News
Newsletter for the week ending 10th November
Apologies for the delay – technical issues! Please read on to find out about Children in Need, Christmas Fayre change of date and much, much more…
AROUND THE SCHOOL
Children in Need
Wear spots or stripes on Friday 17th for a minimum donation of £1
Allergies and Medical Requirements
Please ensure that we are aware of any changes to your child’s medical requirements by contacting teh school by either calling 01237 474365 or emailing admin@appledore-primary.devon.sch.uk
Christmas Fayre
If you would like to help with the Christmas Fayre, please come to a meeting at 7pm on Tuesday 14th November at the school. Please note the new date for the Christmas Fayre is Thursday 7th December.
Pirate Ship
to clear up any confusion regarding the use of the pirate ship on our bottom playground, are not permitted to use it before 9am and after 3.30pm or any other time unless they are supervised by a member of staff. Thank you for your support with ensuring the children remain safe.
Our Art Studio Reaches Out
Our art studio continues to provide opportunities for pupils at Appledore and the other eight schools in ACCT, the cooperative trust of schools we are part of. This week we also provided a workshop for Northam Lodge, a Devon charity that provides services for adults with learning and physical disabilities. We are very proud of the pupils at Appledore School who joined this workshop and will continue to do so once a week for the rest of this term. We also held a nurture workhop this week for children across the nine ACCT schools who deserved a change of scene following recent events in their lives. As part of an ongoing project, St Margaret’s and St George’s schools have been sending a class for one day a week for workshops since the beginning of term for art projects that link with other areas of their curriculum. And…we also held a printing workshop for all the teachers in the ACCT schools as part of ongoing training we are providing to improve pupils’ art outcomes in this area.
Rolle Canal Performance
Tickets are now available for the Rolle Canal Performance on Wednesday 15th November 2017 @ 7:00 p.m. They are purchased direct from Rosemoor Gardens from this link https://gardentickets.rhs.org.uk/rhsrm/sessions.aspx?tid=19. Please be aware that several schools are taking part and tickets are likely to sell out quickly.
AROUND THE CLASSES
This week we have learnt about lots of different counting rhymes (1,2,3,4,5, 5 little ducks, 5 speckled frogs, 10 fat sausages and 10 green bottles.) We have completed lots of counting activities, worked out how many we would have if we were given an extra sausage or if we ate one. We have painted frogs and ducks and identified different parts of a duck and a frog.
This week we had a big surprise when Fred the dinosaur came into our classroom and pooed on the table! We used magnifying glasses to investigate whether Fred and his friends are herbivores, carnivores or omnivores. In writing we have found out what a verb is. We looked at a selection of hats and decided who would wear a hat like that. We then made a word bank of verbs that went with each hat and wrote sentences using the verbs. In Maths we have continued to work out number bonds systematically, we have worked out which dinosaurs we could buy if we only have 10p and we have added by putting the largest number in our head and counting on. Our P4C session this week was inspired by the book Odd Dog Out, we discussed the question ‘Can you still be friends even if you are different?’
This week, in English, Lundy Puffins have been turning the story ‘How to wash a woolly mammoth’ into ‘How to wash a cheeky chimpanzee’. There were lots of really imaginative ideas. In Maths, they have been adding and subtracting tens numbers and beginning to add on a single digit number by bridging through 10. This proved to be tricky at first, but with perseverance they are starting to get it. On Wednesday, they were very excited to discover that a dinosaur had visited the classroom. They spent the afternoon looking for dinosaur signs and investigating ‘poo’ to find out whether it was a carnivore, herbivore or omnivore. The Christmas play song rehearsals have started and you should have received a letter about costumes and performance times – please come and see me if you haven’t received it. Our P4C question this week from the book ‘Odd Dog Out’ was: Does it matter if you are the odd one out?
Seahunter have worked really hard on data handling in maths this week, completing surveys for the society of dragonologists and presenting them in tally charts and bar charts. They have all developed their skills and made great progress. In topic work, they have learnt about remembrance and created some beautiful artwork representing the sadness of war and the hope represented by poppies. They have also developed their sewing skills making beautiful felt poppies to wear.
This week in Maths, HMS Echo have worked really hard on their multiplication skills. We have looked at multiplying multiples of 10, 100 and 1000 and have also been working on solving and writing worded problems. The children have been particularly good at writing thought bubbles to explain their understanding. In English, the children used what they had learnt last week about complex sentences and embedded clauses, to write up an information page about super heroes. The children all worked on different pages, to create a class book. For our P4C lesson, we looked at an image of boy sat on his own in the playground. The children’s big question was ‘Why are the other children not including the boy?’ Earlier in the week, I modeled the process of the digestive system to the class, using some household items and ingredients. This helped the children to have a better understanding and supported them to write scientifically. In preparation for our sewing next week, the class have cut out the felt that they will need to sew together. The children are all very excited about starting to make their Christmas decorations!
Year 5 have had a really busy week writing their diary entries about last weeks residential and putting their photographs into a power-point. We are going to share these with our parents next week. In maths we have been looking at different methods for multiplication. In art we have started our work on ‘textiles’ looking at the Bayeux Tapestry. We then looked at a scene from the tapestry and used a range a stitching skills to fill in parts of the picture. In P4C this week we watched a short film, ‘El Caminante’ (The Traveller), and discussed the question’ Do we learn from taking risks?’.
Year 6 have acted out Viking Sagas this week as well as mapping stories and working on sentences in pairs. In maths, they have been working on long division – ask them to show you their methods at home – more speed and accuracy required. Art has entailed Viking brooches and they have worked really hard on their performance for Rosemoor – we’ve been really impressed, it should be a great show. In science they have been experimenting with bread – to see which conditions turn it mouldy more quickly – this is part of our work on micro-organisms. Grammar has moved to the past tense, children would benefit from being able to test their skills with a parent.
Best wishes from
Jeremy Cooper and all the staff and children
