Welcome to our November Newsletter! We hope you will enjoy reading about all the events that have been happening at FPJS so far this term. As I write, our Y6 children are currently enjoying their residential trip to Rhos-y-Gwaliau, climbing mountains, slate mines and gorge walking. They are having a fantastic time not only taking part in outdoor activities but also learning vital team building skills as well as the chance to develop more independence by being away from home! Our year 5 children have also enjoyed a trip to Maidenhead Heritage Centre, had a visit from an energetic poet and a zoom session with an author, our Year 4 children have been enjoying some very messy science, learning about the digestive system and our Year 3 children are eagerly learning songs and preparing for their Christmas plays.

Today, the whole school were given the challenge to keep the beat going via our drumathon using our newly purchased samba equipment- including staff. Much thanks to Mrs L-D and Mr Bowen for arranging this exciting opportunity for us all!

Anna Clark, Head of School

Diary Dates... Coming Up Soon

Mon 22nd November: Y4 Viking Day
Weds 24th November: Talk n Tour for Y2 parents 9am

Virtual author visit- Phillip Reeve Y4-6

Fri 26th November: Flu immunisation for whole school
Mon 29th November: Final week for after school clubs this term

Cinderella play for whole school

Weds 1st Dec: Virtual author visit- Greg James and Chris Smith

Our new school council 2021(Y6 not pictured!)

Introducing our 2021-22 school council

Congratulations to our new school council, pictured below, who will soon be meeting to discuss what they can do to make our school even better! The FPJS school council are made up of a representative from each class as follows:

Wren: Damon

Robin: Lucy

Finch: Albie

Swift: Kitty

Kingfisher: Harry W

Skylark: Isabel

Eagle: Matlida

Kestrel: Eliza

Kite: Arib

Cormorant: Flynt

Swan: James

Heron: Isabella

Upcoming virtual authors visits

On Wednesday 24th November, we shall be joining other schools for an online event with best-selling, award-winning author PHILIP REEVE. Philip will talk about his brand-new middle grade novel: UTTERLY DARK AND THE FACE OF THE DEEP.

"When the Watcher on Wildsea drowns, his young ward Utterly takes over his duties, keeping watch for the mysterious islands which are said to appear sometimes out in the western sea... Utterly Dark and the Face of the Deep is a story about friendship, family, magic, cake, and the wild power of the sea"

If your child would like to buy a copy of UTTERLY DARK AND THE FACE OF THE DEEP, please click on this link to order:

BUY A PHILLIP REEVE BOOK HERE!

Videos of the drumathon 19th November 2021

FPJS drums for Children In Need

We have had a great day non-stop drumming today for Children In Need! Thanks to Mr Bowen, Robin class teacher, who kept the beat going all morning, allowing children to have fun drumming as a whole class with our new samba kit! Many thanks to parents who have kindly donated to this worthy charity. If you haven't yet had chance to add your donation, it isn't too late! Simply click on the link below!

At the time of writing today, we have raised a fantastic £660, which has already smashed our £500 target!

If you want to see some of our children in action, click on the link above.

Donate to Children In Need

Kingfisher class wins nationwide competition!

At the end of last term Kingfisher class entered a nationwide coding competition. 591 schools entered and over 13,000 students. Thanks to the fantastic coders in our class, we won! We have won a coding kit for the class and best of all a free year's subscription for the whole school to Codementum. Next we're going to enter the International competition.

Written by Mrs Hooper

On Wednesday 1^st December, we shall be joining other schools for an online event with GREG JAMES and CHRIS SMITH! Radio 1 broadcasters and bestselling authors of KID NORMAL, Greg and Chris are back to talk about their brand new children’s book THE GREAT DREAM ROBBERY!

In this outrageous adventure that celebrates imagination and the power of dreams, the jokes come thick and fast and readers are invited to participate in the action. But, underlying the humour and surreal goings on, are themes of friendship, faith and facing your fears. All this makes THE GREAT DREAM ROBBERY a first-class choice for readers with a wide range of interests.

BUY A GREG JAMES AND CHRIS SMITH BOOK HERE!

Interhouse Quiz Winners

On Friday, 5th November, each year group took part in the yearly FPJS Interhouse quiz. Each house was divided into 4 teams and all children had fun answering a range of trivia questions.

The highest scoring teams won themselves a chocolate treat, whilst the points were added up to find overall house winners.

The results were as follows:

Y3/4 Quiz Winners: Romans (Y3 winners: Romans, Y4 winners: Romans)

Y5/6 Quiz Winners: Vikings (Y5 winners: Vikings, Y6 winners: Danes)

Overall Scores:

1st: Romans: 549

2nd: Vikings: 542.5

3rd: Normans: 532.5

4th: Danes: 527.5

Inter-house art competition

Well done to all the children who took part in the inter-house art competition based on the theme of Remembrance day. We had some absolutely fantastic reponses, demonstrating how thoughtful and creative our children are. Here are a selection of the entries, with the winning entries.

Year 3 - Katie B from Wren, Evie - from Robin , Jocelyn from Robin

Year 4 - Jessica from Skylark, Bronwyn from Kingfisher, Amber from Kingfisher and Megan from Swift.

Year 5- Riley from Kestrel, Alice from Kestrel, Evie S from Kite, Issy from Eagle and Charlene from Kestrel who did a fantastic collage with some intricate needlework too!

Year 6- Ellen P, Flynt P from Cormorant, Ellie H from Swan

Adisa the Verbaliser poetry workshop for Y5

Adisa the Verbaliser, a fantastic performance poet, joined year 5 for a day of imagination, rhyming, fun and deep thinking about language in poetry.

In the morning, Adisa performed a number of his poems and discussed his inspiration for them. A particular favourite for many of the children was Phat Bucks - a poem with it's own hidden meaning!

Later in the day, each class had a workshop with Adisa where they had the opportunity to develop their own poems with his support. Here is one of the poems that we developed.

If I were a building... by Hannah Young

I stand strong with my 10 floors and take things step by step.

I have my diamond smile with my delicate, paper heart.

I am made of steel as well as gold.

I am strong and I like to shine.

I face lovely north, the place to explore lots of mysterious animals and more.

With my circular windows I am soft and understanding to all.

Y5 trip to Maidenhead Heritage Centre

Our visit to Maidenhead Heritage Centre by Phoebe Spiers

The inside, which was full of many ancient objects, was bigger than I imagined. A friendly man welcomed us, his name was Richard. He taught us all about the history of Maidenhead. Did you know that a few hundred year ago it took 3 days to get from London to Bath? Now it is less than 3 hours!

In 1205, a wooden bridge was made so people could cross the Thames on foot or by horse and cart. In 1839, an engineer called Isambard Kingdom Brunel designed and built a bridge out of bricks. Everyone thought the bridge would fall down because the arches of the bridge were so wide (37m) and he made it out of bricks instead of stone. He left the scaffolding up after the bridge was finished and one day a storm came and blew it all away. The bridge has been standing ever since.

We then made our own bridges using 100 Duplo bricks. The aim was to build the longest bridge possible with no support in the middle. The winning group built a bridge which was 84cm long! After that we thanked Richard and walked back to school, along one of the roads we had seen in an old photo.

I had a brilliant time at the Heritage Centre! It was fun and we did some great team work. I found it very interesting to learn more about Maidenhead.

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Stars of the week

Star of the week newsletter 4 2021

Well done to all our stars this week!

Our stars are chosen from following the values of the school: Passion, Well-being and respect.

We also chose children who have made exceptional effort in their work or attitude to learning.

Our stars are in a downloadable format if you want to print to keep!

TT Rockstars Update

Well done to all our children who have started using TT rock stars regularly to practise times tables!

The photos in this edition show the current leaders from Years 4 to 6 and the top 10 from these year groups who have made the most progress since September. Well done!

Well done to Amelie and Chizara, both in Y3 who have already completed level 10 of their cracking times tables!

Sports Update

PE News!

Another great week in PE!

In our PE sessions this week, we continued to practise our netball skills with various skills-based activities working towards playing mini team games and 7 aside netball.

A big "Thank you" to Miss Johnson who joined us in PE this week. During her sessions, the children worked in the Hall using their gymnastic skills to show agility, balance and co-ordination in a sequence of movements.

We would also like to say a massive "Thank you" to all FPJS parents who transport their children to the many sporting events FPJS take part in. Without you, we wouldn't be able to do all that we do. THANK YOU!

By Mr Kemp/Mrs Winter

inter house Cross Country competition

On Friday 5th November the whole school participated in our first inter-house competition of the new school calendar year.

The results are as follows:

Year 3

Winners: Normans

Year 4

Winners: Normans

Year 5

Winners: Normans

Year 6

Winners: Normans

The overall winners - NORMANS!! Well done Normans- a convincing win in all year groups!

PE Stars of the Week

Class Swan - Omayma

Class Heron - Nikko

Class Comorant - Tillie

Class Kite - Maisie, Zayn

Class Eagle -Kyle, Toby

Class Kestrel - Thomas, Liam

Class Swift - Immie, Charlie D

Class Kingfisher - Pippa B, Grace

Class Skylark - Alice A, Lily S

Class Wren - Evie, Damon

Class Robin - Selin, Amelie

Class Finch - Prasad, Megan

Well done to all the PE stars over the last few weeks!

Netball Matches

Oldfield vs FPJS

On Thursday 11th November, the Netball team went to Oldfield school to play our 3rd fixture.

This was another competitive fixture but the team continued with a positive attitude and showed excellent teamwork. After 3 well fought quarters, Oldfield pulled away in the final quarter to win 7-4.

Our training sessions will continue and our final match before Christmas will be on Monday 29th November at FPJS. This will be our first home fixture!

RBWM Cross country competition

On Wednesday 10th November, a team of pupils took part in the annual Cross Country competition held at Altwood School which included many schools from the Borough.

Everyone who participated showed the FPJS values of Passion, Respect and Well-Being added to the commitment to compete at the highest level. This gave FPJS a number of top 5 finishes.

Our stand out performance came from Archie Charles in Year 6.

Full results to follow in the next Newsletter.

Year Group Updates

Year 3 News

This week, we had a visitor in to teach us about Road Safety. The workshop was lots of fun and we really enjoyed using actions to help embed our knowledge. Parents, do not be surprised if you get dragged out and about to practice the Green Cross Code! Your children are experts and will be able to advise you about where the safest places are to cross and what we can wear to make us more visible. To embed this knowledge further, the children then wrote a recount of their session and did an excellent job of using conjunctions to extend their sentences.

We’ve been spending lots of time practicing our Christmas play and are so impressed by how well children have learnt their lines. Keep up the hard work at home and it will be so worth it! More details for parents to follow very soon.

In computing, we’ve been learning about internet safety and how to keep ourselves online. Soon, we’ll be combining this knowledge with learning on how to send an email.

Keep up the hard work year 3, we're so impressed with you all!

Mrs Lawrence-Davis Y3 Team Leader

Year 3- What are we learning?

Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt:

What is the Green Cross Code?

What can we do to keep ourselves safe online?

Tell me about the conjunctions that you used in your writing.

our current reads we are enjoying in Y3...

Below are some of the texts that Year 3 have been enjoying as part of their comprehension lessons and for pleasure:

Ross Welford- The 100- year old boy

Anne Fine- The diary of a killer cat

Edward Lear- The Owl and the Pussycat

Year 4 News

Year 4 have had an excellent start to the new term.

In maths we have been learning to use our place value knowledge to multiply and divide by 100. We have also been looking at patterns in our 3, 6 and 9 times tables to help us remember these.

In English, the children have been writing story build ups. We have learnt how to build suspense using short sentences, add personification to our writing to create atmosphere and writing descriptions using our senses.

Our new topic in science is about the digestive system. We got to eat some skittles during our science lessons in order to test our taste buds! We also investigated what happened to egg shells when they were left in different liquids. The egg shell is a similar material to our tooth enamel so we could see what would happen if we didn't brush our teeth! We have also recreated the digestive system; it was great fun and we all got very messy!

Mrs Barbosa Y4 Team Leader

Year 4- What are we learning?

Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt:

Why do we have different types of teeth?

How do you use a place vlaue grid to multiply and divide by 10 and 100?

What can you tell me about the features of a build up in a story?

our current reads we are enjoying in Y4...

Below are some of the books that Year 4 have been enjoying, as part of their book talk lessons and for pleasure!

Year 5 News

We've had a very busy few weeks in Year 5!

Our visit to Maidenhead Heritage Centre kicked off our learning about the history of the local area. The children have been researching the building of the railways including Brunel's bridge and the effect it had on the people of Maidenhead. We have also been learning about the building of Victorian homes within the area and how they differ from homes built more recently.

The children have really enjoyed reading the Boy in the Tower by Polly Ho-Yen. They have produced some fantastic work warning others about the Bluchers and delving in to the inner workings of the character's minds. It has been a brilliant book which draws many parallels to our own lives within the last few years.

In Maths, we are working on our understanding of multiplication and division and have been focusing particularly on our understanding of how these operations work and why we need to use them. For English, we have been building our own short, blackout poems as part of our work on Remembrance Day.

Coming up, we are looking forward to continuing our poetry work inspired by Adisa the Verbaliser and discovering a familiar face when we research the history of the school!

Miss Moakes Y5 Team Leader

Year 5- What are we learning?

Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt:

Who was Isambard Kingdom Brunel and what impact did he have on Maidenhead?

Why is it important to use the correct register in your writing?

In Science, which was the best surface for James Bond to run across and why?

our current reads we are enjoying in Y5...

The Year 5 children would like to recommend the following books:

Year 6 News

It has been a busy couple of weeks in year 6 and at the time of writing most of them are in Wales enjoying the sunshine(!) and learning all about independence, resilience and how to work in a team. By the time they come home they will be able to hoover, make their beds and their own lunches so parents get ready to put your feet up (or get ready for the mountain of washing!).

Children who haven't been to Rhos have also been busy making Christmas wreaths, going on their own farm walk and planting up the allotment ready for Spring - watch out in March for a riot of colour and thanks to the Rotary club who donated some bulbs.

Miss Johnson Y6 Team Leader

Year 6- What are we learning?

Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt:

How can you work out the best blackout material?

How do you use ( ) in a sentence for effect?

What is improvisation in jazz?

our current reads we are enjoying in Y6...

Check out Dr Xargle's Book of Earthlets -by Jeanne Willis this is an hilarious take on how aliens would see humans and year 6 used it as a stimulus for some writing this week.

We also explored the classic Alice In Wonderland by Lewis Carroll when looking at how punctuation was use for effect as she fell down the rabbit hole .

Once Upon a Crime by Robin Stevens

Housepoints:

Useful Information For Parents

Swimarathon Poster 2022.pdf