Summer Term 2 - Week 1 - Sun, Science and Show!

English

In English this week, we began our poetry learning journey. The poetry unit is based on the ‘Tale of Three Brothers’ from the Harry Potter novel. To begin the journey, the children explored the tale, discussing its themes, characters, language and tone. They discussed with their learning buddies the impact of the animation and the effects it has on the reader/listener. For the first lesson, the children then explored different perspectives, focussing on ‘Deaths’ and then created a story map to match that point of view. The story map will then inform the rest of the journey, where the children will right a narrative poem using dramatic conventions.

Next, the children explored poetic devices and began collating a range of vocabulary ready to create their poems. They thought carefully about each of the brothers and their characteristics, along with the gift they were given by death. Within the lesson, we revisited the definitions of adjectives, similes, metaphors and personification.

In the following lessons, the children will begin to structure and plan their poems, by using their VIPERS skills to unpick a range of narrative poems.

Maths

In Maths this week, the children began their negative numbers learning journey. So far, they have learnt to understand negative numbers, count through zero and count through multiples with negative numbers.

The children our confident in their negative numbers and this is due to our morning work. The children have been exposed to negative numbers previously and can now use their tools from their morning work to be successful within the lessons.

In the mornings, children are being active with their next steps, seeking help from teachers to support their misconceptions. This fab to see!

Please continue to access TTRS at home, with negative numbers, counting through multiples, the fluency in times tables is important for this unit.

Wider Curriculum

In wider curriculum the children have been scientists. We have begun by looking at materials and their properties. We carried out an experiment where we looked at a range of materials and investigated whether they were transparent, magnetic or a conductor of electricity. The children made predictions and recorded their findings within a table. To end the lesson, the children selected a material, wrote about its properties and what products it would be best used for. All of this was evidence through the experiment!

In our next lesson, the children honed in on conductors of heat and insulators. The children once again completed an experiment, they were given three cups, filled with warm water and then three materials to wrap around. They had to discover which material would keep their teacher’s tea the warmest for the longest amount of time. With a stop watch, they timed how long it took for the water to cool, checking with a thermometer.

Important dates:

·      WC: 17^th June 2024 – Sports week

·      WC: 8^th July 2024 – Art week

·      Wednesday 10^th July 2024 – Our girls can

·      Friday 12^th July 2024 – Reports will be given

Have a lovely, sunny weekend,

Enjoy the show if you’re going!

Best wishes,

Weeks 5 and 6: Under the Sea! 

Another fantastic fortnight of learning brings our half-term to an end and what a lot we've packed into it! 

This last week saw our fantastic Year 1 children go a visit to Blue Reef Aquarium and there was much dancing at the FOWPA disco. Here are some of the highlights: 

English

We have been looking at poetry and learning about our senses. The children looked at pictures of beaches and worked in groups to make mind maps of what they could see, smell, hear, taste and feel at the seaside. We then used these ideas and added adventurous vocabulary to them to make them more interesting, for example 'seagulls' became 'squawking seagulls' and 'ice cream' became 'scrumptious, sweet ice cream'. The children then used these ideas to create their own seaside senses poems, which they showed confidence in reading out aloud to their classmates. Some really fantastic work! 

Maths

We have been exploring fractions and started with finding a half of an shape and then finding half of a group or a number. The children used concrete objects to work practically and record their answers in their books. We then moved onto finding a quarter of a shape, group and number, again, working practically to solve different problems. We ended the week by looking at position and direction and using our mathematical language of left, right, forwards and backwards to navigate around a picture board and then write instructions for a friend to follow. 

Science

We had a letter delivered from The Singing Mermaid who told us she had unfortunately scraped her tail on a rock and damaged some of her scales. She wrote to Year 1 to ask for their help in finding a material that would be strong, lightweight and waterproof (and beautiful of course!) that she could make some new scales out of. The children set to work learning about different materials and their properties before planning and carrying out 3 experiments to find the best material. They tested if a material was waterproof by dipping it in water to see if it absorbed the water or not, stretched the materials to see which was strongest and felt them to see which was lightest. They recorded their results and found out that plastic was the best material, which children then wrote back to The Singing Mermaid to let her know their findings. 

PE

We have been very lucky to have Pro20 in this half-term teaching the children football skills, which they have loved! They have learnt to dribble and control the ball and have played some very exciting mini games of football! Next half-term, PE goes back to being on a Thursday and we will be doing athletics on the field - running and throwing and jumping - we can't wait! 

Our School Trip 

Wow! What a fantastic time we had at Blue Reef Aquarium - the children were fantastically behaved and showed much interest in what the Blue Reef staff shared with them. We took lots of photos and talked about them after the trip and it was amazing to hear how much information they had remembered! Not only did we have a fantastic time at the Aquarium but the sun shone for us on the beach and we were able to go and play in the sand with our friends! They were amazing on the trip and we really were very proud of them. A big thank you again to all the parents who were able to help us on the trip. 

Reminders

School will reopen on Monday 3rd June and we look forward to seeing you then and hearing all about the children's adventures over half-term.

PE is now on a Thursday so please send your child in full PE kit on Thursdays. 

Library books will continue to be changed on Thursdays too. 

Please do continue to read with your children over half-term and encourage them to complete some of the activities in their phonics packs - they have been very enthusiastic about completing these already, which is great to hear! 

Phonics screening checks will take place on week commencing 10th June. 

Have a wonderful half-term break and we look forward to seeing you on 3rd June. 
The Year 1 Team 

Cornwall Air Ambulance Fundraiser
Congratulations to our Nursery and Reception children who had a great time on their sponsored walk. All the children made masks, flags and banners and took on the challenge of walking or running 4 laps around our school field. We had a special visit from Andy, the pilot from Cornwall Air Ambulance, to say thank you for raising money for them.


FOWPA
Many thanks to FOWPA, our staff, children, parents and Regal Cinema for supporting the recent fundraising events at school. We will be able to share after half term how much was raised from these the Uniform Sale and Disco ahead of the next event, the FOWPA Quiz.

FOWPA are hosting a Non-School Uniform Day on Thursday 13th June. Children may come to school dressed in normal, casual clothes of their choice! In return, we would like to ask you for voluntary donations of luxury hamper items to be used as raffle prizes for the FOWPA Quiz Night on Friday 28th June. Suitable items for donation would be a bottle (alcohol or other), chocolates or biscuits, for example, so that we can put hampers together. FOWPA volunteers will be stood outside the school office at drop off on Thursday 13th June with trolleys to accept your wonderful donations. Please note that alcohol donations MUST be donated by an adult to either an FOWPA volunteer or brought directly into the secretary’s office (where other donations can also be made at any time). All proceeds raised from the raffle go back into supporting the children at WPA.

Thank you as always for your support.
The FOWPA Team


Online Safety
Please check the link sent by email today for some useful information and tips about keeping children safe online.


Car Park
When we return after half term, we will let you know about some changes to the car park for drop off and collection. Unfortunately, there is no perfect solution – I’ve heard it has been tweaked many times already! We will need everyone’s support in helping make drop off and collection as smooth and safe as possible. Look out for an email from me in the first week back to update you on the new arrangements.


Summer 2024 Bridge Schools Trust Parent and Carer Questionnaire
A reminder that the school survey closes today, thank you. Please check your parent email for the link.


PE Days
Please note your child's PE day below as some year groups have changed days. This is due to external providers such as Pro20 and DT Coaching having set days to come and deliver quality PE provision to our pupils. The children only have one day of PE (or split days in Year 3) but have 2 lessons during the school day to ensure they receive the required time.

Reception: Monday with Pro20 (please send children to school dressed in their PE kit)
Year 1: Thursday
Year 2: Monday (Pro20 Sports Academy)
Year 3: Monday and Wednesday (DT Coaching). 2 days due to split lessons.
Year 4: Tuesday
Year 5: Friday
Year 6: Thursday


Class Photos
On Wednesday 5th June, the school photographer will be in during the morning to take class photos. Please ensure your child is wearing full school uniform on that day. If they have PE, they will need to bring in their PE kit to change into on that day. Thank you for your co-operation.


Important dates coming up:

Monday 3rd June: Back to school

Tuesday 4th June: 14:00-16:15 Year 5 and Year 6 Quad Games at Wadebridge Secondary School – please complete form recently sent by email

Wednesday 5th June: Class Photos – Children need to wear their full school uniform to school

Thursday 6th June: Year 6 Sponsored Dance-a-thon

Friday 7th June: Community Day for Royal Cornwall Show – School closed for children

Monday 10th – Friday 14th June: Year 1 Phonics Screening Check Week

Monday 10th June: (pm) Choir singing at St Breock Care Home

Tuesday 11th June: Year 4 Multiplication Check

Thursday 13th June: FOWPA Non-Uniform Day

Friday 14th June: 09:00 SEND Coffee Morning

Friday 14th June: (pm) Year 6 Transition – KS3 Team and Year 7 Buddies visit.


Thank you for all your support this half term.
We look forward to an exciting final half term of the year, seeing everyone back on Monday 3rd June.

With very best wishes,

Chris Wathern 

We just wanted to say how proud we are of Year 2. Over the past few weeks we have been doing our KS1 SATS papers. The children have taken these on with such resilience and confidence. They have been amazing!

So to celebrate this and to celebrate (a week earlier than normal) we ended Summer 1 with a scone picnic outside to celebrate National Scone Day! This was a great link to our Wider Curriculum question 'Did the Cornish do a proper job?'. Safe to safe to say there were sticky fingers all round. See you after the half term holiday.
Many thanks,
Year 2. 

Wow, what a wonderful morning. The children were super excited to do their sponsored walk and made the nursery team proud. Morwenna and Andy the Air Ambulance mascot came to cheer us on our way.
Thank you for all of your support.

Year 3 Geography Trip 

On Monday, Year 3 went to Treraven Farm on a geography trip. We took part in different activities including orienteering through the woods using compasses, bug and flower hunts for different types of species and fire lighting. We also walked either to Treraven Farm, or back to the school so that we could map a familiar route. The children had a great time and especially enjoyed the sunny weather and the stop at the park!

To commemorate 40 years since the passing of Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman CBE, Concern Wadebridge hosted a poetry competition for all Wadebridge area primary school aged children. The theme of the poetry competition was ‘Wadebridge.’ The competition was sponsored by Bricknells who provided the first-place prizes for the best written entries for Key Stage 1 & Key Stage 2 children. There were also special prizes for the most creative entries.

Manager Emma Burt said: “We were delighted to receive over 100 entries. I would not only like to say thank you to St Breock Primary School & Nursery and Wadebridge Primary Academy for promoting the competition but also to Bricknells for sponsoring the event. A special mention to Cathy and Kevin Daisy, our John Betjeman memorabilia volunteers who came up with the idea of the competition and helped me with the hard task for judging all the brilliant entries. All the winning entries will now be on display at The John Betjeman Centre for the half term holidays and until the end of June. Please come and see the talent for yourselves.”


Congratulations to our children:

Best Written Poem Key Stage 1: Lennon 

Best Written Poem Key Stage 2: Daisy 

Highly Commended: Tom

17/05/2024

What a busy 2 weeks we have had in Year 3!

Last Friday we had a fantastic alternative day of sports. Coaches from Arena came in to deliver some awesome games including Dartmoor 3 ball, Capture the Flag, American Football, Boccia and Archery. We had a fantastic day and we were very impressed with the skills and teamwork that we saw. 

Also this week we have been continuing with sewing. Year 3 first designed their pillows before cutting the fabric, sewing the motif and using a running stitch to sew it all together. The finished designs looks fabulous!  

In Science we have been looking at Plants and continuing with our work in the school Polytunnel growing flowers and vegetables. We conducted an experiment, which we have been monitoring for the last 3 weeks, to see if a seed will germinate and grow in a darkness, artificial light and natural sunlight. We also used soil and cotton wool to compare growth too.  We predicted that the seeds in the natural light and soil would grow the best as those conditions give a plant everything it needs to grow. The children were amazed to see that the seeds in darkness did germinate however, the seedlings were stringy, brown and did not look too healthy. After half term we will be starting to look at the Water Cycle and Rivers. 

We are looking forward to our Geography Field Trip on Monday and will post some pictures from the trip later next week.

Have a lovely weekend!

The Year 3 Team 

Mines and Mosques!

KS2 SATs
Well done to our wonderful Year 6 children. They approached the assessments this week with a determined and calm attitude. Today they have certainly let their hair down (and given it a rinse too) as they finished the week with some water fun. The warmer weather certainly added to their afternoon!

Summer 2024 Bridge Schools Trust Parent and Carer Questionnaire
Your feedback is really important to us as we work in partnership to achieve the best possible education for the children. Please check your email to complete a Trust-wide questionnaire that each school is sending out. For Q20, I would really appreciate your views on the key strengths to celebrate, as well as areas we could develop even further for all our children. Your time in completing this questionnaire is valued and will help us continually improve. Please complete by Friday 24th May, thank you. 

FOWPA Disco – Wednesday 22nd May
A reminder of arrangements:

14:15 – 15:00 Reception, Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3 (in school time)
15:15 – 16:00 Year 4, Year 5 and Year 6

Children are invited to wear party clothes into school. Please note that Year 6 will need to wear their PE kit to school and bring a change of clothes if they are going to the Disco.

We will have a couple of quieter areas should children want to have some time out from all that dancing!

Don’t forget to complete a permission slip if your child is in Year 4 - Year 6, as the Disco takes place at the end of the school day. Spare letters are available from your class teacher/office. For this fundraising event, we would welcome a suggested donation of £1.50. Please ensure your child brings into school a water bottle that can be topped up. A small snack will also be provided.

Lost Property
Thank you to FOWPA for organising the nearly new uniform sales this week. Next Monday-Wednesday after school, we will be putting out all the lost property by the main entrance. Please do take a look to see if anything belongs to your child. Anything that isn’t collected will be donated to a local charity/clothes bank.

House Points
Congratulations to this week’s winners, Choughs!

Swans – 365
Choughs – 369
Cormorants – 281
Puffins – 331

Important dates coming up:
Monday 20th May: Year 1 and Year 3 Trips
Monday 20th May: Year 2 PE instead of Wednesday (please wear PE kit)
Wednesday 22nd May: 14:15-15:00 Reception-Year 3 Disco; 15:15-16:00 Year 4-Year 6 Disco
Friday 24th May: INSET Day – School closed
Monday 27th – Friday 31st: May Half term
Monday 3rd June: Back to school
Tuesday 4th June: 14:00-16:15 Year 5 and Year 6 Quad Games
Wednesday 5th June: Class Photos
Thursday 6th June: Year 6 Dance-a-thon
Friday 7th June: Community Day for Royal Cornwall Show – School closed for children

A reminder that school is closed next Friday 24th May for INSET. It’s a four-day week for the children before the May half term break.

Have a relaxing weekend.
Best wishes,
Chris Wathern

Summer 1 - Week 5 - Innovating, researching and recording! 

English

In English this week, the writing genre focussed on information texts. The children read up to chapter 7 gathering information about Podkin, his siblings and most importantly the 12 gifts from the Goddess.

The children used a planning format to innovate their own gifts from the Goddess. They had to consider its name, its magical properties, its history and its current whereabouts. They used 3 of the original gifts to give them inspiration before generating their own. The plan would then provide them with notes for writing their information texts independently.

The children then began writing the introduction, here they had to provide the reader background context, what the text would be about and some information about the Goddess.

Finally, they began writing their main body of the text; this was broken down into weapons, tools, armour/clothing. For each, they had to explain information about the gifts using descriptive language.

Next week, it’s poetry where the children will explore how to use onomatopoeia.

Maths

For Maths, we continued with position and direction. The children learnt about translation, and then translation using co-ordinates in order to be more accurate. They then were introduced to symmetry, where the children had to make connections to previous learning. Using mirrors, they located lines of symmetry on shapes and identifying horizontal and vertical lines of symmetry.

On Thursday, the children then completed their end of unit assessments. Their scores were recorded and next steps/targets set.

On Friday, the children then completed their half termly arithmetic assessment. This is where the children can work towards their targets making progress in their scores!

Wider Curriculum

This week, the children were Geographers learning how to describe and understand key aspects of the water cycle, whilst outlining the impact on human geography through the distribution of natural resources.

This was a heavy research lesson, with lots of discussion and use of retrieval skills to unpick information and record key facts. The children then created a double page spread explaining their understanding of the above. They then use iPads to continue gathering data and statistics.

Next, the children then looked at natural disasters, again the recorded what they had learnt making links to the UK and other foreign countries, outlining the impact on human geography.

We’ve had a busy week, next week is the countdown to half term!

Have a lovely sunny weekend,

Best Wishes,

The Year 5 Team

Summer 1 - Week 4 and 5

Adding to our learning journey

Over the last 2 weeks, the children have been busy impressing us with their writing and maths skills. 

Writing - Every morning, the children have been coming into class and writing sentences based on a picture stimulus. The progress the children have made in their writing has blown us away. They are saying their sentences aloud, applying their phonics knowledge, correctly forming their letters and getting more confident in using finger spaces. Great work Reception!

Maths - We have been working on addition and subtraction  stories over the last two weeks. In their addition stories, the children started with using concrete objects, and were then able to move on to writing addition sums. We moved onto subtraction within 10 this week which the children are starting to grasp. 

Music - We were lucky enough to have Mrs Wade join us to give the children an African drumming lesson. The children thoroughly enjoyed learning how to play the drum. They were able to copy rhythms and made their own rhythm up to perform it to the class. Thank you Mrs Wade for giving up your time to give the children this experience.

PE - After half term,  Reception will be lucky enough to have Pro20 for a sports session each week. This weekly session will be on a Monday afternoon, starting from our first day back. For this session, the children will need to come into school already in their P.E kits. They will not need to wear their school uniforms on a Monday until Pro20 has finished (we will inform you closer to the time when this will be). P.E kits can then be kept at home. It would be handy to still keep a spare pair of clothes/uniform in their bags daily or kept on their pegs, just in case of water play accidents etc. The children will continue to have a P.E session on a Thursday but this will be in their uniforms, as it is rehearsing for sports day.

Thank you so much for your help in making drop off and pick up a smooth transition through our new gate. We really do appreciate it. 

Have a wonderful weekend. 

Best wishes,
The Reception Team 

The children have been learning about the  'Life cycle of a butterfly’.
We have had some real caterpillars for the children to observe and to watch grow.

Over the past few weeks, the children have been lucky enough to see the caterpillars develop into chrysalis' and then turn into butterflies. 
This week, the children went to woody corner to release the caterpillars that had come out of their chrysalis.’

Summer 1, Weeks 3 and 4: Determined designers

Another busy fortnight in Year 1 but we have been particularly impressed with the resilience shown in Year 1 - we have a lot of "Keep Going Koalas"! 

DT

Linked to our wider curriculum learning of the seaside, the children have been busy designing jellyfish puppets. 
Firstly, they had to work with small pieces of felt and investigate the 3 different ways of joining the pieces together - with glue, safety pins or staples. Everyone tried all 3 methods and the glue station got very sticky at one point with no one having much success - but that's ok because designers try things and evaluate whether it worked or could have been better. The children unanimously decided the glue wasn't for them and we tried our hand at stapling. We had more success here but did get through a lot of staples! We also tried joined the felt together using safety pins. We soon realised these were tricky - especially some of the smaller ones - but some of our classmates were amazing at pinning the pieces together and were nominated as "class experts" and they helped others out who were struggling - some wonderful teamwork turtle skills on show! 

Finally, we were ready to design our jellyfish so children chose a colour of felt and sketched out on a template what their jellyfish would look like. These were photocopied before the children used their cutting skills to carefully cut out the template and - back to the safety pins! - pinned the template onto the felt. They then had to cut out the felt and join their 2 jellyfish pieces together. This was where they chose which method they would like to use to join them. The jellyfish need to be finished next week and we can't wait to show them off!


English

We finished off our learning of the Singing Mermaid by reinventing the story together and the children decided they would like their new character to be the Dancing Dolphin. The Dancing Dolphin lived in the deep, blue sea and was warned by William Whale not to go with Sam Sly to the circus where she was trapped in a tank. Luckily, her friend Ollie Octopus helped her escape back to the sea. The children loved writing their stories and we are seeing them apply the knowledge they have learnt in lessons to their writing, often independently. For example, children were using exclamation marks and some wonderful adjectives to describe the characters and their feelings in the story. We really enjoyed reading their stories. 

We then started on a poetry unit, looking at our different senses and thinking what we can see, hear, smell, taste and feel at the seaside. Children worked in groups and studied different photos of beaches to make lists and we added adjectives to these the following day. For example, I can see the sea became I can see the crashing waves; and I can hear the seagulls became I can hear the noisy seagulls squawking. The children are then going to use these ideas to write their own seaside senses poems.

Maths

We have now moved onto learn about fractions and looked at halving an object, such as a pizza or an orange, and talked about now having 2 parts. We moved onto discuss halving a group of objects, talking about having more than 2 objects but still having 2 groups of objects. We identified to be halved, the groups need to have an equal number and we shared out different numbers of counters equally to see what half of a given number was. The children are making the link between halving and doubling, knowing that if 5 is a half, they have to double 5 to find the whole number. 

History

As part of our learning around the question "have people always liked to be beside the seaside?", we looked at what beaches were like in the past and how they have changed over time. The children loved looking at a range of photos of seasides in the past and learning what many Victorians did when they went to the seaside. Their favourite part was looking at the bathing carriages some Victorians were lucky enough to use where ladies were pulled by horse in a carriage into the sea where they would lower themselves into the water and have a swim before climbing back into the carriage to change and be pulled back to dry land. What a wonderful idea! They were less keen on wearing a suit or a formal dress to the beach though - much preferring their t-shirts and shorts! 

Phonics

With our phonics screening check creeping ever closer, we have planned in some fun phonics afternoons where the children have enjoyed playing phonics games in groups to practice their sounds. Please do continue to read with your child at home and practice their phonics sounds. There are some great games on "Phonics Play" website which are free to play and the children do love them! 

Reminders

If you have already done so, please do return your trip consent letter for the aquarium trip. 
Library day is Thursday - please do send your child in with their book so they are able to change it. 
Monday is PE so children should come to school in PE kits please. 

Have a lovely weekend, 
The Year 1 Team

Summer 1 - Week 4 - Things are hotting up! 

English

In English this week, the children began a new learning journey focusing on the genre ‘Myths and Legends’ and the text ‘The Legend of Podkin One-Ear’. Throughout the learning journey, the children will have the opportunity to explore a range of grammatical skills and knowledge before writing their own version of a chapter from the text.

On Tuesday, the children used their VIPERS skills prediction and inference to write a blurb. The only information they had was the contents page and a map. The children were presented with a range of WAGOLL’s to encourage imagination.

On Wednesday, the children then used their retrieval skills, where they learnt about some of the treasures from the text via an information piece. Using notes, the children then wrote two additional paragraphs, mimicking style, tone and vocabulary.

We’ve also noticed within writing lessons, the children find it tricky to edit, improve and re-draft their work. Therefore, on Thursday the children had the opportunity to improve a paragraph, continuing on from the information writing. They had to look at, sentence structures, formal language, punctuation etc.

Maths

In Maths, the children began their position and direction learning journey. To begin the journey, we introduced them to vocabulary that may appear throughout. We also used our Freya models, to discuss misconceptions and examples which the children can refer to throughout their learning.

So far, the children have looked at reading and plotting co-ordinates and then applying this when problem solving. They have also explored translation and then translation with co-ordinates. For this journey, we have also had the chance to apply our knowledge to real life scenarios.

In Morning work, we continue to revisit learning from our shape learning journey. This week, the children had the opportunity to draw angles using protractors accurately. We will continue to embed this over the next few weeks.

Wider Curriculum

In Wider curriculum, we have continued with our Art learning journey. On Wednesday, the children worked in their sketch books, experimenting with colour palettes for their Modroc animals. They decided which colours and designs words well and how to mix colours in order to generate the correct shade.

On Thursday, the children then began painting their base colours and painting the more intricate details. With the weather being so lovely, we were able to get outside and enjoy the sunshine whilst we painted. Once their animal was complete, they went back to the sketch books, writing annotations and evaluating their work.

We are going to keep hold of the animals and use them in our computing/animation project! WATCH THIS SPACE!

As always, have a magical weekend,

Enjoy the glorious weather,

Best Wishes,

Year 2 have been scientists this week investigating everyday materials. They started off finding and naming materials in the classroom (glass, plastic, wood, water, metal, rock, brick, paper, fabric). Then they thought about other objects that are also made from the same material. From here they were able to talk about if certain materials are suitable or not suitable for particular items. For example is glass suitable for a hammer? Why is wood suitable for a table? Why is cardboard not suitable for a water bottle? Then they used scientific descriptions to write why these materials or suitable or not suitable (waterproof, stiff, hard, smooth, absorbent, stretchy etc). Towards the end of the week they conducted an experiment to see how different materials can be bent, squashed, twisted and stretched. This helped them to deepen their understanding about the suitability of materials for everyday items and why it is important for some items to have its shape changed. For example, playdough needs to be squashable and elastic in clothing needs to be stretched.

Here is a link to continue the learning at home Everyday materials - KS1 Science - BBC Bitesize

Enjoy the sunny weather!

Whilst it’s been a shorter week, it has certainly been a full one (and the sun came out too which was a bonus). I had the pleasure of showing another headteacher working in Cornwall around our school. We were both impressed with the calm and purposeful atmosphere in and around the classes. From seeing how well our Big Nursery and Reception children are settling into their new rooms to the quality of teaching and learning as we toured the school. We also saw politeness in abundance; such an important quality. From greetings to opening doors, the children should be rightly proud of themselves.

Coffee Sessions
I really appreciated being able to meet you during this week’s coffee sessions. Thank you for the opportunity to share a bit about my experiences as well as how we will continually develop our fantastic school. I was also grateful for your feedback, questions and ideas about what’s working well and what we can do together for the future. From each of the sessions, one message came out clearly, and that’s the chance to have regular opportunities to come into school. Watch this space!

Summer 2024 Bridge Schools Trust Parent and Carer Questionnaire
Your feedback is really important to us as we work in partnership to achieve the best possible education for the children. Please check your email with the link to complete a Trust-wide questionnaire that each school is sending out. For Q20, as mentioned at this week’s welcome coffee sessions, I would really appreciate your views on the key strengths to celebrate, as well as areas we could develop even further for all our children. Your time in completing this questionnaire is valued and will help us continually improve. Thank you. 

House Points
Congratulations to this week’s winners, Swans, earning 282 points.

Swans – 282
Choughs – 276
Cormorants – 238
Puffins – 237

Our overall leaders this year so far are Choughs, with an impressive 10,577 points!

Good luck Year 6!
Good luck to our Year 6 children next week as they complete their end of KS2 SATs. We are really proud of what they have already achieved throughout their primary years, both in the subjects that are assessed, and those areas that aren’t. Go Year 6!

Events next week
Monday 13th – Thursday 16th May: Year 6 SATs

Thursday 16th May: Census Day - Change of school lunch menu

Thursday 16th May: Deadline for sign-up for May half term Bridge Kids Holiday Club

Thursday 16th May (after school): FOWPA Uniform Sale

Friday 17th May (after school): FOWPA Uniform Sale


Have a relaxing weekend.

Best wishes,

Chris Wathern