Dear Parents,
This week the school has been buzzing with the excitement of Mr Harmer and his team, who have been filming everything that happens at Fairstead House! The timetable has been busy to fit in lessons, sport, art, languages, lunch, clubs, break times and more. We are very much looking forward to releasing the film, which will be shown on the school website, during the next few weeks – date of publication will be released soon!
Celebration Assembly
One of the happiest moments of the week, is celebrating all the different complimentary comments awarded to children who receive certificates. They enjoy standing on the stage, displaying their certificate and I always enjoy the applause and congratulations shared by their peers.
School Council
The representatives for the School Council are pictured below. They are very proud to be wearing their new badges, which are clearly displayed on their blazers. One of their first challenges, will be to explore a range of new water bottles that are eco-friendly and sustainable. We are hoping to have samples arriving soon, so that the children can discuss their favourite ones.
MFL
Next Friday (29th September) the school will be celebrating European Day of Languages. On this day we encourage the children to come to school dressed in their own clothes, wearing an outfit that represents another country or culture from around the world. It can be any language, including those from outside Europe. On the day we will celebrate with themed activities during our lessons and a special lunch from chef and the team! If you have any questions you can contact Miss Bryan directly on kathrynbryan@fairsteadhouse.org
Sport
Hockey V OBH & Culford
Last Friday our U9s played their first hockey matches of the season in a triangular fixture against Old Buckenham Hall and Culford. It was the first ever hockey match for many of the boys and they equipped themselves well, producing some exciting hockey. The boys were split into Red, Black and Green teams with each playing two matches. The Red team were particularly impressive with their spacing and passing. All the boys have lots of potential and I am excited to see them progress in future matches.
Netball V OBH
Our U9 girls had their first Netball fixture on Friday. The block of matches against OBH allowed everyone to get some important match practice, challenging their passing and shooting in a competitive situation. The girls had lots of fun and success with their new skills.
Next week our U11s have their first matches of the year away at South Lee School, details can be found on my school portal.
Mental Health and Emotional Wellbeing
Mrs Varma has provided two links, for useful advice and resources:
- Short reads and videos on a range of subjects for parents from Place2be Place2Be
- It’s ‘Sleeptember’ and The Sleep Charity are a good resource for practical advice on all sleep related issues. In the Information and Support section you will find a section which focuses on children Sleep Well
Reception
This week, the children in Reception have been given ‘The Power!’
They have enjoyed learning an inspirational song to help them to strengthen their ‘Characteristics of Effective Learning’ and have celebrated their strengths and achievements by making medals.
The children have also loved reading about Gerald, the giraffe who couldn’t dance. Everyone decided that if he just kept trying then he could achieve his goals. This was the message that the children have carried forward with them over the week and we have seen some super letter formation in phonics and some great sorting in maths. The children have also used their imaginations to create their own giraffes and have recalled some amazing facts.
The highlight of everyone’s week was a surprise visit to the forest for some exploring in the trees. The children were very excited to discover a campfire, marshmallows and delicious hot chocolate waiting for them too! What a wonderful end to a wonderful week!
Year 1
We travelled north to North America this week! It was great fun learning about some of America’s famous landmarks and replicating them using bricks and magnetic shapes.
In English, we have been learning about autumn, or fall as it is called in North America. We explored the wonderful first signs of Autumn that we discovered at the weekend and came up with some adjectives to describe them. We read a story called ‘Sam the Scarecrow’ and highlighted all the adjectives used. We thought carefully about the impact the adjectives had on the text and soon realised that adjectives help to paint a picture in our minds.
Please check out the beautiful autumn leaves we collaged in the pictures below.
Year 2
Year 2 have had a fantastic week focusing on ‘The Deep Dark Wood’. We have spent time mapping the story and learning a dramatic retelling complete with actions! We have been sequencing the events in our comprehension session and have applied our new understanding of statements and questions by writing statements and questions that we would ask the witch, the troll and the giant from our story. In maths we have continued our exploration of place value. We have been using part whole models, place value mats and number lines to find and create amounts. Our mapping took us into Once Upon a Time Land and our science materials understanding focused on sorting materials by feature. On Friday we went to The Fitzwilliam museum to learn about stories in art. We had a wonderful time listening to Holly, our museum leader, tell us about the hidden details in paintings, pottery and sculptures. We have spent Friday afternoon drawing and being creative when retelling stories from the art we have seen. The children were a credit to the school!
Have a lovely weekend.
Year 3
This week, Year 3 have been working hard to develop their place value knowledge of numbers to 1000. Using practical resources and more abstract concepts, they have been comparing and ordering numbers with confidence and conviction. In English, the focus has been on identifying verbs and adverbs. The children have been exploring how the order of the word classes can create different effects on the reader. Our topic lessons this week took us on a tour around the world to discover the continents and oceans. The children loved finding out amazing facts about the world around us. In PSHE, the children discussed different emotions and how we express these. Take a look at the photos below… Can you identify any of our emotions from our facial expressions and body language?
Year 4
This week, we were able to congratulate our new class council reps when they received their badges in assembly. They also had their first school council meeting. I am sure that they will be able to work with the other council members to bring forward some wonderful ideas such as our current focus of ‘What makes Fairstead special’.
In science, we started to look at teeth – both their form and function. The children saw different skulls with different types of teeth as well as mapping their own teeth. They were able to identify the different types in their mouth and whether they were adult or baby teeth. They also drew some excellent labelled diagrams of teeth. We finished off by have a quiz which allowed them to show their knowledge to the class.
In addition, we have continued thinking about what makes Fairstead special while looking at ourselves in PSHE. We discussed all the people that are involved in the school family and their role. This was from parents to teachers, ground staff and cleaners. We looked at the fact they all had an important part to play for our family to work. By understanding how we are all part of one big family, it will help us understand how we can work together. We also looked at other families they are in such as groups and clubs.
Year 5
Year 5 are studying Malamander by Thomas Taylor. They inspected some objects that had been left by the two main characters, Herbie Lemon and Violet Palma, and have been writing descriptive sentences about them, attempting to load the sentences with more information. Here are some examples of their sentences:
Her large, brown satchel was almost exploding with all her belongings and had many little pockets for little things- it was a mystery how everything didn’t fall out through the many tears and scratches all over its pockmarked surface. -Amelia
There was a suspicious, gloop that was watery but a bit stiff as well and it was brownish reddish; there were moon crumbs that were pink and some orange powder that looked like spiced pepper. -Lily
In a mysterious brown box, twelve brain serum ingredients in bottles stood as still as soldiers in a dark cramped trench.-Lola
A strange, mysterious box held twelve little vials with ingredients for disgusting, slimy brain serum.-Anna
Like it came form heaven, the sweet scented bar of soap sat at the bottom of the bag, in case she needed to wash her hands.-Matilda
Spotty, dark red and white, a bunch of bracelets had been dropped by a Lady. They jangled when Herbie shook them. -David
To carry all her things she had an old, leather bag with her compartment full of things; it was quite bulky and it would hang off her back.-Laila
Year 6
This year, Years 5-6 will be taught History, Geography and RS by Mr Peace. The History topic for the Michaelmas Term is entitled ‘How We Used to Live: 1950s & 1960s’. Each week, the children watch and discuss an episode from a TV series that follows the fortunes of the Brady, Selby and Hodgkins families who live in a town called Bradley, in Yorkshire. Each programme highlights events or aspects of the era (e.g. Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, the end of rationing, steam trains, jukeboxes, teenagers, teddy boys, coffee bars, National Service, the Suez Crisis etc) and we see how members of each family respond to UK and world events. Years 5-6 were shocked to learn that you could leave school at 15 and have been struck, in particular, by the reaction of adults to their children’s desire to express opinions! We have related the latter change in attitude to life in school today, such as the development of our School Council and listening to the ‘pupil voice’. The children have been encouraged to discuss this period of history with members of their extended family. Well done to Anna and Mina, in particular, for responding so enthusiastically and sharing some wonderful artefacts with their classmates in Thursday afternoon’s lesson.
Have a lovely weekend!
Michael Radford