Friars Weekly Newsletter friday 17th may 2024

Coming up in this edition of the newsletter...

• Church visitors for Year 5
• Parking plea

The penultimate week of the half-term saw the Year 6 children sit the Standard Assessment Tests… or SATs as they are usually called. Monday was grammar, punctuation and spelling, Tuesday was reading and Wednesday and Thursday… maths! The children all did brilliantly and we are proud of them. A few thank yous…

Thank you to the Year 6 staff team who managed the week superbly!

Thank you to Mrs. Stephens who provided the children with breakfast all week! Yum!

Thank you to all of our fabulous adults who helped at breakfast or in the test rooms!

Year 6 might have had a taxing week but a big reward comes next week as the children are heading off on the Isle of Wight residential or staying behind to engage in Southend Week fun! We hope that everyone has an amazing time!

Next week is busy for other children too. We have a Junior Music Festival rehearsal on Monday and Nursery and Reception Sports Days to mention just a few highlights.

Have a good weekend and see you on Monday.

Mr. McClay, Principal

Naming Clothing

With the warmer weather, we have seen an increase this week of children removing jumpers, cardigans and coats... and then leaving them around the school. We obviously support the children to look after their belongings but it really helps if everything is named. Please over the weekend, can we ask for everyone to check that uniform and coats are all named. Thank you.

Parking

Please may we ask again that we are all very considerate in our parking around the school. Recently we have seen parking on the zigzags outside at the start and end of the day and we have had reports from neighbours about both unsafe parking and parking that blocks driveways. Thank you.

Nursery

Unfortunately, this week’s beach trip did not take place due to the weather conditions however we adapted the activities and the children enjoyed lots of beach craft in Nursery instead. Crabs, shells and fish of all kinds were made and are currently hanging around the nursery on display.

The wet weather brought out all the snails this week and the children have enjoyed observing their behaviours. We collected some and looked at them through magnifying glasses, talking about the different patterns on their shells.

We also set up the bowling alley for the children to play, this is a perfect opportunity to support counting and children are getting better each time at recognising how many pins they knock over.

REMINDER: Please remember with the continuous changing weather conditions that children all have appropriate clothing for both indoor and outdoor provisions. If your child stays all day and comes in wearing their wellies, can they please bring shoes to change into.

We hope to go onto the mud at next week’s beach trip, so please provide aqua shoes or wellies if your child would like to do this.

Reception

We have looked at number bonds to 5 this week, using the part, part, whole method. We found 6 different ways of making 5 and have begun to investigate different ways of making 10.

We continued practising for sports day, recalling how a relay works and practising our skills...all great fun and everyone enjoyed themselves.

We’ve had a lovely week, talking about ourselves, what’s different about our families and how no matter the family makeup, the consistent is always love and respect for each other. It’s been lovely hearing the children share what they think friends are good at and talking with pride about their own strengths.

REMINDER: Next Thursday is Sports Day. Gates are open from 1.30pm-1.45pm and will then be locked again for safeguarding. Please send your child into school dressed in black shorts/joggers, trainers and their house-coloured t-shirt (Red, Blue, Green, Yellow)

Year 1

Throughout the week, the children have re-written the story of Lila and the Secret of Rain. They were encouraged to use a range of conjunctions, including ; but, so, and + or as well as using words ending in –ed, -est and –er. In maths we have been finding quarters of shapes and quantities. There was lots of fun in our science lesson where the children were investigating floating and sinking. During our PSHE lesson we spoke about what qualities a good friend has.

REMINDER: On swimming days, please ensure that children have removed their earrings.

As the weather is starting to get hotter, please ensure that your child has a water bottle in school each day.

Year 2

We’ve had a great TIME in Year 2 this week. In maths, we launched our unit on... you guessed it... time! We have looked at the analogue clock face and practised telling the time to o’clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to. In English, we looked at contractions in grammar and begun to look at our new story, ‘Geronimo!’ We made predictions about what might happen in a text, and use adjectives, nouns, verbs and adverbs to describe characters. In topic, we learned about the heroic and tragic expedition of Sir Robert Falcon Scott and wrote some brief recounts. In RE we have continued our study of stories with meanings, with ‘The Boy Who Cried Wolf,’ and in PE we learned about wickets and bases in our throwing and catching unit.

Year 3

This week we have been reading, editing and up levelling sentences in English. We started the week by editing some sentences that had some terrible spellings, grammar, and punctuation mistakes. We then took those sentences and rewrote them to make them even better! In maths we have continued with time, reading analogue and digital clocks. We then moved onto seconds, minutes, hours, days, and months of the year.

During our fun packed afternoons, we have started to put our tennis skills into action and have been playing some simple tennis matches with opponents. In science we have planted and started to record the growth of some bean plants as a part of our flower investigation.

Lastly, we are sure you were just as impressed by the pizzas the children made as we were..... In DT we evaluated what we made, what we really liked, what we would do differently next time and what would have made our pizza making even better!

Year 4

In science this week, the children continued to build on their knowledge of electrical circuits by investigating which materials would conduct electricity and which materials would not. The results were very interesting.

In maths, the children continue to build on their learning of decimals – being able to place them on a number line and write them in order, smallest to largest and vice versa.

Descriptive writing was the main focus in English. The children had to use their 5 senses and imagine what it would be like to be on a desert island, like Michael was in our layered reading book. How would they describe what they saw or heard? Would things feel the same or would they be very different? In order to help the children with their ideas, we did think about trying to arrange a visit to a sun-kissed desert island next half-term, but sadly, we’re not going to have the budget!

It’s quite scary to think that next week sees the beginning of the May half-term. Don’t forget that we are not back at school until Tuesday 4th June.

REMINDER: Please, please, please ensure that children’s jumpers, fleeces and cardigans have their names in. If you’re writing their names in, the likelihood is that you will need to do this fairly regularly, as after a while, the name will wash out...

Year 5

This week, Year 5 have had their outdoor learning sessions. In the first session, they planned a weekend’s worth of meals that can be prepared purely on an open fire. For the second session, they worked in groups to wash, cut and chop their vegetables. At this time, they learnt about the health and safety around cooking. The food was then cooked on a fire and the kids thoroughly enjoyed their meal.

5BW had a visit from Vicky Baker and Mark from Shoeburyness and Thorpe Bay Baptist church to discuss baptism. The children were excellent listeners and communicated respectively.

Maths has seen us looking at shape work. We identified regular and irregular polygons and looked at the features of 3D shapes.

In English, we studied modal verbs and researched Tudor life in preparation for our non-chronological reports.

Year 6

The Year 6 team want to say a huge well done to all the children in Year 6 who have taken their SATs this week. Every-one demonstrated great levels of perseverance and resilience and gave their best.

In the afternoons, we have continued with the team sport of rounders and further enhanced our athletic skills.

In geography, we have used Ordnance Survey maps of Shoebury, from the 1890’s, through the 1950’s to modern day Shoebury. Comparisons were made regarding the transport links, the land use and facilities that have been developed over the years and the reasons behind the changes.

In Science, we have learnt about Charles Darwin and his voyage to the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean and his theory of evolution by natural selection.

We want to wish all the children a good final week before half term next week, whether they be going on the residential trip to the Isle of Wight or staying closer to home on the Southend Week.

Online Safety

Outdoor Learning

This week, Year 5 have had their outdoor learning sessions. In the first session, they planned a weekend’s worth of meals that can be prepared purely on an open fire. For the second session, they worked in groups to wash, cut and chop their vegetables. At this time, they learnt about the health and safety around cooking. The food was then cooked on a fire and the kids thoroughly enjoyed their meal.

There will be no Outdoor Learning next week due to the Year 6 Residential. The Year 6 children staying for Southend Week need to come dressed and ready for a day in the garden on Monday.

Singing Assemblies

KS2 with Ms. Taylor-Brown

There was no singing assembly this week due to the Year 6 SATs.

PTA

Some exciting developments and some summer fun is being planned! Watch. This. Space!