year 2, it has been all about dragons’ eggs! The children received a letter from Professor Hanan al-Hroub from Warwick University. She is conducting a very important experiment. She believes that the character of a dragon is changed by the environment in which the egg lays and she is hoping that by having the eggs in our classrooms for two weeks, the baby dragons will be born with a kind and hard-working nature. The eggs will have to be returned to the university before they hatch, but we will receive news and possibly some pictures following the birth. The only problem was that the eggs disappeared! Thankfully, we found them and we are now keeping them safe, showing them how to love and care for each other so that when they hatch, they will grow to be as wonderful as we are. We have written some amazing dragon poems and created dragon world landscapes to help ignite our imaginations for our English lessons next week. 

Odd socks started our week to help us recognise national Anti-Bullying Week. We also took time to think of how to be kind to each other and took turns saying a kind thing about our friends. In Science we learnt about transparent, translucent and opaque materials. We had lots of different materials to sort like, baking paper, card, plastic, wood and Sellotape. Two dimensional shape was our topic in Maths and we have been exploring how many sides and vertices each shape had. Some of us were very surprised to find a circle had one side and no vertices! In English we developed our understanding of adjectives and after sorting some to match the characters in Cinderella, we then used them to extend sentences to make them more descriptive.

Nativity rehearsals are in full swing in Reception this week! We have been so pleased with how the children are remembering their lines and performing the songs with wonderful actions. We can’t wait for everyone to see it! In Maths we have been exploring the numbers 4 and 5. We have found so many different ways to make them!

First of all a HUGE THANK YOU FOR THE AMAZING POPPIES .....can you get your ‘creative heads’ on again please.

Make a Christmas Bauble to raise awareness of the 'Heads Together' charity to support the mental health of children.

Your task is to find out about the charity 'Heads Together' led by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, then make a Christmas bauble for the Christmas tree which we will entered into the annual Christmas Tree competition at St Nicholas church at the Kenilworth Light Switch On.

Mrs Jackson-Mayne is imagining an amazing array of colouful 'head shaped' baubles that show different emotions.

The final date for entries is Tuesday 22 November.

Everyone is invited to visit the church on Friday 26 November to vote for the best decorated tree.

All the proceeds this year go towards the The Kenilworth Centre for the Youth Wellbeing Fund which links with our theme.

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

Thank you to Father Kevin and Junior 4 today for leading the Mass on the theme of Vocations. The pupils took time out of their busy routine to reflect and think about how our lives are a wonderful journey with many different paths and signposts along the way.  During the Mass they listened to the readings from Genesis in the Old Testament, which linked with the work they have completed in their RE lessons and explored the theme of listening to God’s call in their own lives.

Congratulations to all the Minnie Vinnies who have been enrolled today at the end of our school Mass.  It is amazing to see that so many pupils from Junior 5 and 6 are willing to give their time and energy to do something for others. An appropriate way to end our Vocation Mass. Their first mission will be to lead a couple of initiatives to make Christmas more fun for those less fortunate than us.

Today is a very important celebration in the Sikh calendar, it is the birthday of Guru Nanak Dev Ji. Guru Nanak was the first of ten Gurus and the founder of Sikhism. Guru means teacher and throughout his life Guru Nanak taught us that we should treat everyone equally and with respect, live an honest life and share with others. Hardaya shared a poster she made at home with J2G and answered lots of questions from her curious classmates. Thank you, Hardaya.

Please find information below:

Childrens Liturgy

Activity Sheet

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

Weekly Mission

Last Thursday 11 November, the U11 Hockey Girls travelled to the Lee Valley Stadium to take part in the ISA National Hockey Tournament. Taking part were 28 teams from across the country.

The girls had a very early start and, after stopping for breakfast en route, arrived at the Lee Valley Stadium just before 10.00am. They went straight into the morning pool round, playing on the outside pitches. The team had a slightly hesitant start as they adjusted to the atmosphere of a big stadium and although the girls kept up the pressure and dominated in defence, they just couldn’t get onto the score sheet and their first match finished 0-0. In their second game, they played with a renewed confidence and, once they scored, they just couldn’t stop! They finished that game 3-0. The final game of the pool was a tough challenge and the team fought hard and ended up the victors 1-0. That meant that Crackley Hall had won their pool and they went through to the Cup Finals in the afternoon.

The Cup competition was against the top seven teams in the tournament, playing for the top three medal spots. Crackley Hall started well in their first Cup game but despite excellent attacking play, just couldn’t manage to score. That was a pattern that continued across the afternoon as the girls struggled to find the goal (partly due to exceptional goalkeeping from the opposition teams). An end-to-end game against Littlegarth School resulted in their only loss of the tournament, 0-1. That was the only goal that the girls conceded throughout the entire tournament, and their only loss of the tournament – against the eventual National Champions!

Overall, the girls finished 5th nationally out of the 28 teams competing on the day. A really super result.

A well-deserved stop off at McDonald’s for tea allowed the girls to celebrate in style before a late return home at 8.00pm.

PE and Games Co-ordinator, Kat Vaughan, was delighted, commenting, “We are so proud of the girls. Their attitude, conduct, manners and perseverance were outstanding all day. We were very impressed with their progress in their skills and game play and exceptionally proud to say that the girls are from Crackley Hall School.”

Player of the tournament was Issey Cleary, and most improved player was Elle Weir.

Playing for Crackley Hall were: Olivia Burley (Goalkeeper) , Issey Cleary (Vice-Captain), Isabella Downes-Black, Elsie Glover, Grace Johnson, Holly Lloyd-Evans, Willow Rochford, Jasmine Staveley and Elle Weir (Captain)

On Saturday 13 November, the U9 boys travelled to Repton Prep, for their annual football festival. Playing were six teams from five schools and they all had fun playing lots of fantastic football in the sunshine. With no results published, the morning was all about gaining on-pitch experience, learning the game and just enjoying playing football. Throughout the morning, the boys grew in confidence and this was reflected in the way that they played. It was great to see their determination and wonderful attitude, they thanked the match officials after every game, and congratulated their opposition after every match. Host of the festival, Mr Clarkson even said “Crackley Hall are always the best-behaved school we have visiting us!” Well done to all of the boys, we are very proud of you!

U11 A & B Hockey vs Kingsley:

On Wednesday 17 November, the U11A team played hockey against Kingsley. We won 1-0 (although we did score 3 more goals from just outside the D!).

Jaz had a great game in defence and Issey was quick in mid-field. Player of the match (as voted by the opposition) was Grace and Holly was voted the most determined. Mrs Vaughan’s player of the match was Jasmine.

(Written by Elle)

On Wednesday 17 November the U11B team played hockey against Kingsley. We drew 2-2. We were very happy with how the team played as we were determined and improved as the game went on. Player of the match (as voted by the opposition) was Willow.

(Written by Willow (Captain) and Elsie (Vice-Captain)

U9A & B Hockey vs Croft:

On Thursday 18 November, the U9A and B team girls travelled to Croft to play hockey.

The girls had to adapt quickly to a game on grass, as they soon found that the ball doesn’t travel nearly as easily as on astroturf!

All of the girls fought very hard. In the A team game, Croft just had the edge in the D and converted their chances, where Crackley couldn’t quite get the ball to cross the line. This meant a 3-0 loss in a game that was much closer than the score line suggests.

The B team had more success in front of goal and managed to convert two of their chances, so winning 2-1.

Player of the match for the A team was Sienna.

Player of the match for the B team was Elsie.

Have you ever wished you could live in your own castle? Well this week in Lego Club we made several castle residences. We had towers galore and spectacular dragons flying a little too close for comfort as they battled on dry land with the knights who were trying to guard their chateaus. Drawbridges were raised for added protection and moats were widened to stop any fearsome villains venturing inside.  Beaming with ideas, we decided to have a secret code to lower our drawbridges to welcome visitors... with a riddle to answer first. What eats more than a dragon? Answers on a postcard please!! Looking for somewhere to relax and chill, we even made a treehouse for our beloved animals to take in the tranquillity of their surroundings without any dragon interruptions….ahh bliss!

We have had a beautifully calm and colourful week in nursery, with lots of pastel, chalk and paint creations based on the colours of autumn.  Luckily the leaves have been falling all around us and we were able to collect many different colours to bring inside and add to our autumn playdough.  The children utilised some sticks and conkers to create playdough hedgehogs and mini beasts to hide amongst the leaves.  We were also quite excited to find eggs while playing outside… and thanks to the power of the internet, we investigated who had left the pretty pearly eggs… and surprisingly it was the ugly slimy slugs!  Thank you to everyone for sending your nativity costumes in so quickly, we are practicing our songs and looking forward to the big day!  I hope everyone has a lovely weekend, and we will see you next week.

Newsletter

We need more volunteers to help prepare and run the different stalls at the Children's Christmas Fayre on Friday 3 December from 4.45pm to 6.45pm and then on Monday 6 December from 9.00am to 2.00pm. If you are available, please send an email to Tara Card on cardtara@gmail.com

The Big PTA Christmas Raffle is still open!

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. 

We have a goal of 500 tickets sold... So get involved if you haven't already!

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

On Thursday 2 December, the Crackley Hall Christmas tree will be displayed outside school.  This year the tree has been kindly donated by The Orangery and we would like to give all students the opportunity to donate one Christmas decoration to be added to the tree.  This can be a homemade decoration or a simple ornament that you may already have. It must be waterproof, shatterproof and be able to withstand the British weather. We look forward to seeing each child’s decoration represented on this year’s tree. 

Decorations can be left in the collection box in the school front porch which will be available from Monday 22 November until Tuesday 30 November.

The November Flash Sale on Jumpers and Winter Coats is still on!

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.

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Willow (J6H) has lost her school coat and her tracksuit bottoms (both named)

Olivia (J5W) has lost her swimming bag which contains boots, gumshield and shinpads (all named)

Julia (J5W) has lost her named PE fleece

Ryan (Rec C) has lost his named winter coat