From the Head…
After a long weekend, it was lovely to be back at school on Tuesday for another busy week. I have had the pleasure of starting the secondary transfer meetings with Year 5 parents this week and it has been really positive to start thinking about the schools our children will move on to in Year 7. While it is obviously very important to consider the academic expectations of various schools and ensure that our children are fully prepared for any entrance exams they are sitting, our children are also developing many other personal qualities that are not measured by testing. Creativity, critical thinking, resilience, motivation, persistence, curiosity, humour, endurance, reliability and enthusiasm are all vital life skills and, in developing these, we are increasing our children’s potential. It is important that we remember that these qualities are as, if not more, important for our children to develop and through the Values Education at St Olave’s, we are giving the children every opportunity to develop these skills alongside their extensive academic achievements.
Have a lovely weekend,
Kind regards
Miss Claire Holloway
Headteacher
Reception, Year 1 & Year 2 Football
Please can parents ensure that all children bring a named water bottle to football on Thursdays to help avoid confusion
Year 6
It may have been a slightly shorter week, but in Year 6 we have managed to fit in just as much! On Tuesday we had our first read through of our Presentation Evening script and rehearsals will be held at regular intervals in the week from now on.
In preparation for our trip to Bletchley Park next week, the children in Year 6 learnt a little more about the work done there during the Second World War. They even turned their hand to some code breaking themselves!
6L presented their assembly to the whole school on Wednesday morning, giving improvised demonstrations of all the activities they enjoyed whilst on their activity holiday in France.
On Friday we visited the Houses of Parliament. We had a workshop about democracy and voting - a very hot topic right now - as well as actually going into the House of Commons and the House of Lords, rooms which we usually only get to see on the news.
Next week will see us just as busy with another school trip and some special visitors coming into school to see us!
Year 5
This week Year 5 have been exploring data and analysing different graphs, ranging from bar charts to line graphs and pie charts. We also looked at ways of recording raw data through creating frequency charts.
In English, we have looked at homonyms, modal verbs, relative clauses and relative pronouns. We have been identifying these within texts that we’ve been reading in class. On Friday, we had a whole morning dedicated to debating. The children imagined that they were temporarily in power of the world and had to debate one change to make the world a better place. The children planned their comments carefully making sure to back up their ideas with evidence. They learnt about the running of a debate with each group taking on a particular role. The judges then decided who had won the debate after all of the speeches were over. Many of the children then chose to continue their debates at morning playtime!
Year 4
Year 4 have re-formed into their original groups and are immediately working very hard! In 4S, the children have been comparing two versions of the Heracles/Hercules story whilst also evaluating new classroom games (in a sepia coloured classroom).
In 4T, the children have been working with a friend to discover which shapes they can make from triangles. It is amazing how many interesting shapes, such as a parallelogram or rhombus, can be formed with triangles.
Year 3
We have had a busy week introducing our new science topic, ‘Animals including Humans’ and have learnt all about the different food groups and why we need them. The children enjoyed finding out that carbohydrates give us energy and that we need to have good fats in our diet! We also enjoyed launching our new RE topic of Hinduism and are lucky enough to have a few practising Hindus in our classes to share their expertise. Some were surprised to hear that Hinduism is one of the largest religions in the world and we all enjoyed looking at the artefacts.
The children have been so enthusiastic about our Anglo-Saxon topic work. We have been learning about the role of archeologists and the significance of the Anglo-Saxon burial boat which was discovered at Sutton Hoo.
The children enjoyed archiving and grouping the many objects that were discovered within the burial boat and piecing the clues together to consider who may have been buried there.
Year 2
The children have made a great start to their new topic of the rainforest. We have listened to the sounds of the rain, thunder, tree frogs, monkeys and bird song in the rainforest. The children have taken a close look at the toucans which live in the canopy and have created beautiful pictures of these colourful birds using mixed media. The children are looking forward to learning more about other birds and animals of the rainforest in the coming weeks.
Year 1
This week the children were focusing on writing postcards. First they wrote as ‘Beegu’, describing the planet she is from. There were some very imaginative ideas, such as tomato land and candy floss trees! The children were very surprised to receive a letter from Beegu telling them about her short visit to earth and how lonely she felt. Year 1 replied, offering friendship advice and asking Beegu to visit again soon. The children have really enjoyed making alien hats and their very own alien friend to look after. They are always on the look out for further signs of paranormal activity! Watch this SPACE!!
Reception
This week the children started off with a word hunt in our phonics session. The children worked in pairs to decode and match high frequency words that had been hidden around the playground.
We have continued to find out facts about our solar system. In RSJ we have been investigating what it might be like to live in the space station and what experiences we might have if we were astronauts. Some of our favourite ideas were to fly a rocket into space and to meet aliens. In RC the children have been creating flying saucers for aliens and finished our planet ordering. The whole of Reception managed to find some sunny weather this week enabling them to paint a rocket outside.
Nursery
This week in Barnaby Bear assembly, the children in the EYFS listened to the story of Noah’s Ark. The nursery children enjoyed re enacting the story with a beautiful wooden ark and animals. They also learnt how to play a Noah’s Ark matching memory game. In music this week we learnt a new song all about Mr Noah. The children performed it to the Reception children during assembly with great enthusiasm. I think we may have some future X Factor contestants in nursery!
Active Travel
The cycling race, ‘The Women’s Tour’ will be coming to London on 11th June: http://www.womenstour.co.uk/ . The children in the Upper School have entered a competition to design a flag to be waved at the start of the race. It has been interesting to see which different female heroes the children have chosen for their flags and the effective details they have incorporated into their designs, such as London landmarks. The entries are of a very high quality, well done! Here is a selection of some of the most outstanding designs:
Clubs
The damp weather didn’t deter our Upper School children as they had a great time during our first skateboarding club of the year last week. There was a lot of determination and bravery on display as well as lots of fun!
PLEASE NOTE ALL CLUBS ARE NOW FULLY SUBSCRIBED
In the event of wet weather in the afternoon, please check your phone for ParentMail text messages regarding the outdoor clubs. Thank you.
School Office
