Christ with us

This week, we looked ahead to the 4th Sunday of Advent and lit the final purple candle on our wreath. As we journey through December, the light outside diminishes but the light of our wreath increases, reminding us of the increasing anticipation of Christ’s presence among us.

Indeed, this week, we hear the story of Jesus’ birth and we are reminded that he is the Emmanuel - a name which means ‘God is with us’. Helping our children to recognise and feel God’s presence in their lives is probably the single-most powerful strategy we can offer them to increase their confidence and self-esteem. Believing that God knows and cares about us individually and that he journeys with us through the joys and challenges we face, can help give purpose and meaning to our lives.

Just as the Advent wreath illuminates the winter darkness, the presence of God in our lives can illuminate the darkness of self-doubt and anxiety.

Infant Nativities

Congratulations and thank you to our amazing Infant classes and classroom staff, who shared their beautiful rendition of the Christmas story with us in this year's Infant Nativity - The Big Little Nativity. All nine classes took part in three trios, offering all children an important opportunity to perform in public and share their gifts and talents with us all.

The songs were catchy, the jokes were hilarious and the message was timeless - Jesus Christ was born on Christmas Day. Thank you Infants for preparing us to greet him once more. God bless you!

Out of darkness...

Year 4 have completed an exciting new festive D.T. project, each child designed, made and evaluated their own 'light up' sign. The sign had to meet specific design criteria which included that their sign should be free standing, have a festive theme and light up. This project built on previous D.T. learning in Year 3 where the children have drawn nets and constructed 3D biscuit boxes. The children also had to make links to their Year 4 Science learning of Electricity in order to get their sign to light up. We were amazed by the unique, festive boxes that each child created. The children enjoyed this project and were able to evaluate their successes and consider what they would do differently next time.

Year 2 In Print

In Year 2 we have been enjoying an art week. We have learned about different artists including Burgerman, Hokusai and Warhol. We have been evaluating their printing work and from this developed our own styles of printing using natural materials and man-made materials (which links to our science topic on materials).

The children have created their own masterpieces which are being turned in to some surprise gifts!

Junior Apprentice

Our thanks and congratulations to all Juniors, whose mesmerising production of "The Apprentice" shed a whole new light on the Christmas story for us. We heard of Sarah, the carpenter's apprentice who had a silent but vital role in helping the Inn Keeper, Shephrds and Wise Men prepare to greet the infant Jesus.

All Juniors took part in song, dance and celebration to mark this special time of year. It was a joy to see them share their gifts and talents in service of the community. The tone was set by our remarkable solo instrumentalists who inspired the crowds with their impressive performances. Well done and God bless you all!

Shaping up nicely!

This week Year 6 have been exploring the properties of 3D shapes and investigating nets. We looked at a range of three dimensional shapes, even a dodecahedron, and described them in terms of their faces, vertices and edges. We explored this further by looking at a range of nets for a cube, deciding if these would work or not. Interestingly, we found that some children had a knack for spatial awareness and could imagine the outcome of the shape from the net, whilst others- teachers included -needed to physically make the net and fold it to see if it would work. Hannah in 6R was particularly good at visualising the shapes and was able to reason why a given net would or wouldn't work- fantastic mathematical thinking.

FISCH Fundraising - A Thank You!

At the end of last academic year, we began a partnership with FISCH in Tanzania and took part in 'FISCH Fundraising Friday' to raise money for the charity to provide street children with uniforms and school supplies. We dressed up in the colours of the Tanzanian flag and took part in a 'Stationery Sacrifice' for the day. The community was INCREDIBLY generous and we raised an amazing £1110!

As promised, these funds have gone directly to FISCH, Tanzania, and they have created this video to show us how the money we raised was used.

We will continue to work with FISCH moving forward and will have some more fundraising fun for next summer term!

Thank you to you all for your support.