Pimlico Primary Journal

July 2022 | Issue 6

A message from Miss Bains

It is my great privilege to write this update for the end of year journal, in my capacity as Acting Head of School, whilst Mrs Hardwick is away on maternity leave.

As we approach the end of the academic year, it is a good time to reflect on some of the year’s highlights and to look forward to the new year ahead.

This has been a unique and very progressive year in which the major feature has been a very welcome return to more ‘normal’ attendance figures, following the lifting of Covid restrictions. It has been simply wonderful to have the pupils back in school and to be working with them face to face again. I think we can reflect on a hugely fulfilling year in which we saw a welcome return to our core framework of high quality face to face teaching, supported by our dynamic extra-curricular programme and our strong axis and interface with parents and carers. These foundations are vital in achieving both progressive learning and the wider wellbeing of our pupils.

I would like to thank all the pupils for their extraordinary enthusiasm, commitment and resilience over the past year. In addition, I would like to extend my very best wishes to those pupils who leave us at the end of this year, particularly those in Year 6. I wish you all the best of luck in the next stages of your education and beyond.

I would like to thank all the parents and carers for their fantastic engagement and continued support across the year, and I would like to thank our incredible team of staff - whose tremendous expertise and dedication underpin all that we do at Pimlico Primary.

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Mrs Hardwick for all her hard work and commitment to Pimlico Primary. We wish her a wonderful maternity leave and look forward to seeing her again next year.

In the meantime, I hope you all have a wonderful summer break. I am already looking forward to working with you all when we return on Monday 5th September.

Best wishes,

Miss Bains

Summer Holiday Activities

With the summer holidays starting, we wanted to include some ideas for things you can do over the holidays.

1. Visit your local library and pick up some new books to read in the holidays. Pimlico Library | Westminster City Council

2. Go on a treasure hunt with your family. Write a list on a piece of paper and tick off the options as you see them. Some examples of what you could look for could be:

A stop sign
An empty park bench
A squirrel
A street sign that starts with the letter ‘S’
A double decker bus
A pink flower
A library
An aeroplane in the sky
An outdoor clock
A brown dog
A twig in the shape of a ‘Y’
A taxi
A phone box
A blue front door
A zebra crossing
A white bicycle
A yellow car
A tube sign
A bird
A river or pond

3. Make a sock puppet and put on a show. Get an old sock and using a pen draw a face on the sock and give it a name. Rehearse and put on a show for your family.

4. Go to the park and create your own obstacle course.

5. Write a story. Get your imagination going and write a short story.

6. Get creative with chalk. Use coloured chalk crayons to draw on paving stabs, you can either draw pictures or create games like hopscotch.

7. Go birdwatching and make your own binoculars.

8. Meet your friends at the local playground and make up obstacle courses using the merry go rounds, swings and more. Be sure to stay safe and do this with adults around.

9. Get creative with homemade playdough. Please see the instructions below.

Ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup water
2 teaspoons cream or tartar
1/3 cup salt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
Food colouring of your choice

Method:
Mix together all the ingredients in a large saucepan.
Cook over low/medium heat while stirring the mixture.
Continue stirring until the mixture is thickened and begins to gather around the spoon.
Remove the dough onto wax paper or a plate to cool.

10. Make milk carton boats. Take an old milk carton and shape it in the fashion of a boat. You can even paint it and stick a toothpick in it with a taped flag! Test it out by putting it in water in the sink or bath. Does it float? If not, your kids can brainstorm on how to fix it.

11. Visit your local park. Make it a day trip if you need to. It is a fun, cheap way to create summer memories with your kids. Pack a lunch and find a good spot!

12. Color changing flowers. Obtain glasses to hold one flower at a time. After pouring them half full of water, put a couple drops of different dye colors in each. Each glass should have a white flower inside. Slowly, they will begin to change!

Curriculum Focus: Art

As part of our Windrush celebrations, Reception made carnival crowns using different materials that included coloured cellophane and feathers.

This term, Year 1 have been focusing on recreating the London skyline. Students have been practising using pencil as a medium to observe and record lines and shapes in actual objects. For their final project, students drew a selection of London landmarks to capture the London skyline.

The Year 2 children made their own landscape paintings ‘en plein air’ using quick brush strokes like Claude Monet and Berthe Morisot. They tried to ‘capture the light’ on the roof garden, choosing to paint the scene of the church and the trees.

The children in Year 3 looked at the Ancient Egyptian artefact discovered in Tutankahmun’s tomb - The Scarab Pectoral. They drew their own version of it, and then simplified their drawing to create a design for printing. They used printing tiles and printing inks to create a repeated pattern of their beetle designs.

They also learnt about two Roman mosaics discovered in The House of Faun in Pompeii: The Alexander mosaic and The Fish mosaic. They carefully drew then painted a sea creature from the fish mosaic before cutting it into tesserae and sticking in a regular mosaic formation on a contrasting background. The results were very special.

The children in Year 4 learnt how to use the grid method to copy, enlarge or reduce images by breaking them down into smaller areas. They chose to copy a portrait of either Elizabeth I or her father Henry VIII, and then used fine brushes and watercolour paints to add colour and detail.

The children in Year 5 looked at the work of a collection of contemporary textile artists and then of the Japanese artist Hokusai.

They used his artwork, ’The Great Wave of Kanguawa’, to inspire their colour choices for their own weaving designs.

The Year 6 children learnt about the Renaissance concept known as Chiaroscuro. They drew still life objects with casting shadows and experimented with different techniques to add light and shade.

Term Dates, Autumn 2022

Autumn Term 2022

Monday 5th September – Term starts

Monday 24th October – Friday 4th November – Autumn half-term

Friday 16th December – Term ends