Furze Platt Junior School
Newsletter- 3rd March 2023
It's all about books!
It has been an absolute pleasure today to see everyone taking part in our World Book Day celebrations! It makes me so proud of how much both the children and the adults at FPJS love books! Having such a brilliant author in today to inspire our children was the icing on the cake! Having a passion for for reading is something that I want every child to have by the time they leave us in Y6; today our Y6 children demonstrated that love for reading by sharing books with the EYFS children at FPI school- a magical scene! There is a lot of unrest in the world in so many ways at the moment, but seeing children immersed in listening to books, reading books and discussing books somehow gives us all hope for the future! Reading really can and does change lives:
“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”
Have a wonderful weekend, and hopefully, further opportunities to enjoy lots of book related activities with Maidenhead's Big Read!
Anna Clark
Head of School
Important reminders for parents
Following the app message sent on 27/2, just a few key reminders for parents:
Snacks in schools
Please do not send your child in with any sweets, chocolate or nut based products.
Breaktime snacks should be healthy- ideally fruit or vegetables. Please limit crisps or wrapped goods such as cereal bars to lunchtime only.
Parent communication
Urgent messages should go via the office to ensure this gets to teachers on the day.
All other communication to teachers should be sent via Seesaw. Teachers may take 48 hours to acknowledge email.
Arrival time
Children should arrive at school no later than 8.50am to complete morning tasks. This is an important learning time.
Uniform
Hoodies should not be worn as a coat substitute.
School PE uniform should be plain and logo free as possible.
Dates for your diary
Mon 6th March: Y5/6 zoom author visit- Sharma Jackson
Fri 10th March- International Footballer visit- Lily Woodham- children to wear PE kit on this day!
Thurs 14th March- Parents consultations 3.30-5.30pm
Weds/Thurs 15th/16th March- potential NEU strike action
Fri 17th March- Red Nose Day (more info to follow)
Thurs 23rd March- Y6 Easter Cracked sessions at St Peter's church
Thurs 23rd March- Parents consultations 3.30-5.30pm
Mon 27th March- Y6 SATs meeting (by zoom) for Y6 parents (more details to follow)
Tues 28th March- Y5 Kestrel Class assembly 9.15am
Weds 29th March- Y4 trip to the living rainforest (details to follow)
Weds 29th March- Y5 Kite Class assembly 9.15am
Thurs 30th March- Y5 Eagle Class assembly 9.15am
Fri 31st March- Term 4 ends
Easter Holidays 3rd-14th April
Mon 17th April- Term 5 begins
World Book Day Celebrations at FPJS!
What a fantastic day we had today (Friday, 3rd March) celebrating all things book-related! Our Y6 children visited EYFS to read books, and our Y3 children teamed up with Y2 to share stories. We had some brilliant costumes and enjoyed lots of brilliant book talk throughout the day. Thanks to Steve Cole, our visiting author for making this a really special world book day for FPJS! Please enjoy all our photos of the day!
Y5 and Y6 are also looking forward to an additional "zoom" author visit from Sharma Jackson on Monday 6th March.
Steve Cole, Author visit
Thanks to the Maidenhead's big read event (which you can read all about below) we were thrilled to have such a fantastic author and speaker, Steve Cole join us as part of our world book day celebrations. Steve enthralled the children with his alien stories and songs with a focus on using your imagination. Steve's books have exceed three million copies and his hugely successful Astrosaurs young fiction series has been a UK top-ten children’s bestseller. His several original Doctor Who novels have also been bestsellers so we were incredibly lucky to have such a prolific writer join us at FPJS!
Maidenhead's big read 2023
We are so pleased to be supporting this year's Maidenhead's big read event. This year, the theme is "Outer Space" and during the weekend of 5th and 6th March there will be many free events at Maidenhead library. Your child should be bringing home more information today. What is even more exciting is that the school with the highest attendance during the event will be in with a chance to win a free visit from Immersive Experiences Ltd, including a free planetariam. FPJS would love to win, so we would really like to encourage everyone to go along and have some fun at the library during this time!
Scholastic Book Fair- Thanks!
Many thanks to all the children and parents to purchased books at our recent fair. The response was amazing! We raised a total of £1983.75- which is the highest amount we have ever raised! This will allow us to spend an amazing £1680 on new books for the library! The class with the most orders was Swift class, and they gained an additional £25 to spend on book purchases for their classroom. Well done everyone for your passion for reading!
International Footballer to visit FPJS!
We are looking forward to a visit from a professional footballer to FPJS next week! Lily Woodham is a pro football player with Wales & Reading FC, and is coming to FPJS to inspire the girls and boys with her story.
She has recently joined Sports for Champions and will be running inspirational workshops across the country in what remains of the school year. Lily's workshop is all about promoting health, fitness and resilience. Our pupils will have chance to meet Lily, ask questions and take part in a super fun exercise circuit led by my Lily too.
Quick Links
Stars Of The Week
TT Rock stars Update & Spelling Shed Top 10
Well done to the following children who are in our top 10 for attainment OR top ten for progress in their TT rock stars...
Well done to our current Spelling shed and maths shed pupils who top the charts with their scores!
Mastery of Times Tables award
Well done to Madeline in Robin class for mastering her times tables this week!
Eco COUNCIL update from Miss Edwards
I met with the Eco Councillors this morning and we reviewed the results of our latest Cut Your Carbon campaign. I am very pleased to say that after comparing two weeks of meter readings - Thank you Mr Dearnaley, (week before we started vs the week after) we have managed to cut down our carbon by 32%! This is fantastic and something for the Eco Councillors to be very proud of! It just goes to show that no one is too small to make a difference and when we all come together, that big difference becomes a HUGE one! Well done, eco group.
Our next eco project that starts in a few weeks time will be the Great Big School Clean 2023. This starts on the 17th March and runs up to the Easter holidays. More on this later.
Year Group Updates
Year 3 News
It has been a fantastic start to the new term and Year 3 have been working incredibly hard already!
This week the children have been looking at the features of a recount in English. We have focused on time conjunctions, paragraphs and past tense verbs.
In maths, we have been focusing on fractions. The children have looked at what the numerator and denominator are as well as putting fractions on a number line and comparing fractions.
In science our topic is 'Rocks'. The children have thoroughly enjoyed comparing different rocks as well as discovering how rocks are formed. The children completed an investigation this week which helped them decide whether the rocks were igneous, metamorphic or sedimentary.
In geography our topic is 'North America' and the children have really enjoyed looking at the countries in North America as well lines of latitude and longitude. Homeworks also look wonderful so well done to all of the Year 3 children on completing those.
Finally, we said goodbye to Mr Clark (our student teacher) last week but he will be keeping in touch to see how the children are getting on and may even come back for a visit so watch this space.
Mrs Barry- Y3 Team Leader
Year 3- What are we learning?
Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt over the last few weeks!:
What are the features of a recount?
What is the role of the denominator?
Can you remember the 3 different ways in which rocks are formed?
Our current reads we are enjoying in Y3...
The Twits - Roald Dahl
Earth shattering events - Robin Jacobs and Sophie Williams
Year 4 News
It has been a great start back after half term for year 4. The children seem to have really enjoyed working on their rainforest project homework and we have some incredible pieces to share. Homework winners from each class will be announced in next week's assembly and photos will be in the next newsletter.
The children have been learning about fractions in maths. They have been learning how to find families of equivalent fractions, fractions of amounts and fractions of shapes It has been great to hear the children using mathematical words such as numerator and denominator, too.
In English the children are enjoying writing spooky stories. They are learning to build up suspense and have been coming up with incredible vocabulary to describe spooky scenes. All the children will also be ending the stories on a cliff-hanger.
Our new topic in science is about classifying animals. The children have been introduced to broad groups on animals: mammals, birds, fish, amphibians and reptiles and learning about the features of each.
We have lots of exciting things to look forward to this half term including some cake tasting in DT next week!
Mrs Barbosa Y4 Team Leader
Year 4- What are we learning?
Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt over the last few weeks:
What can you tell me about equivalent fractions?
What are some characteristics of a mammal?
Tell me about the 'Eatwell Plate'.
Our current reads we are enjoying in Y4...
Zombierella: Fairytales Gone Bad - Jospeh Coelho
Charlotte's Web - E.B. White
Stuart Little - E.B. White
Year 5 News
Year 5 have had a positive first two weeks back after half term and we are learning lots of new topics across the curriculum.
In writing, we have finished publishing our Greek myths and they read very well. Hopefully the children will be able to give you a summary on what happened in their myth.
In maths, we have learnt a lot about decimals and percentages and how these link in with our previous knowledge of fractions. To help the children further their understanding of mathematical concepts, we have been using more manipulatives (pictured). Next, we will be continuing with decimals and beginning to solve problems involving decimal numbers.
The teachers in Year 5 have loved seeing the quality of the project homework coming in and we have displayed some of these pieces of work in our classrooms for all to enjoy. The geography topic, Volcanoes and Earthquakes is already intriguing many children & we have been impressed with their thirst for knowledge so far.
In DT, the children are getting creative with sock monsters! They are learning how to stitch which will help them later when putting their monsters together. We can't wait to show you the finished monsters!
Miss Edwards, Y5 Team Leader
Year 5 - What are we learning?
Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt over the last few weeks:
What is the % symbol called and what does it mean?
What is the Earth's core made up of?
Explain how you thread a needle.
Our current reads we are enjoying in Y5...
The Bacteria Book - Steve Mould
The Secret of the Treasure Keepers - A.M. Howell
The Iguana Boy - James Bishop
Year 6 News
Year 6 have had a busy start to the half term and we have seen some fantastic project homework come into class - it is evident that some students have been very busy at home!
In English, we have been learning how to write a factual encyclopaedia entry about Charles Darwin. We have been focusing on a range of sentence types and scientific language.
In maths, we have entered the world of algebra. We have been working out how to solve missing number problems and how to writing simple expressions.
In science, we have been exploring the functions of the heart and we carried out a fun experiment to explore the effect of restricted blood flow in arteries.
We have started our new unit in Geography and have been exploring what goods are exported and imported around the world.
In RE, we have been looking at influential people and we have been discussing the influences of Christianity that we see in every day life.
Miss Morales, Y6 Team Leader
Year 6- What are we learning?
Ask your child the following questions to see what they have learnt over the last few weeks:
Name a difference between arteries and veins.
What are the top countries in the world for world trade?
Can you tell me what natural selection is?
Our current reads we are enjoying in Y6..
Children's Encyclopedia - Christopher Lloyd
Sky Song - Abi Elphinstone
Wildsmith - Liz Flanagan
Sports Update
PE UPdate
Just a short update this week. At the time of writitng this our year 3/4 and 5/6 teams are competiting at the Berkshire County Sportshall Athletics Finals in Newbury. Both teams will be battling it out against other schools who won their respective qualifier event so I anticipate a very tense and tight contest. I am Super proud of our children making it to this stage. Results will be released in the next newsletter but i'm sure you will hear about it before then from our very excited and eager children!
In other news, we have a few competitions coming up next week. We will see our girls compete in a year 5/6 stingers netball competition at Newlands Girls School on Tuesday followed by a year 3/4 football competition at LVS Ascot on Wednesday. Very excited for both these competitions with results being released in the next newsletter as well.
Lastly, Good Luck to all teams competiting, enjoy the events and be proud to represent FPJS!
Mr Manez
Netball News
Netball Update! On Tuesday 28th February, FPJS hosted their latest netball match against St Mary’s.This was our last home fixture of the season, so the whole squad was ready to play. An extremely fast start saw us 4-0 up in the first quarter, with our shooters not missing a shot. St Mary’s worked hard to come into the game, but with a strong defensive display we limited them to just one goal. After a tense final quarter, FPJS won this fixture 5-1. Well done to all the squad; we are very lucky to have such strength in depth which allowed everyone to participate in this victory!
We have one more fixture to play, which we will confirm next week.
Mrs Winter & Mr Manez
Y6 Football News
Both Furze Platt A and B team welcome St Edmund Campion to FPJS for their first fixture of the new spring season.The first game saw FPJS A play a really strong match which ended 1-1. The first half saw great football and link up play from; Toby, Eduardo, Patryk and Adam. The FPJS goal came from excellent reactions of goalkeeper Will who played a long ball over the top for Patryk to place over the out rushing goalkeeper to make it 1-0. The defence of Thomas, Liam, Will and Harry who all contributed to FPJS going in at half time at 1-0 up. The second half saw St Eds start really strong and deservedly scored an equaliser. Nonetheless, FPJS keep pushing trying to get a winner. They had opportunities but either good saves from the goalkeeper or a little fortune for St Ed’s meant the game ended 1-1. A very strong performance from FPJS A but plenty more to work on. Well played everyone!
The second game was for FPJS B to play St Eds. This was again a very entertaining game by FPJS but unfortunately St Eds snatched a winner to win 0-1. The first half was a tight matchup in which both teams cancelled each other out. FPJS had great chances through excellent play from; Rishaan, Archie, Henry and Luca. However, once again the goalkeeper produced excellent saves to keep FPJS from scoring. The defence of Max (GK), Liam and Harrison kept FPJS safe from any St Eds threat. The second half saw Will, Harry, and Will come on and FPJS started strong with chances coming but nothing could get past the keeper. Unfortunately against the run of play again St Ed’s scored a goal with a nice finish giving Max in goal no chance from a difficult angle. The FPJS team didn’t give up earning corner after corner and having chance and chance again, FPJS pushed till the very last kick which saw Liam smash a ball just over. Another great game and FPJS B did the school proud as well.
Well done to both teams, who played exceptionally well. Speaking to the Manager afterwards, he was very impressed and told me his teams Player of the match for:
FPJS A: Toby for his composure, strength and perseverance.
FPJS B: Liam for his incredible defending, energy and distribution. Thank you to all the supporters for their incredible support. A thank you to Mr Thorne who excellently refereed both games.
Well done again to all players for representing FPJS so well.
FPSA Updates
Mr T's Quiz Night - Friday 24th March (8pm-10.30pm)
The FPSA Quiz Night is back! Come and join in the fun at the Juniors school hall as we raise money for both schools whilst testing our general knowledge and having a drink or two. Enter as a full team of 6 or come as a pair or individual and we will help you get into a team on the evening. Doors open at 7pm with the quiz starting at 8pm. The quiz includes 4 picture rounds, a connections round, a music round and much more. Book tickets at www.pta-events.co.uk/fpsa
Coin collection
A huge thank you to everyone who donated some coins (and notes!) last month, we had an amazing range of different currencies and some very generous donations too. In total we raised £425, a superb amount!
A big thank you goes to the children that helped out with the collections both before and after school (please see pictures). Some future PTA members there no doubt!
FPSA AGM - 29th March
Congratulations - between us in 2022 alone, we raised a huge £29K through the FPSA to support our children in our schools. Thank you!
Do you want to know how the money has been spent, what the future plans are and to have your say suggesting other ways to spend it? If you have around an hour to spare on Wednesday 29th March from 7.45pm, come the FPSA AGM in the Infants school hall to find out more.
We want to celebrate our success together, so for those who come in person there will be a glass of wine and an opportunity to chat with current FPSA members and both heads of schools who will explain their plans for the money raised and how funds were spent in 2022 for the benefit of our children. We recognise that not everyone can make it in person though, so you're also welcome to join us virtually by Zoom (details to follow...but you'll have to find your own wine).
If you are interested in joining the FPSA, now is a great time as we are looking for new team members in particular a secretary - but don't worry, there is no pressure to join if you come to the meeting to simply find out more. If you can't make it and are interested in getting involved, please do reach out, we'd love to talk to you (fpsa.ebox@gmail.com)
Useful Information For Parents
Save the Date
The IAS (Independent Advice Service) will be hosting a coffee morning in the Infant school hall for parents on TUESDAY 25th APRIL. Times to be confimed!
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