Friars Weekly Newsletter friday 23rd may 2025

Coming up in this edition of the newsletter...

• An incredibly busy final week of the half-term

It's the final day of Summer 1! Where on earth have the previous 2 and a half terms gone?This week has been exceptionally busy with lots of fantastic events keeping us all on our toes.

On Monday, most of our Year 6 children travelled to Ilam Hall in the Peak District for their 5-day residential. I have been with the children all week and we have had an amazing time. The weather has been kind and we have thoroughly enjoyed all of the planned activities and everything else the visit has offered. Hopefully you have managed to read our daily posts on Facebook. The children who did not go to Ilam have participated in Southend Week. Again, this has been very successful with lots of fun had by everyone. A full write-up about Southend Week will be shared after the holiday. I bet there will be some very tired children this weekend!

Monday also saw the choir head to Hamstel Junior School in preparation for the SEESMA music festival. The children have been practising hard ahead of their performance at the Cliffs Pavilion on Monday 9th June. I, for one, cannot wait to see them perform. Many of the same children who represented the school at the Palace Theatre for Southend Makes Music will be in action again. A big thank you to Mrs. Bemister for her organisation and musical brilliance!

Also this week we had our Nursery and Reception sports days and the Year 3 assembly. It is always lovely to have parents and carers in school watching their children perform, compete or simply have fun. If you joined us this week, we hope you enjoyed yourself.

Have a lovely restful break and see you on Tuesday 3rd June. Remember that the school is closed on Monday 2nd June.

Mr. McClay, Principal

TT Rockstars Half Term Holiday Competition

Please enter this competition that is running across the Portico Academy for this half term holiday only.

• Each pupil's scores contribute to a class tally.
• The overall winning class will be announced.

Travelling Book Fair Competition

We are excited to announce that from Monday 30th June – Friday 4th July, we will have our very own Travelling Books book fair and we are giving away vouchers! 5 children have the chance of winning a £5 voucher to go towards a book of their choice.

All entries need to be handed in to the class teacher by Monday 23rd June and the winners of the £5 book vouchers will be announced during our celebration assembly.

EYFS/KS1 - Children need to design a book cover for a story of their choice. They can adapt a book cover from a known story or they can create a book cover for their own story. Book covers need to be bright and inviting and make the reader want to pick the book up. Happy designing!

KS2 - Children need to create a book cover and blurb for a story of their choice. They can use a previously read story or they can let their imaginations run wild and come up with their own their own design. Book covers need to be bright and inviting and blurbs need to be informative but not give too much of the story away. Try to use a ‘show, don’t tell’ approach when writing your blurb. Happy creating!

If your child would like to take part in this competition, please tell them to speak to their class teacher who can provide them with a design template.

Nursery

This week Nursery listened to the story ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’. The children loved taking on the role of the Giant and repeating the phrase Fee Fi Fo Fum as they stomped around the nursery garden. Lots of exploring and investigating work has happened based on the story, with sorting a variety of beans, opening the cases that beans have grown in and seeing how beans grow. The children have also re told the story in pictorial form by cutting and sticking small pictures along a bean stalk that they drew.

We have also enjoyed our family fun sports day. The children loved engaging in a range of physical activities with their visiting adult and thank goodness the weather held off for us.

Reception

Thank you for attending our sports afternoon this week. The children really enjoyed themselves.

Our maths sessions have focused on sharing items into equal groups, recognising when groups are not equal and finding ways to change unequal groups.

Our phonics sessions have continued to revise the Phase 3 digraphs whilst looking at words ending with ‘s’ and ‘es’

Tuesday was World Bee Day – we discussed how bees pollinate plants, make honey and a typical day in a bee’s life.

Throughout the week, we have encouraged the children to extend their sentences using the word ‘because’ and written speech bubbles about our favourite things.

REMINDER: Our trip to Hyde Hall is on Wednesday 25th June. It costs £14

Year 1

We have had a fantastic week in Year 1!

The children have been writing their own versions of Handa’s Surprise. They changed the animals and fruits to those found in the UK and made up their own characters too. Fantastic work!

In maths we have been learning about quarters, that we need to split totals or shapes into 4 equal pieces or groups to find a quarter.

Sadly, it was our last music lesson with Mrs Bemister this week. The children impressed her with their ability to keep time using a variety of percussion instruments.

We have started on our final art pieces this week and will continue them after the half term break. Have a wonderful half term!

REMINDER: Don’t forget our school trip is on the Wednesday of the first week back.

Year 2

The children in year 2 have had a very busy half term and have worked hard in all areas of the curriculum.

We have explored the topic of time in maths this week. The children have learnt how to tell the time to the quarter hour and been introduced to the five-minute intervals of the analogue clock.

In history we used photographic evidence to support our understanding of the explorer Captain Scott. The children found it hard to believe that they had to pull their sledges and didn’t have mobile phones to ring home!

We created some wonderful paper sculptures entitled ‘circles’. The children stuck intertwined rings of paper onto a cardboard base with some super effects.

Our trip to Call of the Wild is fast approaching, so please ensure that you have paid via ParentPay as this also acts as your permission for your child to attend the trip.

REMINDER: Please label all pieces of uniform before the children return to school next half term.

Year 3

Shall we start by discussing the end of the week first!

What an amazing performance by Year 3 on Friday. The children really did shine; we definitely have some budding actors and actresses in our midst. The children worked hard to know when to speak, when to do their parts and their singing was outstanding!

The rest of the week was spent busy learning.

In English we did some recapping of the different grammar rules taught throughout the year, such as, prefixes and suffixes, fronted adverbials and prepositional phrases.

During maths we continued with time and there have been some tricky elements. We have tried our hardest and tried to persevere when it got difficult.

The rest of the week we finished an investigation into plants and saw that even with no light a flower will frantically try and find it to enable it to photosynthesise.

In history we looked at what the Romans did for us, even though they may have taken Britain by force, they have given us a lot to be thankful for – toilets are most definitely one we think you would agree to!

We hope you have a restful holiday and look forward to returning for our final half term.

REMINDER: Thank you to all the parents that came to our assembly and supported us.

What a performance it was!

Make sure your child is attending school every day. 3B managed to gain their fourth spin of the attendance wheel and won themselves a mini picnic on the field, which they enjoyed at the end of the day Friday!

Year 4

Another jam-packed week of learning for Year 4 this week! We had lots of fun in English using the story of The Hobbit to create our very own playscripts! They children really enjoyed the opportunity to get creative with stage directions and actions that the different characters could take in their scripts. In maths we started to learn about money and found our previous topic of decimals incredibly helpful when converting between pounds and pence! We even tried some problem solving based around using money too.

The afternoons have been as busy as ever including testing different materials to find out whether they are electrical conductors or insulators in science, creating our very own Lichtenstein inspired pop art mountain pictures using paint pens and even gave our opinions about the Eurovision song contest in French!

Mr Smith would once again like to highlight that it would be great if the children could find a battery powered appliance and shoebox ready to bring in after the holiday as part of our learning in design and technology. Any questions please feel free to ask Mr Smith!

Year 5

A fantastic end to Summer 1! In English, the children began writing a non-chronological report on the Tudors. This has been a much-enjoyed topic that will continue after the half term holiday.

In maths, we have continued with our work on co-ordinates. This week focused on translation and translation with co-ordinates. On Wednesday we also looked at symmetry with the use of mirrors.

History saw us looking at the reformation and the Catholic church. The children worked in partners and decided on the most and least important factors contributing to this.

The year group has thoroughly enjoyed their DT afternoons. They have worked extremely well in small groups to construct their Tudor houses. This has included using their maths skills, working safely with saws and glue guns and being creative with their designs of wooden beams.

We wish you all a wonderful week off and look forward to seeing you on Tuesday 3rd June.

Year 6

Southend Week

What a wonderful week the children have had. The weather has been superb, as have the children.

Day 1: A morning of fun filled sporting activities and team games followed by a Graffiti Art Master Class led by our very own Mr. Smith.

Day 2: Glorious sunshine awaited us at the seafront. We ate outside and played on the beach before becoming pro golfers from the Aztec and Inca tribes at Adventure Golf. One golfer succeeded in getting a hole in one!

Day 3: A mixture of activities due to the inclement weather – the art work the children produced is already displayed in school.

Day 4: Indirock was the challenge today. Absolutely fabulous, the children enjoyed themselves hanging from the walls, moving themselves along without their feet touching the ground. They rose to the occasion like true mountaineers. This was followed by lunch at The Brickhouse!

Day 5: Kids Kingdom – the children thoroughly enjoyed this and took on the challenge of Jelly Mountain!

All in all the children have had a fabulous week and were role models for our school.

Enjoy your holiday.

Computing

This week children completed their data units. At the beginning of the week year 2 started by conducting a survey to find out their favourite subject. Following this they used this information and created a pictogram to show this information in a clear and organised way.

In year one our time was spent talking about how we can group objects to answer questions with accuracy. We finished the lesson with some time to practice our mouse and typing skills as next half term we are going to be revisiting some programming.

The year 3 students finished their branching database unit and were given the choice of selecting 8 different objects o9f which they needed to sort using yes/no questions. It was really interesting to see how the questions they used in order to sort and organise their objects. Take a look at their creations on Showbie.

Year 4 finalised their learning on data by collecting information on how bright different areas of the playground are. They programmed the Micro:bit then tested the lightness in different areas using the sensor on the Micro:bit. They then recorded their data on a table back on the computer.

Online Safety

With around 70% of teens reporting they've seen violent real-life content on social media in the past year, this guide shines a light on a disturbing – and increasingly common – aspect of young people’s digital lives. From shocking videos to hate speech, many children don’t go looking for this material, it finds them via algorithms or peer sharing.

The guide outlines key concerns, including the mental toll of repeated exposure, shifts in behaviour, and the worrying normalisation of harmful ideologies. It also explains how such content can escalate from screen to street, and why some young people may feel pressured to share or even create violent media themselves.