Grazebrook Primary School Bulletin
12th July 2023
Message from Mrs Beecroft
Dear Families,
It's been an incredible July at Grazebrook, full of fantastic trips and events, and some impressive KS2 SATs results – we are very proud of you, Year 6!
A huge thank you to our dedicated PSA for organising an amazing summer fair and to all of you who supported the PSA by volunteering or attending the fair. Without you, we would not be able to bring our community together in such a positive way at events like this.
The children's End of Year reports will be ready to collect from class teachers at 3.30pm today, Wednesday 12th July. Reports not collected will be brought to the school office, where you will be able to collect them at the end of After School Clubs or Our Space until 6pm on Monday 17th July. All remaining reports will then be posted to you. If you would like to discuss anything in your child's report, please contact the school office by phone or email to book an appointment with your child's class teacher on Monday 17th July. Appointments will be available between 3.40pm to 5.20pm on this day.
This week sees two of year groups graduate. We are very much looking forward to welcoming Nursery parents tomorrow, Thursday 13th July, at 2pm and our Year 6 families on Friday 14th July at 10am. Both events will take place in the main hall.
Moving Up Day is next Tuesday. If your child is currently in Reception to Year 5, they will spend the first part of the morning on this day with their new class teacher in their new classroom. You will receive a letter informing you of your child's new class and class teacher on Monday 17th July.
If you are a parent of a Year 4 or 5 pupil, please join us at 2.15pm next Wednesday, 19th July, for a guitar showcase before our Summer Festival. Your child will perform the piece they have learnt this term in their weekly guitar lessons with their tutors, Vlad and Rico. Please come to the Purple Class/KS2 gate on Lordship Road just before 2.15pm.
The last day of After School Clubs for this term is this Thursday, 13th July. The last day of Our Space and Wraparound Care is next Thursday, 20th July. Our Space will close on this day at the slightly earlier time of 5.30pm. The last day of term is Friday 21st July. School will close at 2pm on this day. The first day of the Autumn term for Year 1 to 6 pupils is Wednesday 6th September with Reception joining us on either the 7th or 8th of September.
Key Dates
12/07 Year 6 Finance Education Workshops
12/07 Year 5 Mock Trial Workshop
12/07 Year 3 Personal Best Finals at Hackney Marshes and in School
12/07 End of Year Reports Sent Home at 3.30pm
13/07 Playground Friends SWAPPA trip
13/07 Year 2 Virtual Hackney History workshops
13/07 Nursery Graduation at 2pm in the main hall
13/07 Last day of After School Clubs this term
14/07 Year 6 Graduation and Leaver's Assembly at 10am
17/07 End of Year Report Parent Consultations by appointment
18/07 Moving Up Morning
19/07 Year 4 and 5 Guitar showcase at 2.15pm
19/07 Grazebrook Summer Festival – open to families from 2.45pm (FYI: this time has been slightly adjusted from the orginal letter)
20/07 Year 1 and 2 Splash Pad trip
20/07 Year 6 Kayaking trip to Laburnum Boat Club
20/07 Last day of Wraparound Care and Our Space this term (the provision will close slightly early at 5.30pm)
21/07 End of Summer Term. School Closes at 2pm
06/09 Year 1 to 6 Return to School at 8.55am
Grazebrook Summer Festival 2023
Next Wednesday is our Grazebrook Festival, where children will take part in a range of exciting workshops to celebrate our diversity and uniqueness and mark the end of a fantastic year. Workshops will include street dance, circus skills, cookery, flamenco dancing, singing, drumming, Irish dancing, poetry, yoga, bubbleology, international sport and Bollywood dancing. This will be a completely free event for everyone to enjoy together.
Children will also have a festival lunch of southern fried chicken nuggets, vegan nuggets, curly fries, BBQ beans and chocolate cookies.
Children should come to school in clothes that celebrate their culture or are suitable for a festival! As children will be very active during the day, they should wear something they can move in and either wear trainers or have these with them to change into. We would love for all our families to join us at 2.45pm to watch performances and share food together. If you can, please bring a dish – savoury or sweet (we don't mind!) – to share with others (no nuts or sesame please). Labels will be sent home for you to provide us with your name, the name of the dish and ingredients. Food and labels can be dropped to Pam in the morning or brought with you at 2.45pm.
We would also love any children who are passionate about baking to enter our Grazebrook Bake Off competition by bringing in their best baked treats on the day. There will be prizes for the most creative entries.
Grazebrook Summer Fair
We had so much fun at the PSA's Summer Fair this year – having our faces painted, making decorations and bookmarks, bouncing on the bouncy castle, racing each other, attending boxing coaching, buying plants, enjoying something delicious from the BBQ, taking part in a flamenco workshop and so much more. Congratulations to: Leo in 3B, Otis in 3B, Dante in 5B and Huxley in 4G for correctly guessing the weight of watermelon and to Adrian in 2B for correctly guessing the number of sweets in the sweet jar – we hope you enjoy your book vouchers! The PSA also wanted to thank the Daldry children for their exceptional volunteerism and community spirit by fundraising for the PSA without being asked. The PSA has contacted raffle prize winners directly – prizes can be collected from the school office at any point during the school day.
Learning Across the Curriculum
Year 3 collaborating, playing guitar together.
Year 4 practising for their showcase on acoustic and electric guitars.
Year 2 singing together with Mr Stevens.
Year 3 using their Design Technology knowledge in our new Creation Station.
Year 5 enjoying the Creation Station area in our Woodland Playground.
Our PSA-funded wellbeing garden in full bloom. The produce tasted so far has been delicious!
Year 1 have been very creative using their construction skills to create birds in their art and design lessons.
Reception children have been working hard on their writing. We are incredibly proud of their progress.
Year 1 have planted sunflower seeds outside their classroom. We can't wait to see how the flowers will grow!
Year 5 really enjoyed visiting the London Careers Fair, where they explored a range of exciting careers.
Reception were very focused, publishing their mini-beast stories. Their ideas were highly creative!
Year 2 made fruit kebabs as part of their design technology learning. Yum!
Our Eco-councillors joined with other schools in our local area to take part in a discussion with Councillor Coban about climate change and how children can encourage others to make sustainable choices and be responsible for the world around them. They have written an eco-code which will be shared with the rest of the school in an assembly next week.
Ahead of the summer holidays, we would urge any families who believe they are eligible for Free School Meals/the Pupil Premium Grant to make an application. There is an eligibility criteria but it takes less than two minutes to make the application and the response is instant. Here is the link to apply: https://education.hackney.gov.uk/content/apply-free-school-meals
The funding received by the school is vital in providing some of our wider opportunities and interventions. Our school office team is more than happy to provide confidential help; just get in touch with us for assistance.
If you have already made an application, Hackney Education will continue to check future entitlement, so there is no need to apply again.
Hackney Council will continue to fund the issuing of Free School Meals vouchers during the Summer holiday. This summer, families who are in receipt of benefit-related free school meals will receive a voucher to the value of £70 per child. (Please note that this does not include children in Reception, Year 1 or Year 2 who receive universal free school meals.)
These vouchers are emailed to you. If you have not been receiving them and believe that you should, please get in touch with the school office. Hackney has made us aware that a large number of eligible families in the borough are not using the vouchers, and we want to ensure our families are receiving all that they are entitled to.
A reminder to Year 6 families in receipt of benefits: you may also be entitled to a school uniform grant. Please visit the Hackney Education website here for further information.
Key Contacts
If you have any queries regarding you child's learning, the first point of contact is your child's class teacher. You can speak to them at the end of the day or contact our school office to arrange a phone call or face-to-face meeting. At times, you may wish to contact the member of staff in charge of your child's year group. At Grazebrook, these are:
Nursery and Reception: Ms Hasina Khan (Deputy Headteacher)
Year 1 and Year 2: Ms Niamh McLaughlin (Lead Teacher)
Year 3, Year 4, Year 5, Year 6: Mr Joshua Middleton (Assistant Headteacher)
SEND: Ms Hasina Khan (Deputy Headteacher)
All email queries, including those for the attention of Mrs Beecroft or Mrs Reid, should be sent to gboffice@newwavefederation.co.uk in the first instance with the addressee and/or topic in the subject line. These will be forwarded to the relevant member of staff.