The children displayed their commitment to the many disciplines of Sport on offer this week. The football and hockey teams played brilliantly against Rossall on Wednesday, and the rugby team competed bravely against Scarisbrick Hall. The children have also been practising for their upcoming swimming galas. Well done children for your courage and excellent teamwork skills, and my thanks goes to Mr Moretti for giving the children as many opportunities as possible to play competitive sport.
Academically, the children transferred their skills of tenacity and perseverance from the sports pitches to their studies this week as they completed their end of term assessments in readiness for their reports to be published at the end of term.
Finally, it was wonderful to see so many parents from the Butterflies Class attend our first Christmas Craft morning with their child today!
Amanda Ilhan
Head of Nursery and Preparatory School
Nursery
This week in Ladybirds we have been learning all about transport and how different vehicles move. We have had our own car wash, made a ramp for our vehicles to race down and even went on a trip to the North Pole on the Polar Express!
In Bees this, week the children have loved looking at numbers and clocks. The children have enjoyed joining in with ‘What time is it Mr Wolf?’ outside and in the hall. The children have been counting with a variety of Noah's Ark animals, number cookies and of course the 'Five Little Ducks' in the water tray. They have had a ride in the Kiddy bus, looking around our environment for numbers in our wonderful grounds.
Nursery Team
Reception
In between learning the songs for the Christmas Play and rehearsing, the Reception Class have continued with their space theme this week. They have created some scary aliens and interesting spaceships, as well as an astronaut calendars.
In Maths, we have been learning about + and = and how to write a number sentence to match what we can see practically in front of us. Well done to all the children who were successfully able to write three different ways to make 4.
Miss Allen and Mrs Walsh
Year 1
In addition to working with perseverance and commitment on their tests this week, Year 1 have been busy learning about the original meaning of Christmas with Mrs Cole and thinking about what they could give as a gift at Christmas, which cannot be bought in a shop. There were some very lovely answers!
In Cultural Craft Club, the children have more than one project on the go, as these are often very complicated and time consuming. The first is associated with Mexico and the ‘Day of the Dead’ using jointed skeleton shapes, the second is Kimono doll bookmarks associated with Japan.
Mrs Smith and Mrs Brooker
Year 2
Year 2 are learning about the polar regions in their Geography lessons and have completed some wonderful projects about a whole range of polar animals. They have used their research skills to find out interesting facts about Arctic and Antarctic animals.
We are well on the way with rehearsals for our Christmas Play, learning lots of songs and our speaking parts. We are very excited and hope you have already got your tickets booked for a magical production of The Little Red Robin!
Mrs Bleasdale
Year 3
A busy time for Year 3 this week as we have been completing our first KS2 assessments. We have worked hard in our English and Maths lessons this term to do as well as we can in our PIRA, PUMA and GAPS papers.
In our Science lessons, we have been exploring opaque, translucent, and transparent objects. We used torches and different objects helping us to learn that opaque objects let no light through, translucent let some light through and transparent let lots of light through.
In Outdoor Learning, we have been looking at different types of maps. Despite the poor weather recently, we were lucky this week and managed to go around the school and map the grounds.
Mrs Blinston and Mr Worthington
Year 4
This week in Year 4, we have been busy with our termly assessments in comprehension, Mathematics, grammar and spelling. We have worked to the best of our ability and shown resilience too.
In Humanities, we are finding out about lines of latitude and longitude as well as compass directions, so we went outside and used a compass to find North and devised a route using the eight compass points.
In our swimming lesson, we have been practising lengths and strokes ready for our swimming gala.
Mrs Briggs
Year 5
This week Year 5 have completed their PIRA, PUMA and GAPS assessments, working very hard to do their very best on every question.
In our Art lessons, we continued to create lovely artwork inspired by Gustav Holst. This week involved opening our tie dye pieces - it was fantastic to cut off the ties and see the patterns.
We have also continued our study of the Romans with Mr Avis, learning about leadership and how power was delegated.
Mrs Whitaker
Year 6
The standard of project work completed in Year 6 this week has surpassed all expectations. A very well done to Sadie, Alyssa, Lucy and Rupert for their spectacular display pieces investigating World War 2- we even had the opportunity to look closely at authentic artefacts including a hand grenade!
Year 6 have been creating interesting characters in Drama and telling stories through playmaking. Lots of excellent performance planning and rehearsing could be seen in the Senior School Drama Studio.
Finally, in Maths, the children have busy using and applying their skills solving fraction based multi-step worded problems. Well done to Bella, Scarlett, Lucy, Harry, Henry, Tom and Jackson for challenging themselves and using bar models and partition method to explain their reasoning. Next week’s new topic is geometry.
Mr Avis and Mr Rice
Sport Round-up
What a week to be an AKS Sports Star and such a positive learning experience for each child and an opportunity to represent #TeamAKS.
Last Friday, our U11A Rugby Squad attended the Stockport Grammar Rugby Festival, competing against various other independent schools from across the Northwest. With competition high, our boys had to work extremely hard in all their matches and scored some magnificent tries with some great tackles and offensive play throughout. Tries: Archie, Will H, Will VR, Noah, Joe and George.
On Wednesday, our U11A Rugby Squad travelled to Scarisbrick Hall to take part in an afternoon's rugby with KGS and Merchant Taylors. With the morning storms making for a muddy afternoon, the boys got stuck in and gave another great account of themselves. Every boy gave their all to the cause, the tackling improved along with the confidence to carry the ball forward. Tries: Archie, Jackson and Joe.
Our U9 Football Squads travelled to Rossall for two friendly fixtures. With many boys representing the school for the first time in fixtures, this was a great introduction to competitive sport and one that all the boys did well. With a defeat for our A squad and a win, loss and draw for our B squad, it was a great opportunity for all. Scorers: George and Raife.
Our U10 Girls Hockey Squads welcomed Rossall to AKS for an afternoon of hockey in the first outing for our newly formed teams. With both sets of girls working well, it was great to see them develop their skills on the pitch. Our A squad suffered a narrow defeat with our B squad making a real statement of intent with a great win. Well done to all the girls. Scorers: (A) Penny (2), (B) Emily H, Winnie (4), Kaitlyn (2) and Sienna (3).
Mr Moretti
Music News
Don't forget our Christmas Spectacular on Friday 2nd December! All children from Year 3 to Year 6 will be performing as part of the Prep Orchestra, and we can't wait to hear them play! Please spread the news and sell as many tickets as possible!
Mr Thomas
MFL News
This week Year 1 have consolidated their learning on garden creatures, colours and numbers. Year 3 have started to look at the tradition of 'Las Posadas' in Mexico and other parts of the Spanish-speaking world in preparation for our own version of the event later this term.
Year 4 did some excellent work in French, working out the meaning of unknown words in the story of 'La Belle et la Bête' and Year 5 have been exploring the traditional tale 'der Rattenfänger von Hameln' in German. Year 6 are working on their understanding of Columbus Day/Día de la Hispanidad in Spanish.
