Prep School Newsletter Friday 26 January 2024

Prep School Notices

Below please find the step by step guide on how to access the SOCS calendar (for sports fixtures) on your phone via the iSAMS Parent Portal. It is very easy to navigate this on your phone and here you will find all the information on the various fixtures and return times. Team sheets are also published here.

We are very excited about our first Swimming Gala taking place on Tuesday 30 January and we would like to wish the U11A and U10A teams the best of luck!

Save the date!

What happened in school this week?

Forest Explorers

This week we are learning all about number 4. We have been writing number 4 with chalks and looking at shapes with 4 sides and 4 corners. We went on a treasure hunt around school to find squares and rectangles.

Reception

We have continued our topic ‘Once Upon a Time…’ this week. Our story last week was Goldilocks and the Three Bears and this week it has been The Gingerbread Man. The children have had great fun re-telling the stories and dressing up as the characters in each story. The role play area has been the Three Bears Cottage and the children have taken it in turns to act out the story with their friends, often changing it, particularly the ending! They have made their own gingerbread people by following a recipe, carefully weighing and measuring each of the ingredients. Each of the children has also designed their own gingerbread person and next week they will be making them using fabric and collage materials.

Year 1

Year 1 have started their new topic of “London Calling” and are really enjoying the train station role play area. They have been selling tickets, looking up destinations and using the tube map, as well as relaxing in the carriages on the train!

We did a mind map of all the things we already know about London. Lots of us have enjoyed days out at the theatres or museums or seeing friends and family; some of us were even born there! We have investigated the various landmarks, created maps and we are looking forward to planning journeys using the tube map and going on a virtual open top bus with Ted the tour guide.

I have been to the museum to learn about the big fire in London, I saw the big monument too. Aniya

I know the fire started in a bakery in 1666. Charlotte

My Daddy works in that big building! Blake

I really enjoyed the Lion King at the theatre! Isabelle and Oliver

Year 2

Year 2 have been learning about money over the last couple of weeks! They have learnt how to recognise all the coins and notes and they investigated different ways to create amounts. Real-life scenarios were acted out allowing the children to apply their knowledge.

Year 3

In our maths lessons we have been learning different ways to divide. After lots of practice we have started to master division using groups, times tables and bus stop. This week, to challenge us further, we started to move onto numbers with remainders!

Year 4

Year 4 started to read the book, Stone Age Boy, this week. Thinking about how people survived, they went to the woods to create tools and resources of their own out of natural materials. They were very inventive and made a range of useful utensils; from knives and forks to spears for fishing, they produced some very useful gadgets.

Year 5

Sikh stories are the main focus in R.E. this half term. We are discussing the meaning of the stories and indeed the messages hidden within them. It is clear, thus far, that the moral or message in each story, despite being extremely old, is still relevant today. 'The Milk and The Jasmine Flower' tells of Guru Nanak's journey to visit a city named Multan. Some corrupt wise men try to deter Guru Nanak's arrival and send a messenger out to meet him. The messenger carries a bowl of milk, so full, the milk has reached the rim. He explained that Guru Nanak could not visit as the city was as full as the bowl. There was no room!

Guru Nanak picked a scented jasmine flower from a nearby bush and dropped the flower in the bowl. Not a drop of milk was spilt. Guru Nanak explained that there was room in the bowl, just as there is more room in the world for goodness and holiness. Guru Nanak did indeed visit Multan and the holy men apologised for their bad behaviour. Year Five considered what there was more room for in our modern world and came up with some tremendous ideas.

Year 6

This week, Year 6 helped cement their knowledge of the composition of blood, by making blood smoothies! These were not real blood, of course. We substituted what we needed to make a delicious drink!

• 55% plasma – we used apple juice (approx. 150ml per group)
• 44% red blood cells – we used frozen strawberries and raspberries (approx. 120g per group) 0.5% white blood cells – we used a tiny sprinkle of mini marshmallows.
• 0.5% platelets – we used a tiny sprinkle of sprinkles.