15.05.20 - Video Message from Mrs Korcz to Parents and Children
Calendar & Events
Summer Term 2020
Term Starts:
Monday 20/4/20
May Day:
8/5/20
Half Term:
25/5/20 - 29/5/20
End of Term: Wednesday 15/7/20
SCHOOL YEAR
2020-2021
Autumn Term 2020
Term Starts:
Wednesday 2/9/20
Half Term:
19/10/20 - 30/10/20
End of Term: Friday 11/12/20
Spring Term 2021
Term Starts:
Tuesday 5/1/21
Half Term:
15/2/21 - 19/2/21
End of Term: Thursday 1/4/21
Summer Term 2021
Term Starts:
Monday 19/4/21
May Day:
3/5/21
Half Term:
31/5/21 - 4/6/21
End of Term: Wednesday 16/7/21
ISSUE: 410 14th May 2020
IMPORTANT PARENT INFORMATION
Cool Cats Uniform Supplier: TGPS website - Please access the Uniform & Equipment heading on the home page there is a direct link to the Cool Cats website.
WEEKLY EVENTS
W/C 18th May SCHOOL CLOSED - DISTANCE LEARNING CONTINUES FOR ALL CHILDREN
SCHOOL OPEN FOR CHILDREN OF KEYWORKERS 8AM - 6PM.
W/C 1st June SCHOOL OPEN FOR NURSERY, RECEPTION, CLASS ONE AND CLASS SIX CHILDREN AND KEYWORKERS CHILDREN
IMPORTANT INFORMATION
18-19.6.2020 Junior Production
24.6.2020 Sports Day
26.6.2020 Sports Day (Reserve 1)
1.7.2020 Sports Day (Reserve 2)
6.7.2020 Speech Day
10.7.2020 Year 6 Leavers' Service
15.7.2020 Last Day of Term
Thank you so much for all your contributions into this weeks newsletter. It's lovely to see so many of you!
A day is longer than a year on Venus.The rotation of Venus is very slow, making a full rotation only every 243 Earth days. In contrast, the planet goes around the sun once every 225 Earth days, making its year 18 Earth days shorter than its day.
News of the week
A grey wolf has been spotted in Normandy, a region in
Northern France, for the first time in more than 100 years. Wolves disappeared from Normandy in the 19th century – and in the whole of France in the 1930s – because of hunting. They started to re – enter France from Italy in the 1990s when they crossed the alps mountain range.
Something to do.
Aidan suggests -
Try to eat something you have never eaten before.
Tell me what you ate and if you liked it or not.
Previous challenge
The previous something to do was to throw and catch a ball with a partner
These are my Mums and my score;
Both hands 109
Left hand 6 - Right hand 14.
My Mum and I are both right handed, as you can probably tell!
Bit of croquet, 4pm tea, and Harry toasting some marshmallows!
Sophia making her VE Day bunting and getting into the spirit of the Day!
Leonie and Olivia preparing the bunting for VE Day!
This couple visited our school a while back. They played this last Thursday during clap for key workers outside their house and opposite mine.
Mrs Whinney
In Reception this week the children's focus traditional tale book was Chicken Licken. The children all loved the different characters in the story, in particular, the evil Foxy Loxy. They were all relieved that he didn't manage to eat all of the birds and that they escaped his evil clutches!! The children enjoyed making their own puppets and acting out the story of Chicken Licken with the role play masks as well. Very creative Reception. This learning also linked to the work in our Science about the life cycle of the hen.
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Chicken Licken Story narrated by Mrs Ives!
The children in Art had a go at making some challenging origami butterflies and designing their own symmetrical butterflies! Well done everyone. What a great week of learning!
Daniel was awarded his orange belt in karate- he does a zoom class every week and they were tested over zoom! Not an easy task for them to test! Well done Daniel!!
Here are Isabelle's instructions for successfully growing sunflowers - complete with photos. This is part of Class One's Science topic - Changing and Growing; plants and life-cycles.
Eliza has made a rain gauge as part of our Geography Topic on Weather. Everyone in Class One is keeping a weather diary for 2 weeks and making the gauge was a task that would be 'crafty and useful'. The incremental marks on the side of her gauge are for measuring (any) rainfall.
A cheeky Class One pupil with all her work for this morning!
Whilst learning about the History of the Seaside, Class One have been thinking about safety at sea. We have been looking at the role of lighthouse keepers, early heroic rescues and the work of the RNLI. Here is Eliza's and Isabelle's history work about Grace Darling.
In art last week, the children had to research Leonardo Da Vinci's weapons of war and draw one with labels.
Here is Eva's tank. Look who's driving!
Benjamin had to draw a rocket for science and then made it with junk modelling
The children had to watch a video about investigating evidence and what it can tell us about the past. Then they had a number of objects and evidence from the Great Fire Of London. They had to comment on what it told them about the past and what they can learn from it. They also had to explain what each object is.
Year 2 had to design a perfect playground for creative writing. Write and describe the features, draw a picture etc. They could also comment on the materials that would be used (in line with their previous Science topic).
Class 3 created work related to friendship this week. We drew around our hands and on each finger (and the thumb) wrote a word associated with being a good friend. We then worked on creating a friendship recipe, thinking about the ingredients that we would need and the method to create a perfect friend. It was lovely seeing all of their smiling faces. Mrs Dickinson
Class 3 getting together on the bank holiday to help Albert begin his birthday celebrations
Class 3 continued their Celtic warrior theme for their STEAM session this week and got creative designing and making their own Celtic shields ready for battle.
Recently pupils in class four were given the challenge of designing and creating a bird box, added to this was the second challenge of creating a bug hotel. As you can see from the photographs they were very resourceful in their approach. The Steam tasks are part of a class project based on recycling and eco living.
Katherine, Pippa, Phoebe, Matthew and Jai all contributed to this project.
Well done.
Olivia's wind chime she made for STEAM this week
On one of the warmest days of the year Miss Linehan decided it would be an amazing idea, to add a bit of excitement, for Class 4 to join their live Geography lesson dressed in clothes suitable for the ARCTIC!!! The children learnt a lot about Arctic animals but quickly had to take off their furry layers to avoid overheating!
This week class 5 have been using their deductive skills to create a map from the Michael Morpurgo book Kensuke’s Kingdom. As you can see they really took their time and have created some amazing maps.
Mrs Dickinson had a Google Meet catch up with Evie who said she was very excited. She had ordered a brand new reading record book as she had filled the old one. Mrs Dickinson said she was so proud of how much reading Evie had been doing; she is tackling the set of Series of Unfortunate Events, and then plans to read all of the Harry Potter set. Evie swims several times (usually) and is still putting in training, albeit of a different kind, but it is so nice to hear how she is using her extra free time.
A few year 6 girls and I held our first zoom drama club this week. We played three games that involve memory, a set rule and word association. It was great fun to see them and to play these games together, although none of us were together.
At the beginning of lock down, I decided to do something new. I started to learn the cello. It was very exciting when it arrived at my house - in a totally socially distanced way. After 6 short weeks, I played for the NHS last Thursday, accompanied by my son Tomas.
Mrs Dickinson
This week the infants have been challenged by James, Hana and Niha to work up a sweat, have some fun and enjoy their PE activities set by M Park. James is on the Towel Relay Challenge and the girls are playing a more competitive form of Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
Hana and Niha's Head Shoulders Knees and Toes Challenge!
James's Towel Relay Challenge
Leonie and Olivia having fun doing Mr Parks Towel Relay Challenge. Looks as though they are having a good time.
Here is another technical example of our children doing fitness in the new world
Ellie's biking challenge this weekend was to ride the distance of a marathon…. which she did….. non-stop!
Well done Ellie!
Evie is clocking c.12 hours weekly on Strava either running or cycling, and c.3 hours on strength/conditioning/weight training to maintain her swimming fitness. Her running has come on leaps and bounds as the 5K Run for NHS Heroes shows.
Well done Evie!
Our remote way of working has not stopped our artists at TGPS from creating super artwork for us to view. I’m sure you will all agree that the children have used their artistic skills admirably and it is a pleasure to include their work in the Art Gallery.
Work included from Katherine, Pippa, Jai, Leah, Evie and Olivia.
Online music lessons have been a great success so far. Everyone has gotten to grips with the technology and I am having a lot of fun with the students.
Teaching online presents its own challenges. There is a slight delay when speaking which makes it hard to play together. As a result I try to make the lessons as light and as fun as possible. We tend to go through our old songs at the start of each lesson. That way they get to do a little virtual concert for me to enjoy. We then move on to newer pieces so that they have a challenge for the week.
Rockband continues at 11.20am on Wednesdays and is going really well. New people are joining all the time and you can chat with your friends in the chat room.
My pictures show me teaching Theo the drums and also me streaming live over twitch for Virtual Rockband.
The lock down has proved challenging, but as the Chinese say Crisis = opportunity.
Online lessons are now the norm. I am able to help people all over the world which is great. I have to give a huge amount of credit to the way my students have adapted to this. Most of them are younger but have approached this in an incredibly mature way. I truly thank them for their continuing efforts. The same must be said to all the parents too. It is not easy at all being locked down together 24/7, we couldn’t do this without your ongoing support, encouragement and motivation. So a huge thank you and well done for managing to stay sane.
While we are seeing some fantastic results, the biggest thing we miss is the human connection. To truly hear the sound being produced and the detail that goes into that sound. How they breath, and produce the note.
Also to be able to really look the student in the eye and congratulate them. “Well done, that's it, you sound great.” It's not the same via a screen. Another issue is instrument malfunction. Not being able to quickly work out what's wrong with an instrument and fix it on the spot is frustrating for all concerned.
One of the biggest and saddest loss is live music. The school band really is a gift and the bond we have is special. I hope that the members of the band miss it as much as I do? I’m sure they are missing creating the fantastic music that we make each Friday morning.
I for one am missing each and everyone of my students, but the fact that I am able to see them each week and be part of their musical journey is still a very important part of my life.
Well done to you all. Keep up the motivation and the practise. One day we will be back, and when we are, we need to be ready to play.
All the very best.
From Mrs Jarvis
This term, my piano pupils have been working especially hard and achieved SO much! They have had fun in lessons, and many are very eager to record their work and send me videos during the week.
Here are a few photos of them having fun. Ralph doing music theory (paper aeroplanes – yes this was music theory!!!), and happy smiley faces showing me how proud they were of their work.
I am continually thankful to parents for supporting online music lessons, and taking time out to set their children up with the technology. Some parents are also enjoying the music lessons too, and I’m teaching Mums to play duets with their children, or showing them how to guide their child to follow the music. Thank you all.
This term, now the children have become more accustomed to Skype, Zoom and Whatsapp lessons, we are embracing technology and creating virtual bands. We have 3 virtual group pieces in the practice and recording stages at the moment and one group collage of them all practicing together. Here are a few stills of the video collages so far. These videos should be ready by beginning of next term, and we will share them with school for you all to hear.
Well done everyone for your hard work! Keep up the practicing!
From Mrs Parry
I am happy to say that all my lessons are continuing regularly. This is in large part due to the great help of parents in setting up various devices to receive Face Time. All my pupils are making the kind of progress I would be expecting in 'normal' lessons.
Theory work is done as usual with the answers often sent to me as a photo by those very helpful parents! And, of course, playing continues with scales, sight reading and pieces as appropriate!
I am more than pleased with the efforts made by all the children during the lessons and, even more importantly, throughout the week with their practice. I can still tell if this is being done!
On 23 April 2020, we joined the global celebration of World Book Day by recognising the magical power of books, celebrating authors, illustrators, books and most importantly: reading! This worldwide celebration of books has been designated by UNESCO and marked in over 100 countries all over the world.
As an English Language and Literature Teacher, this day is especially near to my heart as I firmly believe that literature forms part of our core. It allows for the soul to enrich itself, especially considering our largely evolving digital world. As part of our World Book Day celebration, a few literary characters joined our online English lessons. The IGCSE 2 Language and MYP 1B Classes were greeted by The Big Bad Wolf, the MYP 2B’s happily shared their favourite books with The Mad Hatter and The White Rabbit made time to see the MYP 1A’s. I would much rather eat worms that admit that my students preferred being taught by these characters…
Safeerah Mughal, an English Student at London South Bank University, beautifully stated that literature makes us laugh and makes us cry. “It dances with our emotions - which is what keeps us alive. Without literature life would be stagnant – listless.”
It has become clear to me that the students at Hout Bay International School share this sentiment and their response to literature this term has been remarkable.
Hout Bay International School SOUTH AFRICA
Art is in the House
Our 7th-grade students recreated the work of important painters from different artistic periods from home. This became a great opportunity to approach art from a different perspective while using their imagination.
Mr. D. García
Visual Arts
Colegio Internacional SEK Costa Rica SAN JOSÉ – COSTA RICA
School Bus Collection Points & Times
Bookings for this week:
Please contact the school office to book a place for your child.
8.10am Normanton on Cliffe
8.20am Ancaster
8.25am Wilsford
On Fridays the bus will run 15 minutes earlier to ensure pupils arrive in time for the *Music Machine" School Band rehearsal.
Access to the School Building after 4.30pm
As you are all aware there is now a gate which has a key code access to the Creche in the evening. If you do not have the code, please call 01476 593293 and your call will be answered by Creche.