Junior, Infant and Pre-School Newsletter Issue 6 Friday 16 December 2016 Dear Parents What a triumph of a term! It has been an utterly fantastic finish to 2016, with our girls and boys excelling themselves in every area. So much has transpired this term it is hard to believe and it will be difficult to do justice to the events of the last two weeks. The Junior Carol Concert was sensational, with our pupils reading and performing brilliantly. The little ones enchanted us with ‘Nobody Listens to a Donkey’, an unforgettable performance. We’ve had a visit to the pantomine, a Pre-School Christmas Craft Morning and, of course, the wacky whole school ‘Christmas Mannequin’ challenge, too. Thanks must also go to our Friends of KGS for a lovely Christmas Fair. It is with sadness that we say farewell to Miss Whatmough who has secured a permanent post from January 2017. I am sure you will join me in wishing her every success for her future career. Despite the challenges of fatigue and illness in the last few days of school, the pupils and staff have done tremendously well to keep going. Now we have a chance to gain some respite from the serious pace of life here at KGJS and recharge our batteries. On behalf of all the staff here at the Junior School can I wish you all a fantastic Christmas and New Year break. We look forward to seeing you all refreshed and raring to go in 2017!t ma Mrs AS Roberts Headmistress
Follow me on Twitter: Annette Roberts @KGJShead
Owain Heathcote-Jones ended a fantastic year of swimming, which had started with a top ten GB ranking, by winning five gold medals at the Cumbria County ASA Winter Meet. Owain stormed to victory in the 100m Butterfly, 50m Butterfly, 200m Backstroke, 100m Freestyle and 50m Freestyle events. Owain produced a series of outstanding performances in the pool as he swept aside the county’s top swimmers over two days of intense competition and recorded five new personal best times. That’s not all! Only five minutes after winning a gruelling 100m Butterfly race (4 lengths of butterfly) in a new personal best time, Owain was again back in the pool to produce another fantastic performance to win silver in the 50m Backstroke event. Earlier this year, Owain helped his swimming club, Carnforth Otters, to reach the prestigious North West Micro-League Division A Grand Final and the North West Arena League Division 1 Final. Well done Owain, fantastic swimming!
‘Oh no we didn’t….Oh yes we did!’ Yesterday, all the Infants and Juniors went to see ‘Jack and The Beanstalk’ at the Lowther Pavilion. It was a fantastic morning and a lovely Christmas treat for everyone. It was wonderful to see KGS pupil, Grace Barber on stage, too. All the children joined in with the spirit of the pantomime and they all enjoyed their ice-creams during the interval. The children were well behaved and a credit to the school.
It was a great finish to the year when four teams played a fun tournament in Christmas hats, as part of the Friday night Hockey Club! A very enjoyable time was had by all!
Last week, J2 organised a fantastic German Market during breaktime. They served German sausages, gingerbread and fruit punch, and the children were also able to purchase a raffle ticket to be in with a chance of winning a wonderful gingerbread house. The winner was Trishala in J2X. This event raised a fantastic ÂŁ483.15 which will go towards the Junior Production of Aladdin. Well done, J2.
During their Art lesson, the I3 children experimented with tints, mixing white paint with green to create different tints for their Christmas trees! Well done I3, your trees looked amazing!
This year’s Infant and Pre-School Production, ‘Nobody Ever Listens to a Donkey’, was wonderfully performed by all the Pre-School and Infant children with beautiful singing, professional acting and amazing dancing from all. The children looked brilliant in their costumes and thoroughly enjoyed retelling the traditional Christmas tale in this very unique way! Well done to everyone who took part. The performance was truly spectacular and enjoyed by all!
On Friday 2 December, KGJS hosted the annual AJIS U11 Boys Hockey Tournament. Nine schools took part in what was a very competitive, but very enjoyable, tournament. The competition was divided into two pools of five teams with Kirkham having an A and B team. In the pool games, Kirkham A team beat St Bedes, Manchester 2-0 (goals scored by James Stacey and Harvey Barber), beat Manchester Grammar School 1-0 (James Stacey), beat Redcourt 3-0 (Alexander Kane, Wills Gut and James Stacey) and against The Grange drew 0-0. This meant they topped the group and played Cheadle Hulme in the semi-final. The score after full and extra time was 2-2 (goals scored by Harvey Barber and James Stacey). The game could only be decided by penalty rushes, where a player has to score a goal against the keeper within 10 seconds. Will Davies was the Kirkham keeper and was outstanding, preventing the opposition from scoring. Our players scored twice (Wills Gut and Alexander Kane) which put us into the final against AKS. An early goal by James Stacey settled the nerves and, whilst both teams played really well and were a credit to their schools, Kirkham eventually won and were crowned AJIS Champions for 2016. Kirkham B team also had an excellent afternoon of Hockey. In the pool matches, they played very well and earned a victory against Newcastle under Lyme and a draw against Rossall. After this they progressed to the plate and played Manchester Grammar School in the semi-finals, only to lose 3-0. Alex Maude was the leading goal scorer with 3 goals for the B team. Well done to all of our players in what was a very enjoyable afternoon and thank you to all our parents who came to support, you really do make a difference!
St Nicholas visited Pre-School during the nights of 6 December and left some sweets in a pair of wellies. When we found the sweets inside the wellies we knew something magical had happened. We have spent a lot of time reading Christmas stories and our favourite one is ‘The True Story of Christmas’. It talks about Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem, the birth of baby Jesus in a stable and all the special visitors. Dressing up and acting out the Nativity was so much fun, we can now retell the story by ourselves. Our performance as sheep in the Infant and Pre-School Christmas Production was amazing and we have even been told how wonderful our dance moves were. We have started doing mindfulness as a regular five minute Carpet Time activity and we are finding it fascinating. We feel calm and ready to concentrate after a few listening exercises, so we are definitely going to keep doing mindfulness at Pre-School! Our Christmas Craft morning was a success. We sold wrapping paper and tags, homemade biscuits and hot chocolate reindeer in our ‘Christmas £1’ stall. We thoroughly enjoyed making Christmas Crafts with our families! Thank you to everyone who came along to support.
Christmas is an exceptionally busy time for our KGJS Vocal Ensemble and this year was no exception as they were once again invited to entertain Booths’ customers in Lytham and Poulton. They were also invited to the Forget-me-Not cafÊ in Lytham to take part in an event organised for people living with dementia, their family and carers. The children beautifully sang an array of festive carols and enjoyed chatting to guests afterwards. As always, the children were excellent ambassadors of KGJS. Thank you to all of the children who took part.
The J3 children have been busy creating their own Air Raid Shelters as part of their History topic on WWII. An enormous amount of hard work and creativity went into each model and it was fantastic to see so many different materials used in so many different ways. Well done, J3!
Basic Baking Club had lots of fun at their Christmas decorating party! They enjoyed decorating Christmas Bauble cakes, Christmas Pudding cake pops and Reindeer biscuits.
Last Friday, pupils and staff arrived at school wearing their ‘Christmas Jumpers’ and what a wonderful array of designs there were, too! More photographs are available to view on our KGS Flickr page at https:// w ww.f li ck r. co m/ph otos/ k gsp ho tos / albums/72157673636842734
Pupils and staff recently took part in a whole school ‘Mannequin Challenge’ with the Senior School. The video is now available to view via our KGS Facebook and Twitter page as well as on You Tube.
A fantastic night of Athletics took place on Monday 5 December at YMCA in Lytham, as KGJS faced Lytham Athletics Club for a number of events, including sprints, throws, jumps and relays. Overall scores: U11 Girls Kirkham 86 Lytham 62 U11 Boys Kirkham 96 Lytham 52 Thank you to Lytham AC for hosting a very enjoyable night of Athletics.
Once again the Junior School presented an outstanding Carol Concert on Wednesday evening. An enthusiastic audience enjoyed the traditional carols and readings by James Stacey, Heidi Aldeen, Oscar Harkins, Emily Marsh, Daisy Gibbs, Gabby Holland and Rachel Watson. Mrs Roberts reminded us of the importance of the Christmas message and explained the meaning of the Christingle. Pippa McGregor also spoke about the Christingle in German, with Alice Wright translating into English. The performances by the Orchestra, Handbell Ensemble, Vocal Ensemble and Choir thrilled the audience, and the soloists sang beautifully. It was wonderful to welcome the Bishop of Lancaster, The Rt Revd Geoff Pearson, who shared his thoughts for Christmas with us, along with our School Chaplain, Revd Bunday. Afterwards, our guests enjoyed mince pies, stollen and GlĂźhwein; a wonderful way to finish off a very enjoyable evening and an excellent start to the festive season!
Videos and photographs from our Junior School Christmas Carol Concert are available to view on our KGS Facebook page.
Our J3 pupils have been busy making 'Reindeer Dust'! All monies raised will go to Classrooms in the Clouds Thank you in advance for your support.
Sport/Event Photographs If parents take photographs at school events/sports fixtures we would love to see them! They may even get used in school newsletters, on the website and in press releases. Please email them to Michelle Tickle at m.tickle@kirkhamgrammarjnr.co.uk Thank you
Kirkham Grammar Junior School Facebook news is now on the Kirkham Grammar School Facebook page….we hope this will make the ‘whole school news’ easier to follow! Please visit and ‘LIKE’ the KGS page for all the latest news, photographs and information. The Facebook page name is ‘Kirkham Grammar School’ and can be easily identified from our KGS logo above.
House Sub-total Please follow us on Twitter for the Fylde 2304 latest news at KGJS! Please could we kindly ask parents/carers not to park on
9.12.16
Total
241
2545
Kirkham the yellowtwitter.com/kgjs_ lines within the school car park and keep these 2392 clear at all times in case of an emergency. Preston 2505
193
2585
237
2742
Thank you
234
2524
School
2290
Well done to the following children who were awarded a Merit Certificate at the end of this half term:
I1X
Alexa Airton, Isabella Eagle
I1Y
Esme Brookes, Ava Godbold
I2X
Charlie Hawe, John Watson, Lily Whalley
I2Y
Bea Brooks, Esme Lawson, Isaac Wan
I3X
Daisy Bellamy, Liberty Kirszanek, Joel Rogers
I3Y
Leo Paraskeva, Raia Trend, Freddie Wiltshire
J1X
Jack Dawson-Gerrard, Zara Gilchrist, Harley Marginson
J1Y
James Hall, Oliver Parker, Alice Wright
J2X
Trishala Akundi, Rosie Helliwell, Jason Soar
J2Y
Lucy Jones, Ava Reed, Amelie Singleton
J3X
Alexa Anderson, Jake Pedley, James Shuttleworth
J3Y
AmĂŠlie Wilson, Charlie Wiltshire, April Wright
J4X
Maisie Bailey, Oliver Greenwood, Sam Medhurst
J4Y
Jacob Adjety-Hilton, Ellee Mee, James Stacey
Congratulations to you all!
THE FRIENDS OF KIRKHAM GRAMMAR SCHOOL
♦ ♣ CASINO NIGHT AND DINNER ♥ ♠ Saturday 4 February 2017 7pm - 1am Barton Grange Hotel, Barton, Preston £39.00 per person Application forms are available from the Senior School Reception and can also be downloaded from the school website. Any queries, please contact Mrs Valerie Bennett by email at redstar_v12b@yahoo.co.uk or Mrs Pendergest or Mrs Atkinson at the Senior School on 01772 684264.
Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a peaceful New Year! Spring Term begins on Monday 9 January 2017