This week in Year 3

Welcome back! We have all returned to school rested and ready to go! This is a busy half term and such an exciting one! 

English

In English, we have started a new book, appropriate to the week of Halloween – a spooky story about a mysterious and, perhaps ghostly, marsh.

We had great fun exploring the character of Annie and we used Hot-Seating to ask her questions and consider how different her life is from ours. 

Egyptian Day

You will have received an email about our forthcoming Egyptian Day on Friday 2 December.

We are very excited to allow ourselves to be transported back in time to the banks of the River Nile and enjoy a day of interactive learning. We can’t wait to see the costumes! In the email, we have asked for a number of adult volunteers to help support the very hands-on activities. If you are able, please do fill in the form and start thinking about your costume! 

Matches vs Heath Mount

The boys and girls of Year 3 enjoyed a wonderful afternoon of matches against Heath Mount on Thursday. They all played very well and the rain kept away for the afternoon.

Thank you, once again, to Jack for his excellent photography, which you can see below:

Dates for your Diaries

This term is also filled with Christmas preparations and Year 3 will soon be starting to think about our Christingle Service on Friday 25 November at about 1530. You are all very welcome to attend, so please do put the date in your diaries. The popularity of attendees last year means that it will now be held in the Performance Hall. We will be putting more information in the Google Classrooms in due course. 

Two more dates for your diaries are the House Matches and Christmas Fayre on Saturday 3 December and the two performances of our Christmas Production on either Thursday 8 December (1500-1600) or Friday 9 December (0910-1010). 

Congratulations Sasha

Sasha competed a few weeks ago in the individual County Gymnastics Championship and during the October half term holidays she also competed in the County Teams Championship with 2 members of her gymnastics squad. A huge congratulations to Sasha and her team members for coming 1st in both competitions, what a brilliant achievement.

Warm regards,

Una Oatham, Libby Mann, Sophie Porter and Pauline Pope

The Year 3 Team

This week in Year 4

Sutton Who?

This week, Year 4 have begun to look at the treasures found in Suffolk at the Anglo-Saxon burial ground at Sutton Hoo.  Children had the opportunity find, examine images and make predictions about the amazing artefacts found by archaeologists in 1938.  If you would like to learn more about one of the most famous artefacts, ‘The Sutton Hoo Sword’, this video is well worth a watch .  Not only is Dr Sue Brunning’s passion for a history a true inspiration, but it would be a great starting point for a discussion with your child in how we learn about history from clues gathered from artefacts and how, with a little bit of detective work, many wonders can be revealed!

Forest School

On Monday and Thursday this week, 4I and 4P had exciting mornings out in the school forest. As detectives, we were able to use the fallen leaves to identify the names of trees as we followed a trail into the woods! We had lots of fun exploring and learning about different types of trees.

Notices

• 4I have swimming in PE this half term
• 10 Nov: Away fixtures at Kingshott
• 11 Nov: 4L Forest School Session
• Remembrance poppies can be purchased with a small donation at the Front Desk

This week in Year 5

Fun in Forest School

All of the Year 5 pupils headed off into the woods today for their very first Forest School session of the year.

With the rain kindly holding off, each activity group got stuck into the carousel of fun learning activities that were on offer.

In one session the children displayed their creative sides by making their own mud masks, inspired by Mrs KB’s amazing gargoyle pictures, using the items they found during the scavenger hunt.

Following on from the skills they had developed in Year 4, the pupils also had the chance to use palm drilling skills with Mrs Le Bas – and designed and then created some eye-catching pieces!

Finally, they were set the challenge of protecting the precious cargo of an egg. Using the materials from the forest, they had to design the ‘protective’ landing zone which would allow our egg to be dropped from height and (fingers crossed!) still be in one piece when it landed. As you can probably guess, not all the eggs made it!

A big thank you to Mrs le Bas for her organisation and inspiration and to all of the teachers who came out to help as well. We can’t wait for next term’s Forest School session!

From the Maths Department

Barvember 2022 is here and we are delighted!  White Rose will be sharing five problems every school day in November, which we will be using in lessons to explore the magic of using a bar model to problem solve. We will have weekly winners from all those who have displayed the technique successfully.

Lots of problems will be shared on our Twitter account and we welcome ‘grown ups’ to have a go! We were successful in winning some prizes last year, Mrs Oatham was overjoyed  when she received a Tiny toy.

The thinking behind the process is to use the bar model when solving a plethora of problems as it helps pupils to think about a problem from another point of view.

We hope you will all enjoy putting your thinking caps on and giving a problem a go. To warm you up we have a few problems to solve at your leisure here!

Good luck!

Mrs Groeneveld
Assistant Head of Maths

We’re celebrating Maths Week England by taking part in a friendly times tables (and division) competition. The competition runs from 07:30 GMT Monday 14th November to 19:30 GMT Wednesday 16th November. It’s all done online via play.ttrockstars.com.

Children can play in any gamemode with every correct answer to a multiplication or division question, earning themselves, their class and the school a point. The Times Tables Rock Stars platform will calculate the class average (the number of correct answers per pupil in the class who play during the competition hours, subject to a daily 60-minute limit (see below)). Winning classes in the school and in the competition as a whole will be the ones with the highest average.

To support player wellbeing, there is a daily time limit of 60-minutes per player. In other words, each player can earn competition points for up to 60-minutes between 0730  and 1930 on Monday 14 November and between 0730 and 1930 on Wednesday 16 November. Once the player goes beyond 60-minutes of play on that day, they will still earn coins but will no longer earn points towards the competition.

In the spirit of the competition, please don’t play on their behalf but by all means encourage and support them to the extent that it doesn’t cause high stress levels or impact on family plans.

Good luck and happy rocking!

Marion Wright
Head of Maths

From the Middle Department Library

Witchstorm by Tim Tilley

Will believes in witches and the stories he’s grown up with – of mythical storm-lions, disappearing villages, and secret songs. Most of all, he believes the tales of magical treasure hidden in the Fens centuries ago. Treasure that he has to find, to solve the mystery of his Ma’s disappearance.

Then, in the eye of a storm, a witch arrives. She holds the key to finding the lost treasure – a powerful magical object that can summon storms. But someone else is searching for it too. If it falls into the wrong hands, Will’s beloved home could be destroyed, and with it, his chances of ever finding his Ma.

With riddles to solve, symbols to decipher, and plenty of breakneck broomstick chases, Witchstorm tingles with the thrills of a classic quest, with the richly-described Fens setting adding atmosphere and timelessness.

Reminder

Please can all ‘Read for Good’ donations be paid online by 11^th November (no cash to be brought into school) and for your children to return their sponsorship forms to their Class or to their English teachers.  Thank you in advance.

Head’s Commendations

Congratulations to this week’s recipients of Mr Balfour’s Commendations: