Enjoying and Achieving ~events in school

SUMMER TERM 2015

 

 

The topics this term have been ‘Time Traveller’ for KS1 and ‘Here and There’ for KS2.

In Keystage 1, YF have focussed on transport, Y1 have focussed on how things change and Y2 have focussed on the Titanic.

 In KS2 they launched with a Hook Day of a trip up the River Tamar and have focussed on rivers and the Water Cycle. Wednesday 8th July saw Y3, Y4 and Y5 rounding off their topic work for the term by spending ‘a day in the mountains’. The children found out about life in the Himalayas and spent the morning cooking a traditional breakfast, designing rangoli patterns and making friendship bracelets. The breakfast dish of lentil curry and rice was a total hit with lots of children and Sharon has taken the recipe and may put it on the menu next term. The recipe will be on the school website soon if you wish to try it. Eating curry and rice only using their right hand proved a challenge for some children! The afternoon was spent working in house teams collecting water for ‘their village’.

 

To move our school focus of writing forward, we have carried out a whole school English traditional tales block, looking at different versions of Little Red Riding Hood. Each class focussed on a different aspect and wrote their own versions.

 

I have worked with the School Council this term. They were involved in the interview process to appoint a new Music teacher. They have decided where to display the picture given by Mrs Roberts. They are currently working on what to spend £1000 donation from Mrs. Bradley on – a new piece of equipment for the Jungle Gym!

One of the suggestions on the parent questionnaires was to ask if we could have black PE shorts as part of the school PE kit. So I took this to the School Council, who, along with the Governors, fully supported this. BLACK PE shorts will be part of our uniform from September.

 

Sport WAC – Mr. Howarth organised a very successful Health Week last week, which started with an active launch assembly with all the staff up dancing, included a Mental Health and Well-Being Day, ECC Young Leaders running a Sports WAC  and culminating with a glorious Sports Day. My thanks go to him for all his hard work.

 

Events that children have attended this term include:

 

Y5 and Y6 have attended Maths Master classes at the University, accompanied by Mrs Tunnicliffe.

3 students attended the ELCT G & T Music Day at Manadon and had a fabulous time.

2 students attended the ELCT Outdoor Learning Day at Courtland's, accompanied by Miss Mathews.

3 students attended the ELCT Maths Problem Solving Day at Thornbury accompanied by Mr. Howarth.

Y4 have completed their three week intensive swimming block.

Y5 have completed their Bikeability training.

Y6 have completed Life skills Week.

 Y4 have been to ECC for a Science lesson on ‘Moon rocks’.

Help for Heroes Day ~ a fantastic £155 was collected! J

Y5 went on an Outdoor orienteering Day at  Mount Edgecumbe .

 

 

We have had a presentation from Sarah and Kelly, from Kier Living, to the school about what is involved in building houses. I learnt a great deal - such as it takes 16,390 bricks to build a house and whole building projects are not allowed to take place during the animal mating season!! Mr. Wills , Erin’s Dad, has very generously donated 220 hi-vis jackets, a set for each class, to the school!

 

Mr. Howarth and Mr. Hellyer took 21 KS2 children the Primary Schools Athletics Championships at Brickfields. We had our most successful year in a long time, achieving our highest number of finalists. We tied in joint first place for the boys field events. We are also incredibly proud of

Tom Roberts who , out of over 600 children, was awarded, by the organisers, the cup for Personal Achievement in recognition of his manners, attitude, successes and sportsmanship.

 

Y6 have been incredibly busy post SAT’s. As you know, we are always looking for ways to make links with our local community and Mr. Hellyer and Ms. Mathews took Y6 to visit Valley View Residential Home in Fort Austin Avenue. I am not sure who got most enjoyment out of it - the children or the residents! On their return, the class were very eager to tell me about who they had met and what conversations they had had. Both Mr. Hellyer and Ms. Mathews were full of praise for the manner in which the whole class conducted themselves and what fantastic ambassadors they were.

 

In June they were able to be part of the initiative ‘Swim Safely’ project in conjunction with the RNLI and attended a session at the Lido where they were given a talk about how to keep safe around water and were able to spend time in the pool.

 

Just before going off on Residential, we were treated to a fantastic production of

 ‘Beauty and The Beast’.

The children were absolutely amazing and really did let their lights shine. Thanks must go to Mr Hellyer and Miss Mathews for all their work with Y6. As always the children looked absolutely stunning in their costumes, which is all down to the tremendous hard work of Mrs Mathews supported by Mr Mathews. Thank you also to Mr Howarth, Miss Atkinson and Y4 for providing the choir.

 

Y6 then spent three days at Heatree on their residential, taking part in Raft Building, Mountain Biking, Climbing and abseiling and Stream Scrambling ~ great fun was had by all. My thanks go to Mr Clark, our Chair of Governors, Miss Mathews and Mr Hellyer for accompanying them.

 

 

On Tuesday of this week, Y6 parents and staff thoroughly enjoyed the Y6 Graduation evening. There were a few tears shed, but it was lovely to see the Y6 children sharing their memories of their time at St Edward’s. It was a real privilege to award the two Y6 cups to very worthy recipients.

The pupils chose to award the Y6 cup to Megan Welch and the staff, after much deliberation and discussion awarded the Y6 shield to Jason Bott.

Congratulations to them both, and indeed to all of Y6 who have had a fantastic year and will be missed by us all next year.

 

Wednesday saw Y6 off to the Hoe and Lido for the day and the start of the Y2 / Library swap. The day ended with every one dancing the night away in a VERY hot hall at the PTFA disco. Thanks to the PTFA for all their work organising and supervising on the evening!

 

Thursday was quiet(ish) in school with Y6 off to Woodlands for the day and Venus and Team Point winners off to Central Park for the day.

 

It just remains for us to say a huge ‘Thank you’ for all your support this year.

Have a lovely summer, see you in September.

Mrs Shepherd and all the staff J

End of spring term 2015

The spring term has whizzed by, but we still seemed to have loaded it full of events and activities for the children and parents. There have been many highlights this term including a letter from our featured poet,Tony Mitton. He thoroughly enjoyed reading the children's creations and has complemented them on their poetry. The whole school poetry project was a real success and we are looking forward to another next term. The children have had many opportunities to perform; in their class assemblies, performing their class poem in the achievement assembly and also during the Y3 and Y5 Easter Memories production. The children have enjoyed their gardening days, the KS2 Exhibition and the 'invasion' by superheroes on World Book Day (photos of these can be seen in the  children's section) . St Edwards welcomed children from the other schools in ELCT for a gifted and talented art day and our G&T children have taken part in events across ELCT including computing, Tag Ruby, Music and the School Council.

Our WAC activity for this term has been all about Holy Week and Easter customs. The children had a day of creating, making and reflecting. ( pictures can be seen on the WAC page) I hope all the parents and children enjoyed eating the  'home cooked' Hot Cross buns ( huge thanks to Mrs Tunnicliffe!). Mrs T does not want to see another hot cross bun in her life!

I am jumping for joy that Neptune were the team winners for the spring term. Go Neptune Go!!!! Of course, I'm not biased!

The end of term assembly was super and we celebrated that William Revell Ben Hawkings, Emily Feeley and William Feeley won the winning cups.Saying goodbye to the children was really sad   The presents I received were so kind and thoughtful;the children gave me a St Edwards Star award  as well as a Star Charm and  they have named a star ( in the sky) after me . A huge thank you also to all the parents and children who have sent in cards, flowers, bubbly, chocolates and special gifts. I will miss you all VERY much! 

 

End of the Autumn term.

Yippee no more get ups and only 6 days till Santa! ( Not that we are all counting!) This past term has been amazing and, as usual, my thanks go to the pupils and staff who make St. Ed's a fantastic place to be.

This term has been jam packed full of events.The KS2 Remembrance Service on 11th November focused on the centenary and together with Service parents, we marked this very poignant occasion. Our confident  KS1 and Foundation children led the nativity, Angel Express. Their singing was fantastic and the performances were thoroughly enjoyed by their very proud parents and staff members. KS2 children hosted the 'Christmas by Candlelight' service at our Church, St Edwards. The service maintained the theme of WW1 and  the children acted out  the story of the cease fire and football game on Christmas Day 1914.

This term St Edwards have been working alongside other Plymouth C of E schools on a Big Crib project. The project involved 8 primaries and 1 secondary school. The Big Crib creation is being displayed during the  festive season in St Andrews Church.

We have continues to support our community both near and far through events and celebrations. The Harvest festival generated........ for Foodbank Plymouth,  the Festive Friday event raised £184 for St Luke's Hospice and we continue to support our two children in Malawi to attend school.

 

During the last week of term the Y3 children, performed Street Dance to their parents. We fund this 12 week project as part of the  PE premium grant. They were also joined by the Street dance after school club performers who meet every Wednesday in school.

End of Autumn term 1

This past term has seen a few slight changes at St Ed's and I'm delighted to say these changes haven't had a negative effect on your children. In fact, the Executive Headship role  has meant that St Edwards has been able to employ additional staff as well as increase current hours for support staff  to work with the children in the classroom.  The governors at St George's Academy in Stonehouse have asked if the current leadership role can continue for the Spring term 2015. The governors and staff at St Edwards have responded positively to the current set up  and see the benefits for St Edwards and so  have agreed for it to continue. Thank you also to those parents, particularly of Y6 pupils, who have written in to school to say how well the team teaching partnership is working.

This first half term has been a settling time for some of our children and I'm delighted how well our new children have coped with 'big' school.

Unfortunately, due to staff sickness amongst Plymbridge wardens, we had to postpone our WAC day this term  I appreciate school council were particularly upset about this because it was their plan to launch the National trust 50 things project as part of our day. However, we will ensure our Outdoor experience day takes place asap .

Our visit  from Janine Christians, from our link school St Clements in South Africa, was fantastic. She thoroughly enjoyed spending time in school with your children, who, as usual, were excellent ambassadors! Our global links were also extended when we took part in National Bake week by baking bread from around the world. Please see class pages for specific recipes. I hear the South African bread was delicious!

This year, as part of the PE additional funding, we have allocated specific sports to certain year groups. Some activities this term have included street dance and skipping workshops. We are delighted that Sports Leaders from Eggbuckland Community College will be joining us next half term to develop our school leaders and support our school PE programme. Please see the PE page for additional information.

Parents and children may think that there are weeks until Christmas, but we are most definitely planning the forthcoming weeks. With so much going on please ensure you check the website and update your diaries with events. We do try to give parents as much notice as possible with regard to events, but unfortunately we do have to adjust timings on occasions.