The Chronicle

Dear Parents

Thank you very much for your assistance regarding the PCR testing that was asked for last weekend. Fortunately, we have had a much quieter week, with only a couple of new cases of Covid at Crackley being reported. It remains so important that we are vigilant and continue to battle this virus together. If your child displays any symptoms of the virus, including a runny nose or feeling more tired than usual, please don’t send them into school and arrange to have a PCR test.  Please also continue with the regular lateral flow and PCR testing, as per previous advice and requests.  I must say that it has been lovely to see so many pupils return to school this past week.  I hope that the spread of COVID has now peaked and will continue to reduce throughout next week.  Thank you, once again, for your patience and support during this time while we continue the ‘test to release’ procedure.

I hope you have received the link to watch this week’s assembly where I was able to talk to the children about events in school this week and also share news about Black History Month and Mental Health Week.  Junior 2B reminded us about the importance of looking after our mental health and we will be inviting everyone to wear a hat next Friday on non-uniform day.  The money collected will be shared between the PTA and a local charity, Coventry Mind.

There will be more information to follow from class teachers about Black History Month and year groups will be involved in various activities so please do ask the children about what is happening in school.

I congratulated our Stars of the Week this morning, this week they were awarded to:  Edie, Ciara, Marley, Charley, Charlie, Alfie, Charlotte, Daiya, Wade, Blythe, Suzie, Rayane, Jasmine and George.  Grace in Junior 3 played a delighted piece on her violin and there were also Junior da Vinci awards presented for musical achievements.  Congratulations to everyone for your efforts this week.

Some of you were able to join the PTA AGM on Wednesday when new officers were elected.  I would like to thank out going Chair, Mrs Lamb for her outstanding contribution to the PTA over the years.  I know that Mrs Lamb will be only too happy to support the new Chair, Dr Card and Vice Chair, Mrs Farrow.  Thank you to the whole PTA for their efforts during the course of the school year.  They work tirelessly making sure that the children and school benefit from funds raised.  I wish Dr Card and her team the very best for the year ahead and urge you to become involved in some way if you are able to.

I have written to Reception class parents this week when I shared the sad news that Mrs Convey will be leaving her role as Reception class teacher at the end of this term.  We are in a fortunate position to have strong candidates in consideration for this role and I know that Mrs Convey will certainly be keeping in touch with Crackley Hall as she has a long standing connection with school.

We will shortly be hosting our online parents’ consultation evenings for all classes, with your child’s class teacher being able to provide feedback on how your child has started the year, their progress thus far and their approach to the school day.  Please keep a look out for an email from the school office which will provide a link to booking an online appointment on either Tuesday 12 or Thursday 14 October. 

Holiday club bookings are still being taken and I would urge you to book in advance.  We do need to know numbers in order to arrange suitable staffing ahead of time.

I hope that the weather will be a bit kinder than that of late as we go into the weekend. There is, once again, some good sport to look forward to – especially if you support the All Blacks!  I wish everyone a happy and relaxing weekend with your families.

God bless,

Mr Duigan

If you send your child in with either grapes or cherry tomatoes, can you please ensure that they are cut in half lengthways so that they are not a choking hazard.

Thank you 

Holiday club will be running again during the Autumn Half Term holidays, from Monday 18 October until Friday 29 October 2021. 

Holiday club will be open from 8.30am to 5.00pm and will cost £30 per day. Hot lunch will be provided.

To make a booking, please log on to My School Portal, and select the Clubs and Activities option.

Our Stars of the Week this week are:

Congratulations to them all!

Please find further information about the competition below.

Competition Details

At home, Holly (J6V) has written this fantastic poem about Protective Behaviours and how important it is.

Well done Holly!

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

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

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

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Holmes's class is Jessie

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

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

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

Mathlete of the week for Mrs Widey's group is Alex

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

Well done all!

The ISA Comic Strip Competition encourages pupils to create their own storyboard or cartoon as a means of exploring a topical subject.

This year, pupils in Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 are invited to create comic strips on the theme of Zero Waste.

So come on all you Crackley creatives, get your thinking caps on and your pencils ready and get sketching.

The deadline for entry to the competition is Thursday 16 December 2021.

Please click here for further details. 

Thursday 7 October 2021 - 10.00am to 3.00pm

We are opening our doors for an Open Day on Thursday 7 October 2021 from 10.00am to 3.00pm.

This is an opportunity for prospective families to look around the school and nursery, and to meet staff. The day will be by appointment only in order to keep our pupils, staff and visitors. Please register your interest in attending our Open Day and our Admissions Secretary will be in touch nearer the time. 

To book your place please click here.

We have places available in Nursery and will be recruiting for places in Reception 2022. Please speak to our Admissions Secretary, Mrs Jenny Vaughan for availability in other years.

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

For more information visit www.crackleyhall.co.uk

This week in Junior 6, we have been thinking about the choices we make.  We began by reading the story of the Fall in RE and thought about how Eve knew what the rules were but made a choice that broke these rules.  We considered all the times that we have to make choices on a daily basis and discussed different situations where two choices are possible.  We thought about how every decision we make, whether good or bad, has a consequence and how we must give thought to the choices we make and accept responsibility for our own decisions.

In our English lessons, we have been reading a brilliant book called Cosmic by Frank Cottrell-Boyce. It’s all about a 12-year-old boy, Liam, and his adventures in space. Our children have been acting out scenes from the book; drawing rockets, writing text conversations between Liam and his friend, Florida, and discussing lots of features of the book. They have been working tremendously hard and cannot wait to read the next instalment!

Junior 4 are continuing to excel across the curriculum and are impressing all of us with their endless enthusiasm for learning. In Science, we made string telephones and wrote a description of our dream bedroom, together with diary extracts, to collaborate with our Junior 4 novel, Cloud Tea Monkeys. Mrs Roberts was encouraged by their ability to create panpipes, to demonstrate different varying pitches of sound, although we are not sure whether the rest of the school enjoyed this rather noisy experiment!

Pupils in J4 have been ‘hot seating characters’ in their English lessons this week. It was amazing to see how they interacted with the main character and asked inferential questions, which demonstrated a deep understanding of the text. 

We also found time to take maths outdoors, finding various objects in nature to represent 4-digit numbers. The children produced some amazing comparisons of 4-digit numbers, using sticks, stones, leaves and acorns. Well done to everyone, you are all superstars!

This week Junior 3 have gone ‘all out’ exploring the story settings of Stone Age Boy. We headed out into the Forest School and got our creative ‘thinking hats’ on, brainstorming vocabulary linked to the sights, sounds and smells that would have made up a stone age camp. We were amazed at all the small details that we noticed and it gave us some wonderful ideas for our writing. Our setting descriptions have been out of this world! We have also enjoyed doing our first ever ‘consumer test’ in Science; finding out which drinks have the most sugar in them and how this can impact our health. As always in Science, there were a few surprises! 

The children continued to immerse themselves in our 'Castles' topic this week. We have been thrilled with their artwork and they really enjoyed using different mediums to create their very own castle picture. How amazing do they look?! The children are becoming experts at naming the different parts of a castle, different types of castles, why castles were built the way they were and who introduced castles into Britain? We have been very busy! In Science we have explored so many different materials and even fed them to our materials monster! He loves finding out about materials and particularly likes to eat plastic bottles. It has been a fun and productive week in Year 2. 

Junior 1 this week were asked to create a model of themselves out of salt dough and their hands in RE, just like God has made all of us using His hands. We also used our hands to learn which is left and which is right. We found out that our left hand makes the capital ‘L’ to help us remember. We used this in Geography to find our way round a treasure map and follow directions. History saw us finding out about Tudor houses and how they were much warmer and brighter than earlier homes. In Science we continued to look at our senses; this week it was sight. Using our hands, we found that if we don’t have our sight, we can use them to read with, using ‘braille’. We also managed to write our names in braille, which was quite tricky to do!

Despite a very soggy start to the week, Reception have continued to wow Mrs Malcolm, Miss Collins, Mrs Green and Mrs Convey with their super attitude to their learning. We have thoroughly enjoyed learning and reciting a lovely poem about an owl and made some terrific owl headbands which we wore for our performance at the end of the week. After reading Owl Babies we thought carefully about the feelings of the baby owls and were glad that their mummy returned at the end of the story! Our woodland theme continued in Art and DT, when we made some minibeasts out of pipe cleaners and beads – don’t worry, they won’t bite!    

Calling all pupils who would like to achieve a Full Da Vinci for RE!

Please check out the display of the disciples’ names at the top of the stairs near Mr Cottrill’s office. Or better still find them out yourself.

Task: Think of a way to help people remember all 12 names. It could be in a rhyme or a song. Produce a PPt or a short video.

Practice: Learn the names yourself.

Creative. Think of a creative way to teach others.

Mastery: Teach your way of remembering all 12 names to a group.

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

Monday’s assembly, led by Mr Cottrill, explained the Crackley Compass in detail. In this first part of the term we are focusing on ‘Learning’ which links very nicely with our Crackley Virtues ‘Learned and Wise’. Pupils are asked in their PSHCE and RE lessons to think about how they can use their learning to improve their knowledge of what is happening in the world. Keeping up to date with events in the news is important as it can help us form opinions of our own.

In Junior 2 we looked at the painting of Daniel in the Lion’s Den and each square was slowly revealed.  Each time there was a reveal the children thought about what had been disclosed. At the beginning they saw darkness and thought about night and day and linked this to good and bad. They saw a tail and the body of a lion and thoughts were discussed about Jesus in the tomb after being crucified. When another part of the lion was revealed, they thought of Noah gathering the animals for the ark. When all the lions were revealed, Daniel and the Lion’s Den was remembered and the pupils recognised that praying and forgiving people saved Daniel.

Pupils in J4 looked on in horror as Mrs Jackson-Mayne and Mrs MaCloon destroyed the lego models that they had been creating in their RE lesson. The children were being ‘creative’ and this allowed them to find out how it feels to have their ‘creation’ destroyed. Pupils then discussed how polluting the earth, or hurting others is away of ‘destroying’ God’s Creation.

Please find information below:

Childrens Liturgy

Activity Sheet

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

Weekly Mission

On Wednesday 23 September, led by the Boys Sports Captain, George Morton and Vice-Captain, Dexter Robinson, the U11A & B rugby teams played at home against Bilton Grange. Both games were very competitive and fast paced; with all children giving a very good account of themselves – and particularly after such a long time since the last competitive fixture.

The A team won 4 – 2, and the B team won 7- 3.

Mr Vaughan and Mrs Thomas were very proud of the boy’s work rate and outstanding tackling – with the team showing real promise for the year.

Player-of-the-match, who was voted by the Bilton Grange team A team, was Ollie. However, George and Dexter thought that every member of the Crackley squad was Player-of-the-match!

Bayleaf Cookery Club Information 

Fun and adventure were both on the horizon this week in Lego Club when we re-created the thrill of the ocean waves with speedboat racing, sailing and even a party boat to cater for those seeking seashore fun. We discussed how boats really work whilst mastering the tactics of world-class sailing.  We talked about why we should angle the sails for the ultimate racing position and raising and lowering the dagger boards to maximise stability, whilst using the rudder to steer at the same time – all very complex, but what an engineering skill we were all learning in how boats work! It really was all hands-on deck to solve the mysteries of life on the waves!

We welcomed the rain this week, with open arms, zipped up coats and our wellies! Our waterproofs were necessary as we hunted for monsters amongst the leaves and the mud, and our endeavours didn’t go unrewarded – we found gigantic slugs, speedy spiders and enough wriggly worms to keep everyone happy!  Interestingly, we then took our learning inside and found out what type of slugs they were (leopard ones we think) and discussed what the large holes in the sides of their ’heads’ were for. Well done for those that guessed they were for breathing! This is a wonderful time of year to explore all the fantastic changes that take place in the world around us, as well as the minibeasts making the most of the changes in weather. If you are exploring this weekend, please send in some autumnal photos, we would love to include them in our giant floor book. This is where we collect bits and pieces of what we do and see each week – and it would be lovely to include our families and home adventures too. Have a great weekend!

Newsletter

It was wonderful to welcome everyone to Stay ‘n’ Play’s Forest Fun on Wednesday, especially all the lovely little ones kitted out in their bright wellies and raincoats. The session took place in the Crackley Hall’s wood and was led by Junior 2 teacher Mrs Burley, who is a Forest School Practitioner. The children had a choice of a hands-on creative activity making hedgehogs from pinecones and then helping them to hibernate in dens, as well as plenty of free play, in the woods, in the mud kitchen, on the hammocks, the rope swings and even on an old saddle. And best of all the rain held off all morning and although it was cold, we saw plenty of sunshine. We hope everyone enjoyed the fun!

Coventry Refugee & Migrant Centre are in desperate need of young children’s clothing, especially warm items. As they are not able to hold as many ‘fund-raising’ activities this year due to the Covid restrictions, they are seeking unwanted clothing (aged 2-12).

If parents can help, please send your child into school with a carrier bag of clothing on Friday 8 October. Members of the PTA will be waiting to collect them and will then transport them to the Centre.

Alongside this, our Parish church is also asking for donations of brand-new, or unused, men’s socks and underpants to send on to the same charity. If you can help, please could these be sent in in a separate bag, so we can pass on these items to Mrs Simmonds, who will, in turn, pass on to the church.

As always, thank you, in advance, for your support.

On Wednesday evening this week, the parents committee held a virtual AGM alongside Mr Duigan, Mrs Lammas and Mrs Steeples, to discuss events and ideas for the coming year.

The overall feeling of the meeting was that this year, more than ever, our biggest aim is to get as many parents on board as possible to help build our community to the best it has ever been. All ideas, suggestions, offers for volunteering, no matter how small, are greatly received and help to make our community as wonderful as it can possibly be.

Congratulations, to our newly elected Chair, Dr Tara Card, and new Vice Chair, Mrs Sandrine Farrow, we wish them every success in their new roles.

We now have a date for the Headmaster's Quiz, Friday 12 November – tickets will be on sale soon, watch this space.

Please see the flyer attached for more information on PTA dates for your diary this year. We would love you to get involved!

Save the date information

Friday 8 October

This year we are supporting a wonderful charity for non-school uniform day, Coventry, and Warwickshire Mind, who are raising money during World Mental Health week which falls during the last week of half term. You can find ouot more here: https://cwmind.org.uk/

We are asking children to come into school in non-uniform and to ideally wear a hat too, as part of Hats Off for Mental Health.

We are asking for a donation of £1 with a proportion of that going to the local Mind charity

Friday 24 September 

Our very first fundraising event of the year took place in a quite different format to what we had hoped yet remained a success and we would like to thank each one of you for helping raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support. Thank you to the Camilleri–Willis family for being ever helpful.

Unfortunately, COVID regulations meant that numbers were to be kept to a bare minimum, but please keep up your enthusiasm to help, as our events later this term will be requiring much more parent support!

We are still counting but the figure is looking like nearly £700 was raised. Thank you again.

Donations can be made online here too. https://thyg.uk/BUU004324912

As always, thank you to our wonderful second-hand uniform team, Nikki, Linda, and Katie, for being ever patient and serving our wonderful school community with much needed preloved uniform.

To offer this service, we rely on wonderful donations from you. So, if you have any good quality uniform your child has outgrown, please use the collection box in the school front entrance.  It will then be quarantined for 72 hours before offering for sale.

All money raised from the PTA Uniform shop is spent on extras for your children throughout the year at school and helps the children’s day become even more special.

Unfortunately due to the COVID outbreak at school, we are unable to go into school at present to be able to process any new orders for second hand uniform, we will advise you when we are able to restart this service.

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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Ryan (Rec C) has lost his tracksuit jacket 

Finley (J4R) has lost his sports fleece and track top

Patrick (J4R) has lost his school cap

Elora (J4S) has lost her named coat 

Harry (J6H) has lost his named black sports fleece 

Blythe (J4S) has lost his blue music folder

Patrick (J4R) has lost his new named metal water bottle

Joshua (J2G) left his grey Next hoodie at holiday club

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We are recruiting for a variety of roles currently, as you will see below, so please do share with friends and family by word of mouth.

Further information and application forms on all roles are available on our website - Join Us

• IT Service Team Leader - Princethorpe College
• After School Care Leader - Crackley Hall School
• Reception Teacher - Crackley Hall School
• Teacher of Modern Foreign Languages - Part Time - Crackley Hall School