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discovers that sometimes it’s ok not to be ok. We also talked about the film Inside Out, which makes a statement to parents and children alike: emotions are important and need to be validated and understood as part of a child's development. Inside Out and ‘Lucy’s Blue Day’ teach us about embracing and accepting all of our emotions, both On Saturday 10th October it is World ‘good’ and ‘bad’. It turns out that our Mental Health Day. Throughout the unique tapestry of emotional responses, week the children have found out what whether joy, anger, curiosity, disgust, we mean by mental health and wellbeing surprise, sadness, fear, shame or guilt all and that we all have mental health just as serve a distinctive and important we have physical health. We have purpose. explored how they can promote their own wellbeing and stay mentally healthy. Additionally, Mrs Clarke and Mrs Bateson have created yellow bags (the colour for mental health day for this year) with a collection of stories for each year group to share. There were different books for each class every day on a different aspect of mental health such as worries, emotions, and diversity. In my PSHE lessons I read Chris Duke’s book ‘Lucy’s Blue Day’, a story of a girl called Lucy who has wonderful hair As you will be aware we had our first which changes colour to reflect how she positive case of Covid-19 at St Peter’s feels. It turns yellow when she is happy; 2-8. I know that this will have worried purple when she’s excited and red when many of the school community including she is angry. One day she wakes up to parents and staff and with that being the discover her hair is dark blue – a new case we are very appreciative of how the colour she has never felt before. school community has pulled together to Throughout the book Lucy takes us on manage the mandatory 14-day isolation her journey to try and understand what period. Many of you have other children has caused he hair to turn blue and in school and elsewhere, and managing work and family commitments. Our aim is to support you having had to close Nursery at such short notice. The impact of so many staff having to isolate has been brilliantly managed by the staff in school. The Coronavirus COVID-19- updates from the Health Services Manager Mr Ashley teachers, Mason teaching Firstly, thank you for your support already in helping us to look after all students and staff at St Peter’s. I would like to take this opportunity to remind you of a few key points: When to stay off school - We know it is very hard to tell the difference between many common viruses such as simple colds, but to keep everyone safe you must strictly follow the Government’s testing and isolation criteria. This means anyone with a new cough, temperature or changes to taste and/or smell must stay away from school and have a test. Access to testing - You may be aware a walk through test station has opened at York University. This is available to all residents, not just students of the University. Tests are booked via the gov.uk website as they are for Poppleton.
Newsletter No: 5 Friday, 9th October 2020 assistants, cleaners, catering staff, facilities assistants, support staff and staff across the 3-18 school community have secured the continuity of the educational provision. Particular thanks to our Medical Team led by Ashley Mason who liaised with PHE and supported the children and staff. Tomorrow would normally be our Open Day for prospective children and families. This year we are hosting a Virtual Open Morning. You can also see a number of films (and here, and here) that were recently created providing a small glimpse into the life of St Peter’s 2-8. The one area we can’t replicate on a virtual tour is the magical, vibrant atmosphere the school has as you walk around the stunning classrooms and learning spaces. To that end we are inviting families to visit in person in the evenings and at weekends and in line with Covid-9 guidelines to meet me and have a tour of the school. We are pleased to announce that we will be running a holiday club from 19th to 23rd October; please read further information here. We are finalising the parents’ evening arrangements and resolving some queries and will release appointments early next week. Finally, huge thanks to the Friends of St Peter’s 2-8 who have agreed to purchase waterproof overalls for the children to wear at Forest School and Outdoor Play. ON behalf of the children and staff, we really appreciate the spend of over £2000 as this will enable the children to explore forest school and outdoor learning in all weathers without the need to bring waterproofs from home. I hope you have a wonderful weekend.
learning superheroes •Bertie R
•Amara A
•Charlotte W •Annabel W
Notice Board value champions •William F
•Harriet R
•Louis B
•Edward B
•Emilia B
•Tulsi S
•Caleb B
•Natalie A
•Alfie S-D
•Lochie H
•Ralph W
•James R-P
•Sophie G
•Erin G
•Giorgio M
•Immie E
•Molly D-P
•Siena B
•Bertie T-P
house points trophy
MUSIC Musical Notes – We are all getting very excited in Years 2 and 3 looking forward to our first concerts next week! The choirs have blown me away this week, the children really are in fine voice. The Year 2 Concert is on Tuesday 13th October at 2pm and Mrs Hallgate has circulated the Zoom code already. If you are not able to join our Zoom audience live, we will be making a recording to share with you. The Year 3 Concert is on Friday 16th October at 10.45am. Mrs Hallgate will share the Zoom code with you in Tuesday’s email. This concert will also be recorded. Please can all the children performing have their instruments and music in school on their concert day. Many thanks, Mrs Hayden.
PE award •Lottie W•David L •Xi Z
Music award
Walmgate
•Myla W •Dhruv D
Year 2 have really put their new hockey skills into practice this week. They have been working hard on their push pass technique and knowing the difference between attack and defence. I will look forward to seeing their new skills on display in next week's InterHouse Hockey Tournament.
PE
In Core PE, they have shown great creativity creating their own hopping and jumping obstacle course. Applying their travel and flight skills that they developed earlier in the term.
Please could you ensure Year 3 Reminder your child has a gum shield, shin pads and Year 3 have their Interlong navy and white stripy House Hockey school socks. These are tournament next Monday. essential in order to take part.
Acorns
We love to spend time outside at Nursery and this week the Acorns have most definitely embraced their outdoor play!
As we continue to experience Autumn time in Nursery, this week it has mainly been about pumpkins! We have investigated them, cut them open,
hammered them with nails, created a large one, and of course, made and eaten pumpkin soup! Also this week we ventured out and made it all the way down to our forest school area!
Conkers
Ahoy me hearties!
discussed how it’s just as important to keep our minds healthy as it is to keep our bodies healthy. We have This week Reception have transformed into pirates read books such as ‘Cowboys Can Be Kind’ and ‘The and have been exploring the seven seas. We have been Koala Who Could’ and spoken about why it’s busy making our own pirate hats, eye patches, spy important to be kind to others and how important it glasses, cutlasses and hooks and have really got into is to be brave and to try new things! our scary pirate characters! The children have built pirate ships, protecting their ship by adding cannons What a super week! to fire at the enemy and they have also chosen people to walk the plank! Aye Aye Captain! Many treasure maps have been made and the children have been busy following the maps in search of the hidden treasure, digging in the sand and filling the treasure chest with lots of golden, shiny coins! We have also had chats about keeping our minds healthy to link with Mental Health week. We have
RECEPTION
RECEPTION cont.
This week in Year 1 our focus has been on Mental Health week. We have been discussing with the children what mental health means and talking about our feelings and how they can change. We have used story books such as The Worrysaurus, Something Else and The Colour Monster to help us understand our own and others' feelings and help with our discussions. We have done lots of calming and collaborative activities both inside and outside of the classroom from yoga to watercolour painting and board games, incorporating them into our daily routines. On Tuesday the children walked down by the river and practised mindful breathing whilst looking at and taking in their surroundings. We have also been continuing our work on story maps and
YEAR 1
story language and creating our own versions of stories which the children have enjoyed telling in different forms using apps on the iPad, putting on plays or making characters from their stories. There has also been lots of interest in sewing too this week. We have had a variety of things made, from curtains to decorate houses, to stuffed Colour Monsters and cushions and some children even having a go at designing and making their own clothes! Another very busy week, the time seems to have flown this half term!
YEAR 1 cont.
2H Our Firebird theme has been so inspiring that 2H have been continuing their excitement at home! Sophia’s mummy made this surprise for her and Olivia M’s grandma even made her a Firebird wordsearch! We have also continued to enjoy learning about Australia, after reading ‘Wombat goes Walkabout’. We have started our first proper (very grown up) research project, which is to make a research sheet all about our favourite Australian animal. We have used iPads and books to find out facts and we are going to use different headings and captions to separate our posters into sections. Mrs Hall knows our illustrations
will be amazing because 2H are already starting to be very arty! This Wednesday’s art was all about Australian Aboriginal dot paintings and we used outlines of our hands to paint careful dots to make beautiful pictures. In maths, our work on different methods of addition has led to… column addition! This is already a hit in 2H and we have been using equipment to help us work out the answer, then working carefully to present our work neatly and accurately. On top of all this, we have been reading special books based around helping our mental health and wellbeing. Monday’s book was read at the forest, in the sun. What a lovely thing to do with our friends!
This has been a particularly fantastic week in 2J and I have felt tremendously grateful to work with such a gorgeous bunch of little people every day! We have celebrated lots of birthdays across our year group this week and it has emphasised just how caring and compassionate Year 2 are. I have seen so many acts of kindness which have brightened my day and made me feel incredibly proud. I want to say a BIG thank you to you all 2J and well done for always demonstrating our school values.
lava jars (with a special little fire creature inside!) using coloured water and oil. We observed how the oil didn't mix with the water and learned that this is because oil is less dense than water. A big thank you to Mrs Jones for showing us how washing up liquid affects oil and water!
2J
have begun researching other Australian animals from the story including emus, kangaroos, kookaburras, venomous spiders and koalas. The children have found some incredible facts from their research using books and online We had a wonderful Wednesday afternoon sources; it has been a learning experience with more amazing art; as we have moved for Mrs Moss and me too with all of the on to Australian bush fires after receiving a knowledge they have passed on to us! Next new story from the Firebird, it was only week, we hope to put the information from fitting that we looked at some classic our plans into information posters to share One of our highlights from this week had to aboriginal art. The children drew around this knowledge with others too. be our science experiment! We investigated their hands and used dotting techniques to what makes a solution and what makes a create artwork of this style. After becoming Well done 2J, a fabulous week and thank suspension by trying to mix different fascinated by wombats from our most you for making my job incredibly easy! substances. The children made their own recent text Wombat Goes Walkabout, we
finishing these this week and once dry, painted them gold. In Maths we are continuing with our theme of numbers and have been working on more/less than. Using a combination of Maths equipment, themed Maths games and our mental mathematic knowledge we have challenged ourselves to work on BIG numbers and applied our learnt concepts to work on tricky word problems! Time is flying in Year Three and we can’t believe we only have one week left before half-term! Next week we are going to be Resilient Romans in training…watch this space!
YEAR 3
It has been an exciting week in Year Three! We received ANOTHER letter from Corvus to tell us that he is lost in the Museum Gardens and can’t find his way back. We eventually spotted him by the Multangular Tower with a scrapbook of pictures from his journey tucked under his wing. When we got back to school, we looked at all of the places he had visited and used maps to record the coordinates of each place. We are going to keep a close eye on him from now on! Last week we started making our own Julius Caesar coins out of clay. We had great fun skilfully etching his bust onto our coins and writing his name using different tools. We enjoyed
Friends of St Peter’s 2-8 (formerly Clifton School Friends)
Welcome (back) to school life, and apologies for taking so long to make contact from our Friends headquarters! For those who have not come across us before, Friends of St Peter’s 2-8 is a group of parents who meet regularly and volunteer their time to support the children attending the school. The ways in which we do this are many and varied but usually involve lots of fun for both parents and children. We try to arrange a social event for parents as well as a special treat or themed activity for the children every term. Events range from The Great Clifton Bake-Off, Valentine’s Disco, Easter Pyjama Party and Summer Fete for the children, to Autumn Pub Safari, Quiz Night and Pop-Up Cafés for the grown ups. All of our events are planned, organised, managed and run by our volunteers and raise money for the designated school charity for the year, as well as for additional resources for the children. In doing these events, we also provide a social platform for parents to interact and make friends within the school community. Our fundraising has provided many complementary items and activities for the children. We organised a twoday willow weaving workshop where every child in the school made a fish out of willow, as well as contributing to the large willow tree which now stands proudly outside the Dining Room. We have paid for waterproof suits for every child in the school to wear when attending Forest School. We have purchased interactive play materials for use in the playground and After School Care, and have contributed to the annual Year 3 trip to London and Leavers’ Hoodies. We have also raised significant funds for the various school charities over the years, which, when combined with the large amounts the children themselves have raised, ensure that whichever charity we are supporting, they receive a substantial and significant donation at the end of the school year. Sadly, but inevitably, our events and future plans have been severely disrupted since March by the impact of Covid-19. Our 3rd Annual Summer Fete, Clif-Fest, was cancelled in June and plans to hold an Autumn social and The Great Clifton Bake-Off this term have had to be put on hold until further notice. Even our group meetings have to take place in the playground and socially distanced! As you can imagine, all of this will have an enormous impact on the funds we raise this year, in particular for the school charity. But fear not! As with all things Pandemic-related, we are finding ways to think differently and coming up with new, interesting and innovate ways to fundraise. We are working hard to ensure that we can still raise money and awareness for our school charity, whilst hopefully enjoying ourselves either socially distanced or virtually. So please do look out for more information in the coming weeks and we hope you will be able to continue to support us with our new and exciting projects this year.
The FoSP2-8 Team