We had great fun today at our Christmas party. We played lots of games, enjoyed some yummy food and watched a Christmas film.
We even had a visit from a special person – Father Christmas! He must have read the letter we sent him because he bought us the new dolls we were hoping for.
Merry Christmas everyone!
This week it was the last week of Forest School for this group of Year 5 children. We had a fire and toasted marshmallows. Everyone was very good at remembering the fire safety rules. We always walk around the fire circle. We wait until we are invited to the fire. We kneel in the respect position when at the fire.
The marshmallows tasted delicious!
In our reflection time we thought back over the last few weeks. Here are some of the children’s thoughts:
“I used to not care a lot about nature but now, because of Forest School, I care much more about wildlife”
“I liked it when we got to climb trees”
“It taught me more about nature”
“I usually don’t like bugs but now we’ve learnt about them I like them”
“I got to learn new games from my friends”
I would like to say a big well done to Reception for their nativity, they were fantastic! Even though they missed out on some rehearsal time, they all worked so hard and made me very proud!
Parents joined Birmingham and Solihull Women’s Aid to take part in a ladies only session. They discussed many issues effecting women, the impact of these and where to access support. Parents were able to gain information to share with others and felt confident in being able to support friends, family or loved ones who may need it.
Keep a look out for more sessions!
This half term Year 3 have been learning all about Christianity and the Trinity in their Religious Education lessons. On Friday Year 3 visited St. Martin in the Bullring church. This church is one of the most ancient and contemporary buildings in Birmingham. Most of this Grade II listed church is from the nineteenth century. It was built in 1873 and is an example of gothic Victorian architecture, designed by Alfred Chatwin, from Birmingham, who also worked on the Houses of Parliament. But St Martin’s is much older than that. There has been a church on this site since 1290 and there may well have been a simple place of worship here even in Saxon times.
Year 3 were given a tour by Christina, the families’ minister. After welcoming us inside, she told us more about St. Martin He was a soldier who was born in Hungary in the year 316. He never wanted to join the army but did not have a choice. One bitterly cold winter’s night he was riding through the Amiens in France. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a cold beggar huddled against a wall. Martin was so moved by the sight that he cut his cloak with his sword and gave one half to the beggar. That night he had a dream in which Christ appeared to him as the beggar and thanked Martin for clothing him. In response, the young soldier got baptised. St Martin is remembered today for his service to the poor.
Then, she explained about the different parts of the church and what they were used for. Year 3 were able to share their new learning with Christina, especially about baptism. The church has many stained glass windows, all of which have a special meaning. Year 3 were particularly impressive in their recognition of the signs of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.
Year 3 found out that one of the windows survived the bombings of the Blitz in Birmingham! This was due to the priest at the time having a vision and insisting that the window be taken down, piece by piece, and stored safely until after the war.
A huge thank you to Christina our knowledgeable minister, Mrs Sheckler and Ms Muhammad for joining us and also Year 3 who were first class ambassadors for St. Clement’s Academy.
During Maths Week Reception have been reading a counting by feet book called ‘One Is a Snail Ten Is a Crab’. Reception really enjoyed this week and counting all the feet. 
The children loved making footprints and counting their feet.
We painted using Numicon, counted the dots and wrote the number to match.
The children also carried out their own child-initiated maths learning.
This week our story of the week has been a funny counting story about Father Christmas. He drank lots of cups of tea at all the different houses.
We gave our toy Father Christmas different numbers of cups of tea. We practised counting them slowly, pointing at each one as we counted. We showed how many cups of tea he had on our fingers. We also made marks on paper to represent numbers.
On Wednesday after school all the staff wrapped up warm and went outside for their staff training. We found out what Forest School is and its benefits for the children.
We also learnt how to make a star using willow, how to use a flint and steel and we toasted marshmallows!
In science this half term Year 6 have been studying light and shadow. They have looked at ways in which shadows are formed and how light from a light source is blocked by opaque objects and therefore shadows are created.
The children linked this with Christmas and made shadow puppets of reindeers and other Christmas ideas. The children will perform their shadow puppet plays next week.
During Maths week this year, Year 3 have focused their learning around the story ‘The Royal Treasure Measure’ by Trudy Harris. This is a story all about the problems King Balbazar and his subjects have because they do not have a standard unit for measure!
There are problems with making doors, curtains and royal robes fit, so the king decides to hold a competition to find a standard unit of measurement. People in his kingdom used everything to measure with – from candles to sausages!
During the week, Year 3 worked collaboratively to first estimate and then measure accurately to the nearest centimetre and some to the nearest millimetre. Then the challenge was set to find total measurements of two shorter pieces of chain as the king needed chains of certain lengths for different occasions. This was a tricky challenge because Year 3 had to apply their previous learning of written strategies to solve the problem. Would every two pieces of chain meet the criteria? Extra challenge also had some children using decimal amounts to add together!
Ask Year 3 to explain and demonstrate their addition skills.