Sally Atkins 28/05/2021 Sally Atkins 28/05/2021

Happy half term

Well done year 6!

This week our Year 6’s have completed a mock SATS weeks to enable them to fully experience life at the top of the school and to allow staff to see how well they have progressed. All the pupils were impeccably behaved and to celebrate their achievements, the children were treated to pizza and a film on Friday afternoon. We are all extremely proud of them.

Year 3 and 4

As part of our Art and DT curriculums, the children have been learning to sew. After practising on a piece of card , they moved onto Binca to develop their running stitches. Some children learnt how to cross stich too! They tie-dyed a piece of fabric and will be using their sewing skills to create a quilt piece.

We also built our own looms and learn to weave, selecting different colours and textures of fabric and wool for effect. We think that they look fabulous!

This week in RE, Year 3 and 4 have been learning about Sacred Places, what it means for something to be 'sacred' and how this may make us or others feel. The children have thought about what they might put in a shrine within a sacred place and why.

We have also performed the play scripts that we had written based the opening scene of “The Tempest”. We needed to learn about how to write a play script, including the use of colons and brackets for stage directions.

Chris Lindsay 23/05/2021 Chris Lindsay 23/05/2021

Stanmore Post - 21 May 2021

Dear Parents/ Carers,

Outdoor learning day yesterday was successful and enjoyable. The children were able to be part of their house teams within their class bubbles. Thank you for your support in sending them dressed and prepared for the day. Fortunately it only got showery towards the end of the afternoon. Reflecting on the day, the children said that they enjoyed making the miniature village dens the most. However, there were many other activities that they enjoyed. The hanging art was popular because this was part of an inter-house team competition for the outdoor artist’s prize. It was a close call but Lark House were the winners with a beautiful display of carefully constructed hanging art. The outdoor art theme continued with chalk drawings and alphabetical letters made by collecting very small natural materials. In other areas around the school children created giant symmetrical bugs using wood and natural materials and they enjoyed the opportunity to make potions. I am sure you have noticed the fence weaving by the carpark, the colour is very striking. Hanging in the woodland trees are a number of bug hotels made using natural materials.

Stepping back from the activities, it was a pleasure to notice some other the other features of this positive event. Seeing the children work so well in teams was lovely. During the reflection at the end of the day the children commented on co-operation, one of our keys for success. This was the key that the children believed that they had most successfully demonstrated. The other one was ‘resilience’ as some children surprised themselves by being able to cope with the outdoors all day. We see this event linking into our residential activities – Minstead in December for Year 4 and Stubbington in September for Year 6. Building traditions that are part of the Stanmore Curriculum helps the children to develop a range of skills and emotional resilience. If your child is anxious about the residential it might help to remind them how well they coped with and enjoyed the outdoor learning day. If you have a child in Year 3 or Year 5 at the moment and you haven’t completed a form for our residential offers yet this can be done via SCOPAY. Please contact the school office if you have any queries.

Our wider curriculum is beginning to open up and we have a popular Dance Club, Intergr8 that runs after school on Wednesdays. We also have a KS2 girls’ football and Y5/6 boys’ football clubs. Children can still sign up for these chargeable clubs. On Monday you will receive a letter offering the remaining spaces and providing more details. We are also booking our music teachers for next year. On Monday, you will receive a letter asking you if you would like to sign your child up for music lessons with a Hampshire Music Teacher. We currently offer teaching in string instruments, brass instruments, piano or percussion. There is a cost involved, music lessons are £100/term and for that reason we offer a trial lesson before you commit to the term. If you have any questions about clubs or music lessons, please ask Mrs Taylor or contact the admin office.

Best Wishes

Sharon Taylor

Sally Atkins 21/05/2021 Sally Atkins 21/05/2021

Outdoor Learning Day

KS1

The whole school took part in a range of activities throughout the day, including building small den villages out of natural materials and creating hanging art. The children all had a wonderful time and even managed to avoid the rain long enough to eat lunch outside! Thank you to all the parents for ensuring that the children were dressed for any weather.

Year 3 and 4

The children in Year 3 and 4 thoroughly enjoyed the Outdoor Learning Day. The children decorated their initials using natural resources, created art with nature and adding extensions and new additions to the house ‘villages’. In the afternoon they were set the challenge of measuring an amount of water using different types of containers and everyone rose to the occasion. We all had a fantastic day!

Year 5 and 6

Year 5 and 6 came prepared for Outdoor Learning Day and had an amazing time working in different places of the schools grounds to create natural art and face challenges. The children created some fantastic water colours, as well as making the alphabet out of natural resources, creating their own animals and even measuring the whole field using only one 30cm ruler! the children especially enjoyed weaving different materials through the fences. It was a really great day!

Year 5 and 6 writers

Is this a dagger I see before me?

This week, Year 5/6 have been using drama to explore Shakespeare's well-known play, Macbeth. Focusing on Macbeth's speech in Act 2, the children were asked to define unknown words to help them understand what was being said. They were then given the tricky challenge of translating the speech and rewriting it themselves using modern-day vocabulary.

Chris Lindsay 15/05/2021 Chris Lindsay 15/05/2021

Stanmore Post - 14 May 2021

Dear Parents / Carers,

I was really impressed with the effort that parents and children went to for the Significant People dress up day in KS1. Mr Read and Miss Williamson convinced me that it would be an inspirational hook for their History topic. I need not have worried. The children looked amazing and it was fun trying to guess who was who. Thank you so much for the effort and creativity that you put into supporting events like this. The children and staff really appreciate the special days and it adds to the learning experience. Find out more about our learning.

This week we had our first ‘Curriculum Mash Up’ day. At Stanmore every teacher is responsible for a subject within the curriculum. The children were grouped in their bubbles across different subject areas so they could share their learning experiences and the work in their books with the subject leader. This helps us get a complete picture of the impact of our Stanmore Curriculum in providing a high quality of education to all of our children. I looked at science books across the school and I was proud to see the variety, the detail and the knowledge and understanding reflected in the work. The children spoke knowledgeably about their work in science, history, geography, art, Design Technology (DT) and Personal Social Health Education (PSHE) as well as English and maths. You can help us at home by talking to children about the connection between new learning and any previous experiences.

Some of our children and families celebrated Eid ul-Fitr yesterday. In assembly today a group of children shared a presentation about the festival and what it meant to them. The children throughout the school were very respectful, asking thoughtful questions which were answered in a clear and engaging manner. The assembly reflected all of the school’s values of belonging, excellence, support and trust.

Before lockdown we offered a thriving wrap around care through the company ‘Creative Kidz.’ We would love to restart our wrap around care. Creative Kidz Childcare Ltd are a highly experienced, leading provider of out of school childcare in Hampshire. Their objective is to support and encourage personality development, independence and creativity. Developing social interaction, friendships and an understanding of diversity are also top priorities. Creative Kidz settings are registered with Ofsted Standard for Education on the Early Years register and both the voluntary and compulsory parts of the Childcare register. Their staff teams consist of highly trained, dedicated and experienced childcare professionals, each of which are subject to robust recruitment procedures including DBS checks and our extensive training and development package.

In the Stanmore Post last week we asked parents to email the school office adminoffice@stanmore.hants.sch.uk with an expression of interest by Friday 14thMay. We are pleased with the interest so far and have decided to extend the deadline until Monday 17thMay. Please note this is not a firm commitment, it is to indicate to us that you would like to find out more about a place in wrap around care at Stanmore Primary School with Creative Kidz.

Best Wishes

Sharon Taylor

Sally Atkins 14/05/2021 Sally Atkins 14/05/2021

Significant people and outer space

Year 1 and 2

Year 1/2 had a dress up day this week. The challenge was to dress up as a significant individual and come prepared to share 5 facts about that individual. Some children chose someone from history, past and present and other children chose a family member. We had Florence Nightingale, William Shepherd, Neil Armstrong, Rosa Parks and Archimedes to name a few. The children were great at presenting their facts and very had clearly done a lot of research. Their historical knowledge and ability to recall facts about significant people from history has really improved during this topic. We are looking forward to seeing if they can now argue who they believe is the most significant individual drawing on all this knowledge they have acquired.

Year 3 and 4

The children in Year 3 and 4 have been exploring the Shakespeare play, The Tempest, in writing this week. They have been creating cartoon strips of the story and freeze framing a snapshot from a scene. After getting to know Prospero, the main character, the children have used their understanding of his character to write a message in a bottle to describe what he is like.

In maths, we have been learning about parallel and perpendicular lines - we enjoyed making different examples of these lines using art straws.

Oak Class - Our Solar System Blog

This week in science we have been learning about the Solar System. We are never going to forget this!

We had some fruit, raspberry, peppercorn blueberry, cherry, tomato, watermelon, grapefruit lime and apple, we had children hold the fruit, and the toilet paper. 1 piece of paper was 16,000,000 km.

Comments from the children about the lesson!

It was fun although some of the fruit got a little squished

I would really like to do something like this again and this time get to eat some of the fruit

We lost the peppercorn but we found a small stone instead

My favourite part was holding the watermelon!

It was amazing, I loved seeing everyone holding the fruit and holding the toilet paper down!

Elm Class

Written by Charlotte:

During our science we have been doing research on the solar system, this week we have been focusing on the moon and the ways it changes. We used oreo’s to display the moon cycles for example: new moon, crescent, first quarter, last quarter, full moon The moon has cycles because one side is always light and as it orbits the earth we can see it in sections.

Written by Rebecca

In art, we made some beautiful thumb pots in the style of ancient Greek pots! At the end we evaluated our pots and decided what went well and what didn’t go so well. Everyone got their hands dirty and had a go, they look very authentic, good job everyone!

Chris Lindsay 08/05/2021 Chris Lindsay 08/05/2021

Stanmore Post - 7 May 2021

Dear Parents / Carers,

We are always proud of the excellent manners that children show in school. My attention has been drawn to this recently as we have had an increase in visitors in school, rather than virtually, this term. The visitors have all commented on the way children hold open doors, or speak politely to an adult. They are a credit to you and to our school. Respect is one of our Keys for Success and we do regularly refer to respectful behaviour. Within our Personal Social Health Education (PSHE) curriculum, children are taught to have respect for other people, understanding that people should be treated equally. We are proud of our diverse community and want all of our children to understand that prejudicial or discriminatory behaviour is not part of our Stanmore value of belonging.

Thank you to the parents who joined us this week to review another aspect of our PSHE curriculum, the Relationships and Sex Education Policy. It is important that parents are aware of when and how this is taught in school and we valued the support that was shown at the virtual meeting led by Mrs Horkan earlier this week.

As part of our curriculum this summer term, KS2 children are experiencing theatre through different Shakespeare productions organised by the Royal Shakespeare Company. Today children from Year 3 and 4 enjoyed Michael Morpurgo reading Tales from Shakespeare – A Winter’s Tale. Year 5 and 6 will watch Macbeth. After half term we are looking forward to a real theatre performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream performed by the Young Shakespeare Company. See more of our learning this week.

Their staff teams consist of highly trained, dedicated and experienced childcare professionals, each of which are subject to robust recruitment procedures including DBS checks and our extensive training and development package.

In order to pursue this further we are asking parents to email the school office adminoffice@stanmore.hants.sch.uk with an expression of interest by Friday 14th May. Please note this is not a firm commitment, it is to indicate to us that you would like to find out more about a place in wrap around care at Stanmore Primary School with Creative Kidz. .

Best Wishes

Sharon Taylor

Sally Atkins 07/05/2021 Sally Atkins 07/05/2021

Shakespeare, Space and Chocolate!

Year 1 and 2

Year 1/2 have been exploring the work of Andy Warhol in art. Today we were appreciating the different ways of printing, looking at the effects that are created and which methods are better than others. All of the children created some great prints and are planning and then making their final space themed print in the next couple of weeks.

Year 3 and 4

This week the children completed some experiments about melting, using ice cubes and chocolate. They had to record the temperatures and their observations. We also discussed what the particles look like in solids, liquids, and gases.

In our geography work we have been looking at maps, using tracing paper to show the physical and human geographical features of Africa. We are sure that you will be impressed by the photos, but they look even better in real life!

This Friday we were really lucky to be able to watch a live performance of the Winters Tale by the Royal Shakespeare Company and watched a video of The Tempest. The children all really enjoyed it and can’t wait to explore the play further over the next few weeks.

Finally, we have written some amazing, descriptive narratives based on a story called 'The Promise' by Nicola Davies. We have been using expanded noun phrases as well as creating exciting sentences using things such as repetition, alliteration, and similes. Also, we are proud of our lovely handwriting and spelling. We have been working really hard on this since Easter.

Year 5 and 6

Oak and Elm class have been exploring Space this week, learning interesting facts as well as researching planets and creating their own information fact files. We learnt that it would take over 100 days to reach the Earth from the Sun, and also that sunlight takes over 8 minutes to reach the Earth’s surface.

We have also continued our work on ‘Shadow of the Minotaur and have produced some fantastic descriptive writing about stepping foot into the Minotaur’s maze!

Chris Lindsay 01/05/2021 Chris Lindsay 01/05/2021

Stanmore Post - 30 April 2021

Dear Parents/ Carers,

One of our Keys for success is co-operation. The opportunities to extend outdoor play to year group bubbles has meant that children have been able to co-operate with a wider circle of friends again. I know that children have really enjoyed seeing their friends from a different class. Teaching play skills, for example creating natural spaces in the woodland areas or sharing resources is part of our wider ‘Stanmore Curriculum.’ This is one way in which we can develop leadership skills. Children are having opportunities to learn how to use their words to negotiate and share.

On 6 April 2020, Captain Tom Moore set out round his garden to thank our NHS heroes. One hundred laps later, he’d raised an incredible £38.9 million for the NHS Covid-19 appeal.

His simple message of hope – “Tomorrow will be a good day” – inspired millions around the world and brought comfort and joy to so many during the pandemic.

As a school we have taken up the challenge to build on that legacy. Today would have been his 101st birthday and to honour him and his amazing achievements, we have joined other schools and organisations to take part in the Captain Tom 100.

Today we have achieved 100 minutes of reading in every class. Every time a child read, listened to a story or took part in Guided Reading they filled in the goals on the reading ‘thermometer.’ In addition to this there were 100 inspired writing and maths ideas to choose from. At break time some children were happily picking 100 daisies! Find out more about our Sir Captain Tom Moore 100 challenge.

Best Wishes

Sharon Taylor

Sally Atkins 30/04/2021 Sally Atkins 30/04/2021

Captain Tom

On 6th April 2020, Captain Tom set out round his garden to thank our NHS heroes. One hundred laps later, he’d raised an incredible £38.9 million for the NHS Covid-19 appeal.

As this Friday would have been Captain Tom’s 101st birthday, we decided to build on his legacy and take part in the Captain Tom 100 challenge. Classes were challenged to read for 100 minutes and to take part in linked Maths activities.

Yr R

We used flowers and tens frames to find 100 objects in our outside area. The children loved collecting the items and counting together to support Captain Tom.

Year 1 and 2

The year 1/2 children in Rowan and Maple were challenged to see if they could collect 100 items that they found outside into a hoop. They worked as a team to collect the items and thought about how many of each item they needed in order to make 100, some grouping in 10s, 20s, 25s and 50s. This was a brilliant way of showing all that we had learnt in our multiplication and division from this week.

Year 3 and 4

As part of our recognition of the Captain Tom 100 Day, we have been writing some futuristic descriptions of what we think that our school, house or street might be like in 100 years time. We had lots of suggestions about hovering cars, robots to bring cups of tea and even portals to take us to other worlds! In maths we were estimating using money, length and mass. We had to think flexibly about the best ways to measure based on the equipment that we had. Added into all of that, we have achieved our 100 minutes reading challenge!

To complete the Captain 100 challenge, Birch class worked in teams to collect stones, twigs, daisy or leaves: estimating when they had 100 grams in their bags. Two groups managed to estimate 100 grams correctly with a range of 50 grams to 650 grams.

Year 5 and 6

Oak and Elm class have completed their 100 minute reading challenge for Sir Tom Moore! The children loved watching the ‘ temperature’ rise on their scale to show how many minutes they had left to go. This was their way of commemorating the life of Captain Tom and classes also completed a selection of Captain Tom themed Maths and English tasks, including writing acrostic poems using the words ‘One Hundred’.

Chris Lindsay 26/04/2021 Chris Lindsay 26/04/2021

Stanmore Post - 23 April 2021

Dear Parents/ Carers,

Welcome back to the Summer Term. We have had a brilliant start to the term helped by some lovely sunny weather. With Covid restrictions easing slightly, we have taken the decision to allow the children to mix in Year group bubbles outdoors in the fresh air during break and lunchtime. It has been good to see the children playing with their friends in the good weather. During lessons the new topics have started across the school with exciting hooks to inspire the learning for the term. As we hoped, the children have returned to school much more settled after the Easter holiday. While we are remaining cautious, we are working to return to as much of the planned summer events as possible. Have a look at some of this week’s wonderful work.

I would like to welcome Mrs Emma Holland to the Stanmore Team. Emma is our new Admin Officer and she has made an excellent start, working with Mrs May Eagle in our school office this week. I hope that you get the opportunity to meet with her in person soon. She can be contacted via adminoffice@stanmore.hants.sch.uk

We have two further new members of staff who I would like to welcome. Mrs Kate Barton and Miss Amber Noel-D’Avila have joined our teaching assistant team and we are very pleased to have them in school. Finally, to complete our Stanmore family, Mrs Mason, Mrs Griffiths and Mrs McGovern have returned following the end of Covid shielding restrictions. The children and staff were delighted to see them back in school this week.

I was really proud of the school today as we had our final virtual visit from Whiteknights Primary School, the English Hub who have been supporting us with our early reading programme: Read Write Inc. This has been a two year support package which has seen our teaching strengthen and our outcomes improve by 20%. We will continue to invest time, money and energy into this programme as children throughout the school continue to benefit. As we have made such strong progress with reading, this term we have added a highly focused spelling programme to the daily lessons. In order for this to be effective for all children we need to start the English lesson at 9:05am. Children split into different groups to get teaching at precisely the right level and so for many, this means moving. Children who arrive in the office after 9am are missing their speed sounds. Over time this amounts to a lot of lost learning, affecting reading, spelling and self-esteem. It would be brilliant if this term we could see every child in school by 08:50am.

If you need any support with this please contact Mrs Fenton or Mrs Mason via the admin office email and we can look at ways to help you adjust the morning routine.

Best Wishes

Sharon Taylor