The Chronicle

This week, Junior 6 have auditioned for roles in their summer show: A Hint of Snow White. We heard all the children sing, act, and narrate and were blown away with how they took the time to prepare themselves and add their own twist to the characters. Our performing arts staff now have an incredibly difficult job choosing their cast, as all the children exceeded themselves. Whatever happens, however, we want to congratulate everyone for their determination and diligence. We can’t wait to see you all on stage! Well done Junior 6!

Junior 5 have been learning animal nouns and adjectives in French this term. They have drawn and written about fantastic, imaginary animals made up of the parts of other animals to send to their penpals in Nantes. Last week they were excited to receive postcards from their penpals. This week they watched video recordings of their French friends telling them about their hobbies.

Junior 5 have been enthusiastically writing replies to their penpals, giving information about their favourite animals using the language they have learnt this term. They have created postcards with both writing and drawings of their chosen animals ready to post to Nantes. Well done, Junior 5!

In Art this week, Junior 4 have been making clay moulds in Viking style designs in anticipation of their pewter smelting session. Pupils had several attempts at moulding their clay into the right shape, as the centre of their design had to be deep enough to hold the pewter. Pupils used a large button or a cork and pressed the button into the clay to make a rune shape which formed a recess for the moltan metal to sit into. The pupils then carved and smoothed out the recess. Great work, Junior 4!

This week Junior 3 have been transformed into geologists and have been exploring the properties of different rocks. We have looked at marble, slate, bubble basalt, sandstone and chalk, carefully examining and describing each one. We then learnt all about how different types of rocks form, and what a very long time this takes. We recorded our understanding of these processes on Seesaw, using pictures and the microphone function. Using scientific language can sometimes be tricky, but not for our budding Junior 3 geologists. The classrooms and corridors are also buzzing with excitement for our upcoming Open Day, and we have been proud to display both our completed Pharaoh Portraits, and wonderful work that we have done on Judaism, for all to see.

On Thursday, we enjoyed celebrating World Book Day and dressing up as our favourite book characters. We were quite surprised to see two characters (Old Tom and Mowzer) from our current class story The Mousehole Cat; we hadn’t been expecting to spend a day at sea with them!

Junior 2 have been very curious this week as they enticed their taste buds during a Science experiment. The air was filled with the warm aroma of a variety of bread, with each child embarking on their tasting journey which was very exciting as they discussed the texture, taste, and blend of each type - from a crusty baguette, to the soft embrace of a sweet brioche. Their taste buds danced a symphony of textures and flavours as they discovered the diversity of bread. We all, including staff, delighted in this culinary journey. Thank you to all our lovely parents who helped to make this happen.

This week we have learnt all about adjectives in our English lessons, practising how to describe different nouns, before describing the monsters in our focus story, Where the Wild Things Are. Everyone then drew their own monster and chose lots of adjectives to describe how they look or what they might sound like. In Science, we learnt about the germination of a seed and how plants need water, light and warmth to grow. Everyone has planted their own sunflower seed and we are excited to see the shoots appear before they are taken home to continue their growth. For Maths, we have been using the scales to compare the measurement of different objects and cubes to find out what they weigh. Our classrooms have also become science labs with our cress experiments taking place. Over the coming week we will be testing what happens to cress seeds when they are placed in light, warmth, dark or cold. We can’t wait to discover what happens!

World Book Day proved to be a lot of fun for our Reception children this year. They all joined in with the most amazing costumes and were full of enthusiasm for our whole school assembly, as well as the various activities within the classroom – from designing book covers to drawing favourite characters. The children were so keen they decided to remain in their costumes for the entire day – making for an interestingly colourful PE lesson! Reception also had such a wonderful time preparing and performing for their class assembly for Mother's Day.  What a busy week we have all had in Reception!

This week, Nursery travelled under the deep, blue sea in our big, yellow submarine. The children discovered an amazing world full of all sorts of sea creatures.

They have crafted with shells; created translucent jellyfish with trailing tentacles; and painted underwater scenes outside, along the red brick walls.

On Wednesday, we invited our mummies in for an informal Mother’s Day ‘cuppa and fairy cake’, lovingly mixed, baked and decorated earlier in the week, by all our little Crackers.

The children regaled our visitors with songs to thank their mummies and to tell them how much they love them. Every mummy went home with a beautiful handmade card and a golden daffodil. It was lovely to welcome mummies into Nursery and for the children to have chance to show off their ‘home-from-home’ and to introduce their friends.