We start this week's update with a link to a new Yerbury Podcast made by the children of 4E,
Supported by Val, our Writer-in-Residence. Val lead a writing workshop with Elisa and 4E where the
children created their own 'Monkey-See, Monkey-Do' stories. The children worked incredibly hard and
Val recently used their work as an exemplar when running a workshop for teachers at other schools.
We hope you enjoy!
Monkey See, Monkey Do – an Indian Folk Tale’ A podcast from the children of 4E
Punctuality
Since the beginning of the academic year in September, we have asked for parents and carers to
ensure that their children are in the playground before the bell goes at 9:10am four times. However, we
are still in a position where there are more children coming through the school gate after the bell has
gone than before it. Please. please, please can you make an extra effort to ensure that your children
arrive punctually each morning. If there is anything we can reasonably do to help you get your child to
school on time then please let us know and we will do our best to help. Our school day starts later than
most other schools so even more reason to make an extra effort to help us to ensure that your child's
school day starts off on the right foot.
After-School Clubs (Years 3,4,5,6)
Clubs start on Monday! I have been having some difficulty with email mailing lists - All clubs with the
exception of Philosophy are running this term. Only Netball and Cooking are oversubscribed so if you
applied for a place for any other club then that application has been successful. I told the children on
Friday whether or not they were in Netball or Cooking - this information was accurate so if you have
received and email saying one thing whilst your child is telling you another - believe your child! If you
are still unsure then please either contact me or the school office for confirmation. Thank you and sorry
of any confusion!
Homework
You may have noticed that children in Years 1 to 6 have come home with spelling and/or phonics
homework today. These tasks form part of our new approach to homework which will be explained
more fully in next week’s update. With the exception of Year 6, these words are not tested in school so
we do ask that parents take an active role in ensuring they are practised and learned.
'Life-Story' Assemblies
We would love to continue our life-story assemblies where parents and carers come in to school and
talk to the children during an assembly about:
·Their background
·Their life
·How they got to being where they are
·A story from their life
·What they do & why
The assemblies last 10 or 15 minutes (usually on a Monday).
If you would like to take part then please do make contact with the school office.
Yerbury Music Night - Friday, February 3rd
CALLING ALL MUSICIANS! The Third Annual Yerbury Music Night is fast approaching! This is a night
for the adults only in the Yerbury community to share their musical talent with a friendly crowd and
raise money for the music program at the same time. The event takes place at Nambucca on
Holloway Rd. on FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 3rd. If you would like to perform could you please get in touch
with Mike Warren [email protected] or Graham Chapman [email protected].
Year 1 - Vision and Hearing Screening Check
A brief reminder that the School Nurse will be conducting vision and hearing screening for Year 1
pupils on Tuesday 17th of January.
What Have We Been Learning?
Nursery: This week in Nursery we have welcomed some new children who are settling in to the
nursery routine. Our 'settled' children have been very helpful in this process. We have used various
materials to help develop cutting skills and create a colourful collage. Continuing with our topic, we
have been talking about and reading books about family members who help us. In maths the
children have been counting in order and using programs on the interactive white board to help them
to recognise numerals from 1 - 10. Today the children were excited to see the snow falling have been
looking closely at snowflakes using magnifying glasses and collecting pots. They discovered how the
flakes melt and change to water. Please remember to return your PACT bags and activity packs on
Wednesday.
Reception: The children have enjoyed their first full week of the spring term; we have been very busy
running our shoe-shop in the middle room and managing the cafe in the outside area. We have made
all the pretend food and signs to stock and display in our cafe. We have been discussing traditional
tales which have a shoe theme. We read the Elves and the shoemaker and we have been writing
sentences and captions about the story, we also read and performed some drama based
on Cinderella. We have been thinking about matching a number to amounts and we have been
practising forming numbers. In phonics we have learnt the following sounds: 'j, v,w and x'. We have
been focussing on the tricky words: I, no, go, to and the. We're afraid that we currently have no
clothes for girls to change into if they have an accident. Please bring back any clothes you have from
school and if you have any suitable clothes to donate, we would be most appreciative. Thank you.
Year 1: The children have had a fantastic return to school and an energetic start to the new year. We
have begun our new topic - Homes and Castles - and have been discussing our own dream homes, as
well as looking into homes from the past. We have looked at the work of artist and
architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser, and created our own version of a cityscape. In English this
week we have looked at instructions - understanding how important it is for instructions to be clear. We
have also been ordering and writing our own instructions for different activities. In Maths we have been
learning to tell the time, focussing on 'o'clock' and 'half past' - please do take the time to talk about this
with your children over the weekend, particularly if there are any regular scheduled activities, e.g
bedtime or football club.
Year 2: This week, we have been leaning about money and how to find out how much we have. We
have also been exchanging money for different coins and trying to find out how many possibilities
there are. In English, we have made cheese sandwiches and written instructions on how to make
them. We have used commas in a list, fronted adverbial and adverbs to make our writing more
accurate and desriptive. We have continued to organise our puppet show and will begin to paint our
backgrounds. Have a lovely weekend!
Year 3: This week in Year 3 we have been looking at multiplication and division and how they relate to
each other as the inverse. In English we have been focussing on dialogue in writing and looked at how
to use speech marks to demarcate dialogue. The children have been learning how to punctuate when
using speech marks and spent lots of time thinking of exciting synonyms for the word 'said' in order to
make our writing more interesting. We have started our new topic 'Great British Scientists' by looking
at the meaning of Scientific Method and have carried out our first experiment mixing oil and water.
Year 4: After the disappointment of having to postpone our trip due to the transport strike, Year 4 have
had a great week. The children have shown an impressive understanding of tenths, hundredths as
fractions and the decimal equivalents; written their own entertaining and humorous play scripts and
carried out a variety of investigations to test how sound travels. They had a fun time writing secret
messages in the Greek alphabet and have continued to develop their ukulele-playing skills.
Year 5: This week, we have been studying an Anglo Saxon poem called The Ruin and have written our
own dramatic versions about the destruction. We have learnt how to compare fractions and order them
by converting them so they have a common denominator. We had to guess the properties of different
materials that were hidden inside bags in Science and, lastly, acted out how the historical actions that
brought the Anglo-Saxons to Britain!
Year 6: We have focused on computation and problem solving involving decimals this week. The
children have spend a lot of time applying their reasoning skills when looking at word problems. We
will continue our work on decimals next week and begin our unit on percentages. The children have
started writing a favourite memory in the form of a flashback. Their writing has involved switching
between past and present tense and between first person and third person. We look forward to
continuing this unit next week.
Have a Lovely Weekend,
From the Team at Yerbury
News from the Wider community
Come to Whittington Park Community Association’s Ceilidh Fundraiser, Sat Jan 28th 2017, 7 pm10.30 pm. Advance tickets £10 (£5 concs) £15 on the night. Bar, Raffle, please bring finger food for
the sharing table. All proceeds will go towards transforming our spaces – making our halls multipurpose, bright and better spaces for classes, community events and get-togethers.
After last year’s sell out success, Nicola Hadley and Northern Frisk will be back to get us dancing and
dusting off the January cobwebs! Tickets on sale now https://wpcaceilidh2.eventbrite.co.uk Limited
availability book now!