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Happy Friday to our Rockliffe families! Although it has been a shorter week for the children with our INSET day today, they certainly packed plenty of enthusiasm and creativity into the rest of the week for Arts Fortnight. Across the school, children have been busy finalising their incredible outcomes, from vibrant artwork to expressive writing. The Art Showcase on Monday promises to be a wonderful celebration of the children's learning!

Our school grounds also received a beautiful, green upgrade this week! On Monday, some of our wonderful Friends of Rockliffe families collected an incredible array of plants generously donated to us by the Head Gardener at Greenwich Park. The variety of plants is simply stunning and provided the perfect complement to our 'Arts in Bloom' focus this week. Other members of the Friends team have been incredibly helpful in figuring out the best positions for each plant, and we cannot wait to watch these grow and flourish. In addition to this, Rockliffe Manor turned a little brighter and more yellow as our new Buddy Bench area really started coming together! Once again, a huge thank you to our Friends of Rockliffe families for your hard work and dedication in helping our vision come to life.

On Monday, 16 of our Year 4 children attended a cricket competition organised by Platform Cricket, the company that delivered cricket tuition to the class back in the autumn. Competing against other local schools, it was a fun-filled day of batting, bowling and fantastic team spirit. Despite some fierce competition, our children showcased the excellent skills they learned, cheering each other on and displaying brilliant sportsmanship throughout the day. It was wonderful to see their confidence grow as the tournament progressed and a huge congratulations goes to everyone who took part for representing our school so brilliantly!

This week, we also welcomed the soon-to-be newest members of the Rockliffe family. The children starting Reception in September came in for a 'Stay and Play' session. It was great to see them exploring the Early Years area and getting comfortable in their new surroundings. This event also gave us a wonderful opportunity to connect with their families, answer questions and introduce our staff. We are already looking forward to seeing them all again in September!

On Thursday, we hosted a Curriculum Evaluation Day led by Miss White. This was a valuable opportunity for us to review our learning plans, celebrate our successes and ensure our children are getting the absolute best education possible. This particular evaluation had a special focus on Science and we could not be prouder of how our children shone. Miss White and Miss Roper spent time dropping into classrooms, looking through science books and speaking directly with our young scientists and the feedback was incredibly positive. The children spoke so enthusiastically about their learning, naturally using the scientific vocabulary they have developed alongside a deep understanding of the topics they’ve covered this year. A huge thank you to Miss White for organising such a successful day, to all the children for being fantastic ambassadors for Rockliffe Manor and to our teaching team for their dedication to bringing science to life every single day!

So many amazing things happened this week, and there is so much more to come next week. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend, and we look forward to seeing you back on Monday!

Our Nursery children have been feeling incredibly inspired by their art sessions this week and couldn't wait to share their creativity with adults at home! After exploring iconic artists like Monet, Banksy and David Hockney, Ezra was so eager to share his new knowledge that he brought his mum over to Mrs. Budd to help him recall "the artist who painted the bridge, boats, and flowers" so he could tell her all about it. The children have also been busy crafting beautiful hyacinths and daisy pictures using a wide variety of creative techniques.

In Reception, the classroom has been transformed into a hub of creativity! The children worked incredibly hard using different artistic methods to create their very own mini meadows. Alongside their art, they have been exploring music, listening closely to different pieces and connecting the sounds to how they make them feel.

Year 1 had a very busy week combining a range of techniques to finalize their individual masterpieces for Arts Fortnight. Meanwhile, in science, the class has been learning to recognise the seasonal changes from spring to summer. They put their critical thinking skills to the test when deciding whether to agree or disagree with Miss Master, who thought a particular image represented summer because of the bright sun and green grass. 

Our Year 2 children have been real busy bees in English this week as they stepped into the shoes of Barnaby B. Buzz! The children wrote fantastic diary entries in character, imagining how Barnaby found himself trapped inside an art gallery. They beautifully captured his initial excitement at discovering what he thought was a magnificent display of flowers bursting with nectar, followed by his shocking realization that the flowers lacked "integrity" and were actually just a painting! The children included gorgeous similes and expanded noun phrases in their writing, and they cannot wait to see their work proudly on display.

Year 3 has shown an incredible work ethic during Arts Fortnight! Focusing on botanical art, the children created their own gorgeous flower masterpieces, finishing them off with custom frames for our upcoming display. Meanwhile, in maths, the children tackled the tricky challenge of turns and angles, exploring clockwise and anticlockwise movements. They showed fantastic resilience and gave it their absolute best effort!

Year 4 had an action-packed week with not one, but two exciting trips! The children visited a cricket ground, where many took part in a thrilling cricket competition and also enjoyed a wonderful visit to the library. Throughout both outings, the children demonstrated our Rockliffe Manor values amazingly well, acting as superb ambassadors for our school.

Year 5 had a wonderful week diving into poetry as part of their English learning journey for Arts Fortnight. The children generated some lovely similes and metaphors to describe different flowers. They also completed some beautiful artwork on the topic of floriography (the language of flowers) using watercolours. In history, the children thoroughly enjoyed learning about the Windrush Generation, exploring how people from the Caribbean traveled to the UK after World War II to help rebuild the nation.

Year 6 enjoyed an incredibly creative week putting the finishing touches on their Arts Fortnight projects. They worked skillfully with oil pastels to add vibrant color and depth to their sketches of flowers from our school nature garden. Following this, they used clay to create small floral sculptures, painting them in bright, vivid hues. These individual flowers will be added to a stunning whole-class canvas depicting an abstract meadow. Alongside their artwork, they continue to work incredibly hard on their end-of-year production, showing immense confidence and perseverance as they adapt to script and song changes.

• Monday 22nd June 2026 - Arts Fortnight Showcase - from 3.15

• Wednesday 24th June 2026 - Year 5 & Year 6 BrightSparks Concert 

• Thursday 25th June 2026 - Year 6 Chessington World of Adventures

• Thursday 25th June 2026 - Year 3 Library visit. 

• Friday 26th June 2026 - Own Clothes Day - Donations Toys and books

• Friday 26th June 2026 - Year 1 Beach Trip

• Tuesday 30th June 2026 - Year 4 Tower of London Trip

• Thursday 2nd July 2026 - Year 5 Planetarium Trip 

• Thursday 2nd July 2026 - Year 2 Library Visit

• Friday 3rd July 2026 - Summer Fair from 3.30 - 6pm

• Tuesday 7th July 2026 - Sports day - Reception - Year 6 

• Monday 13th July 2026 - Dress Rehearsal Year 6 performance

• Tuesday 14th July 2026 - Nursery Sports Day 10am Winns Common

• Tuesday 14th July 2026 - Hercules End of Year Production to Parents Year 6 - 4.30pm

• Wednesday 15th July 2026 - EYFS Danson Park Trip

• Thursday 16th July 2026 - Reception Library Visit

• Thursday 16th July 2026 - Year 6 Leavers Disco

• Friday 17th July 2026 - Nursery Graduation 11.15

• Friday 17th July 2026 - Gymnastics End of Term Performance for parents

• Monday 20th July 2026 - Year 6 Leavers Assembly 2pm