Hamstel Infant School & Nursery Weekly News week ending 15th December 2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

Wow - What a week it’s been at Hamstel Infant School and Nursery!

The main focus of this week was about giving our wonderful children the chance to perform in front of their parents, other family members or friends and my goodness they took this opportunity with both hands.

Our Nursery children, certainly didn’t shy away from the spotlight as they entertained parents with their Nativity. Considering that for many children, it was their first experience of doing any sort of performance, they certainly weren’t fazed and all of them performed confidently and sang beautifully throughout as they told the Christmas story to the watching audience. It certainly had the ‘cute’ factor and I hope parents enjoyed it as much as I did.

Equally as brilliant, our Year 2s led parents, carers and family members through their version of the Christmas story with their traditional Christingle service. Joined by Revd Andy Goodliff from Bellevue Baptist Church, the children wowed their audience by singing carols and retelling the Christmas story through our narrators. They did an amazing job to remember all of the words, especially as some of the carols contained all of their verses! Andy completed the service for us by explaining the meaning and significance of the Christingle oranges, which, as the lights were dimmed, were then lit for the children to hold.

A huge well done to both Nursery and Year 2 for their successful performances and a special mention to all of the staff involved who have given up a lot of time and effort to prepare the children for these events. Thank you!

The fun didn’t stop there though, as today we have welcomed our Year 1 parents in for their Christmas Crafts sessions. Another lovely event that allowed parents to work alongside their children to produce some truly great festive creations. We hope children and parents alike enjoyed this event.

A big thank you to everybody who has come along to support one of our Christmas events this year – they really are nothing without you!

On Thursday afternoon, our choir were out entertaining the local community again and I had the pleasure of going along to see the little bit of Christmas joy that the children brought to the residents as they sang some Christmas favourites along with them.

Next week we have our last three days in school before the Christmas break and our PTA have some final festive fun planned for our children to enjoy. The children also have their Christmas parties to look forward to and we are also eagerly awaiting the big man’s visit on Tuesday when rumour has it that Santa Claus himself will be in school!

The lucky tickets from our Children’s Chocolate Raffle have been drawn and the winners will be announced in our Celebration Assembly, that will now take place on Monday having been re-arranged due to the Year 1 Christmas Craft sessions in the hall today.

I will write one last time before we finish the term, but seeing as this is our last newsletter of 2023, I will end it by saying that we look forward to welcoming the children back on Thursday 4th January 2024 for the start of the spring term and on behalf of everybody at Hamstel Infants, I would like to wish you all a very happy and healthy Christmas and a great start to the new year.

Best regards,

Scott Roche

Principal

Rainbow & Starlight

Rainbow

It has been a very busy time for the children this week, we have completed so many activities, the children have enjoyed learning about Christmas and listening to stories about it. They have made some lovely craft work, and decorations that they will be taking home, we have continued with pencil control, and name writing, and fine motor skill activities. The children have been most attentive with Attention Autism (Bucket time), they have really enjoyed bucket time, getting involved and sitting for longer periods happily. The children have also been very interested in story time, listening to different stories through the day. We have continued with activities such as maths, CVC words, matching games, repositions and sentence building. We have been modelling functional play and turn taking, which has been most successful this week.

Swimming was very good on Tuesday, the children enjoyed splashing around and having fun, we had floats and lots of toys in the pool which the children enjoyed playing with, it was enjoyed by everyone.

REMINDER: Rainbow Room will have a party on Wednesday 20th December, and we appreciate any food contributions. Please remember no nuts, thank you.

Starlight

This week the children in Starlight have been looking at the story 'Elf on the Shelf'. The children have really enjoyed hunting for the Elf each day. In Starlight we have been busy practising writing CVC words and describing Christmas pictures.

In Maths we have continued with our counting, addition and subtraction skills. We have also been extremely busy with our Christmas crafts, which has helped with our fine motor skills.

The children had a wonderful time this week during their swimming lesson. It has been wonderful to see their confidence grow.

REMINDERS: Christmas party Monday afternoon.

Reception Year

This week in Reception we have shared ‘Elf on a Shelf’. We have had lots of excitement of the elves arriving and the children have really enjoyed searching for the elves after they have made a big mess in each class and gone missing.

In Literacy we have been learning how to write a wanted poster to describe our elves for others around the school to help look for them.

In Maths we have been finding out everything we have been learning this term.

In PSHE we have been learning how to be polite and to share and take turns when we are playing. In PE we have been learning how to jump for height. In Handwriting we have been practising all the long-legged giraffe letters as well we the one-armed robot letters.

The children have all been assessed for Read Write Inc. and new groups will start after Christmas, please keep up reading for pleasure and practising their reading at home over the holidays.

REMINDERS: Our Class Party is on Tuesday 19th December: Each class will put a list up for you to sign up for what to contribute. Please remember not to send in food containing nuts.

Year One

Year 1 have had a very festive week. We have enjoyed writing about Santa, snowmen and thinking about our own letters to Santa.

In Science we have been monitoring the weather all week and have noticed that it’s been getting colder as the week goes on.

We really enjoyed watching the Year 2 Christingle and had a lovely festive time during our Christmas craft day.

REMINDER:

Our Class Party is on Tuesday 19th December: Each class will put a list up for you to sign up for what to contribute. Please remember not to send in food containing nuts. The children can wear sensible party clothes to school for the day.

Online Safety

With Christmas right around the corner, millions of families are excitedly anticipating the chance to spend some quality time with each other over the festive season. When everyone’s engrossed in their phones or glued to their games consoles, however, genuinely meaningful moments with loved ones can often be difficult to orchestrate.

This Christmas guide will lend a hand: providing some advice on helping young people to set aside their devices for a while and live in the moment. Even if going full tech cold turkey feels unrealistic, implementing just a few of these tips could still decrease the amount of screen time in your home this festive season – enabling everyone to make the most of it.

Messages from the Office

New Menu for Spring Term

When we return in January we will have a new menu, a copy is below for your information. A menu showing all allergens is available on our caterers website at this link.

Parents/Carers of children who have a specific medical dietary requirement and have completed the Medical Diet Request Form will have been contacted direct by Pabulum with their child's new menu.