Grazebrook Primary School Bulletin
Autumn 2 2025
Autumn 2 2025
Dear Grazebrook Families
What an exciting and busy term it has been! I want to take a moment to thank all our families for your incredible support throughout Autumn 1. From attending our Come Learn With Me sessions to joining in our many workshops and events, you have helped make this term really special. We have been especially impressed by the creativity and enthusiasm you brought to our Art and Design and Design and Technology Come Learn With Me events. We are very much looking forward to the Autumn events for Upper Key Stage 2 and Early Years later this term.
A huge thank you also goes to everyone who donated food items and loose change to our Harvest and charity projects, as well as to those who contributed to the PSA’s non-uniform and spooky fundraiser today. Every single donation helps us to enhance the experience at Grazebrook for all our children - our staff are very grateful for your generosity.
We’d also like to give a special shout-out to Jim in Year 5, who won the Keeping Hackney Clean poster competition! Keep an eye out for his brilliant design on posters across the borough in the coming weeks.
Congratulations as well to all our children and families for helping Grazebrook achieve the TfL Travel for Life Gold Award! Your continued commitment to walking, cycling, scooting and using public transport makes a huge difference. We are currently applying for funding to install an additional scooter shed in the KS2 playground, as we know this area can get very busy — thank you for your patience as we work towards this improvement.
Finally, we are thrilled to announce that work has now begun on our brand-new 2-Year-Old Nursery. We are hopeful that this exciting new space will be ready to welcome pupils before the end of the academic year.
Thank you, as always, for your continued support, enthusiasm, and partnership. Grazebrook truly thrives because of our wonderful community. Wishing everyone a happy and safe half term. Looking forward to seeing everyone back at school at 8.55am on Monday 3rd November.
- 27/10-31/10 Half Term - school closed to pupils
- 06/11 Nursery Come Learn With Me 9.05am
- 06/11 Animal Encounters - Years 1, 2 & Nursery
- 06/11 Flu Vaccines Second Round
- 07/11 Year 2 Reading Breakfast 8.30am
- 07/11 Year 5 Learning Celebration Assembly at 10am
- 10/11-14/11 Antibullying Week - The Power of Good!
- 10/11 Bigfoot Antibullying Week Workshops
- 11/11 Reception Come Learn With Me 9.05am
- 11/11 Year 6 Trip to the British Museum
- 14/11 Dental Fluoride Program R & Y1
- 14/11 Year 3 Reading Breakfast 8.30am
- 14/11 Year 4 Learning Celebration Assembly 10am
- 17-21/11 Road Safety Week
- 20/11 Year 5 Come Dine With Me 12.30pm
- 21/11 Year 4 Reading Breakfast 8.30am
- 27/11 Year 6 Come Dine With Me 12.30pm
- 27/11 6B Dance Show at The Place
- 28/11 EYFS Family Friday & Nursery Trip to Clissold Park
- 28/11 Year 3 Learning Celebration Assembly 10am
- 28/11 6G Dance Show at The Place
- 02 & 03/12 Parent Consultation Meetings (3.40-6.00)
- 04/12 Reception Come Dine With Me 11.45am
- 05/12 Year 1 Celebration Assembly at 10am
- 05/12 Year 4 trip to the Little Angel Theatre - Storm Whale
- 06/12 Grazebrook PSA Winter Fair 12-3pm
- 08/12 Year 4 Come Learn With Me at 9.05am
- 09/12 Year 5 Come Learn With Me at 9.05am
- 10/12 Year 6 Come Learn With Me at 9.05am
- 11/12 Y1 to Y6 Hackney Empire Trip: Cinderella
- 11/12 EYFS Bigfoot Pantomime in School: The Clumsiest Elf
- 12/12 EYFS Family Friday
- 19/12 Last day of term 1pm finish
This half term, the children have been expanding their geography knowledge through a range of exciting, hands-on learning experiences.
Year 1 have been learning how to read simple maps and used compasses for the first time to identify the location of different parts of the school grounds.
Year 2 enjoyed a trip to Clissold Park, where they carried out fieldwork by identifying local landmarks and then used their observations to create their own maps of the park.
Year 3 explored Europe by researching five different countries. They used their iPads to create digital fact files and worked collaboratively to present their findings to the class.
Year 4 investigated sound levels around the local area using their iPads to record data, before conducting fieldwork to compare the topography of Stoke Newington and Alexandra Park.
Years 5 and 6 took their geography learning further afield with a visit to Woodberry Wetlands. There, they created scaled maps of the site and designed their own nature reserves using natural materials.
Through these rich, practical experiences, children across Grazebrook have been developing their skills as geographers — observing, mapping, comparing, and presenting their findings with curiosity and creativity.
Year 1 loved collaborating to create their field of flowers demonstrating their work on spirals in their art and design lessons.
Year 2 worked together to design their dream playgrounds turning 2-D shapes into 3-D structures.
Year 3 have been very creative in their design and technology lessons creating gift box shell structures as well as being inspired by the cave paintings of Stone Age people.
This half term, our budding scientists have been busy exploring a variety of fascinating topics through hands-on experiments and investigations. It has been wonderful to see children across Key Stage 2 developing their scientific enquiry skills — asking thoughtful questions, making predictions, and drawing conclusions from their own evidence-based investigations.
Year 6 have been learning about micro-organisms. As part of their unit, they explored mould and its characteristics, investigating the best conditions for mould to develop and grow. Their curiosity and careful observations have led to some impressive scientific thinking!
Year 5 have been observing changes in materials, carrying out comparative and fair tests to explore non-reversible changes such as burning, rusting, and chemical reactions. The children have shown great teamwork and precision as they recorded and analysed their results.
Year 4 have been investigating freezing and melting, measuring the rate of change and exploring how different factors affect these processes. Their experiments have helped them understand how materials behave when they change state.
The Nursery children have loved their transport topic this half term. They made a bus and went on an adventure together. They also demonstrated collaboration when they set up a bike wash in the Nursery garden and gave their bikes and tricycles a wash and polish!
In Reception, the children have been working together, whilst also making the most out of the activities. They collaborated to make obstacle courses in their learning garden. They have also loved their colour topic, inspired by the book The Colour Monster, as well as artists such as Kandinsky.
Year 1 worked as a team to solve problems as part of their PSHE lessons. They then used their skills in PE whilst developing their speed and agility and in computing to get to grips with the parts of a computer and what they do.
Our new Hackney Reading Ambassadors attended the launch event at Hackney Town Hall earlier this month. They will be leading our team of Reading Champions to get everyone reading at Grazebrook including setting up reading buddies where our older children will read to and with our younger children within their classrooms and at breaktimes.
Year 6 enjoyed taking part in a Youth First Aid Workshop delivered by the British Red Cross this morning. Pupils engaged in thoughtful discussions about the importance of staying calm during emergencies and learned key actions to take when faced with real-life situations. It was a valuable and empowering experience for everyone involved!
If you have any queries regarding your 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 a senior member of staff. These are:
Deputy Headteacher: Ms Simone Bunbury
Federation Assistant Headteacher: Ms Joanna Ichim
Early Years Leader: Ms Kelly O'Callaghan
Lead Practitioner for SEND and SENCo: Ms Eleanor Alford
All email queries, including those for the attention of a class teacher or school leader, 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.