Christmas Celebrations
There have been lots of lovely festive activities taking place across all of our schools.
Here is a video of Christmas highlights for you to enjoy:
Mental Health Awareness
Sledmere Mental Health Ambassadors
In their commitment to raise the profile of mental health, Sledmere Primary School now have a team of pupil Mental Health Ambassadors. As part of their training, the ambassadors attended a Mental Health Workshop event at Wolverhampton Art Gallery. The event was hosted by Reflexions, an agency that Sledmere now work closely with. The event was designed to remind everyone to talk about mental health and show that mental health matters. Children were given the opportunity to engage in a range of activities that support mental health and the 5 Ways to Well-Being. They will now be planning how they can use these strategies and activities to support others in school.
World Mental Health Day Celebrations
Coinciding with Berrybrook's Well-being Friday in Autumn 1, children celebrated World Mental Health Day by coming to school dressed in yellow clothes and spending the day working on activities around the 5 ways to well-being - Connect, Give, Take Notice, Get Active and Learn.
Perry Hall celebrated World Mental Health Day by attending school dressed in yellow - a colour to bring positivity. Along with this, children participated in PSHE lessons focussed on mental wellbeing and happiness.
Anti-Bullying Week
Anti-Bullying week took place between 13th and 17th of November and schools embraced the opportunity to raise awareness and highlight ways of preventing and responding to bullying
Forest Hills and Stanley Road Primary children wore odd socks for the whole week to was to show their support of stamping out bullying. In PSHE at forest Hills, children also learned about what bullying is and what to do if they are worried someone might be upset.
Perry Hall Primary School children also wore odd socks during this year’s Anti-Bullying Week. It was wonderful to see the variety of odd socks around school, representing that we should all be proud of our own uniqueness and that we respect and celebrate the individuality of everyone. Throughout the week, all year groups thought carefully about the definition of bullying and were taught about the different roles involved. Across school, this year’s Anti-Bullying week theme ‘Make A Noise About Bullying’ was promoted in all year groups, with children considering how they can do this in school, such as ways of sharing kindness with others and being considerate of others feelings. In Nursery, children shared the ‘Rainbow Fish’ story. They spoke about times they have been a good friend to others and how it feels to have a good friend. In Year 6, children considered strategies for dealing with bullying as a bystander and the difference between ‘banter’ and ‘bullying’. Importantly, all of the children were given the opportunity to reflect on trusted adults they can speak to in school or at home and were reminded how to report bullying should they ever need to.
What else have our schools been up to this term?
Reading at Bird's Bush Primary
Bird's Bush Primary have been promoting a love of reading across school including setting up their new library and sharing new reading displays! The Premier League Primary Stars kindly opened the new school library which has been a huge hit with all children.
Berrybrook Visit to the Grand Theatre
Berrybrook Year 2 pupils visited the Grand Theatre in Wolverhampton to see author and illustrator, Benji Davies at the Children's Book Show. Benji showed the children how he created his characters and read one of his books to them. All children were also lucky to receive a copy of Benji's book 'The Storm Whale'. In addition to the show, Berrybrook were extremely lucky to be chosen for Benji to visit school to work with the class where he helped children to make their own characters.
Fire Service Visit for Stanley Road Children
Stanley Road Reception children enjoyed an exciting morning on Wednesday 18th October. They were incredibly lucky to have the Hereford and Worcester Fire and Rescue Service visit them at school! Children thoroughly enjoyed looking at all the equipment, climbing into the cab and even squirting the hose! A huge thank you to the fabulous firefighters for enabling such a wonderful experience for the children!
Story Rangers Visit Mesty Croft Primary
Mesty Croft Nursery children enjoyed a visit from 'Story Rangers' - a company who visit schools to immerse children in stories using drama, props, music, games and sensory play. The children enjoyed the story 'Handa's Surprise' and thought the animals were very cheeky taking the fruit from Handa's basket!
Spanish Day for Perry Hall Primary
Perry Hall Primary children had an amazing day celebrating all things Spanish this term. Children came into school dressed in red, yellow or Spanish clothing and took part in activities such as sampling Spanish foods, creating their own tapas, enjoying music of Spanish origin and taking part in Salsa lessons from an instructor, which were then performed to key stage one. Bien hecho (well done) Perry Hall!
New Writing Approach at Woodthorne Primary
Woodthorne have launched a brand new approach to writing called 'Ready, Steady Write', implemented alongside 'Steps to Read'. All staff attended an inset training day to officially launch the new approach and feedback from both the course and the writing outcomes this first half term has been nothing but positive! Ready, Steady, Write provides a sequenced, ambitious curriculum, that places quality literature at its core. Units have been carefully mapped out to match the entire statutory curriculum for writing and align with the wider curriculum units from the likes of PKC.
National Poetry Day at Tillington Manor
To celebrate National Poetry day, poet - Andy Tooze, visited children at Tillington Manor Primary to share his expertise. During his visit, he spent time working with the children in each class and shared some of his poems. The children wrote their own poetry during his workshops and shared them in a celebration assembly.
Library Improvements at Dunstall Hill Primary
Dunstall Hill Primary are extremely proud of their every-growing library. Through grants and a recent book fair, school have created new sections in their library which both staff and children have enjoyed choosing books from. There are now dedicated sections on welcoming others, black history, celebrating differences and emotions and well-being. School have also invested in bi-lingual texts for many of the wonderful languages spoken in their school and community. Many children have become excited see themselves, their culture or their first language represented in the texts that they read for pleasure as well as learning about the lives of those with lives very different to their own.
Forest Hills Green Gang!
Forest Hills Primary Green Gang spent much of the Spring and Summer term, growing and tending to their vegetable garden. Before the summer children enjoyed carrots, peas and beetroot from their school garden at lunchtime. They needed to wait until late this term to harvest our sprouts though - just in time for Christmas dinner!
As the year draws to a close, we would like to take this opportunity to express our gratitude for the support you have given to our schools. Those partnerships with our families play a vital part in the success and educational experiences of our children.
We would like to extend our warmest wishes to you and your families this Christmas and we look forward to seeing you all again in the new year.
Andrew Brocklehurst (Chair of Trustees) and Amarjit Cheema (CEO)