You can follow us ...….. Newsletter No: 2
Friday, 15th September, 2017
CoMPasS
Registered Charity No: 1141329
Although this is only the second week of term so much has happened at Clifton already!
The children chose the school charity, the atrium was filled with home grown produce for
The Great Clifton Glut, our co-curricular activities got underway and we held three
Parent Information Evenings.
Many thanks to the parents who attended the Parent Information Evenings this week.
They were an opportunity for you to find more about what your children are getting up to
in school and asking any questions you may have had. If you have any further questions
then please don’t hesitate to contact your child’s class teacher or alternatively you can pop
in and see either Mrs Clarke or myself. Our door is always open. We would like to run
some parent workshops throughout the year and we would welcome your suggestions as
to which topics may be of interest to you. Please let either myself or Mrs Clarke know if
there is a curriculum area that would be of particular value for you to know more about.
On Tuesday we had our Clifton Friends AGM. A report of the year was shared by the
outgoing Chair Mrs Keyes and the treasurer Mrs Dib-Bennett, and there was a discussion
about how the group can move forward in the future. There will be a meeting on
Thursday 21st September at drop off to discuss Clifton School Friends. I would be very
grateful if you could please spare a short time to help shape the future of this important
area of school. The purpose of the Clifton Friends is to organise social events for parents
across all year groups, social events for children and also events for the whole school
community. They work with the School Council to raise funds for our School charity and
for special activities for the children. My thanks to Mrs Keyes, Mrs Dib-Bennett, Mrs Glyn
-Mills and Mrs Ingham and all the committee for their hard work last year.
This morning there was a parent’s café in the dining room which was attended by over 50
people. This provided a lovely opportunity for parents to pop in for a chat and a coffee.
My thanks to all those who attended and helped run the café, especially to Mrs Rigby for
organising this event.
As you may know each Friday we hold a special celebration assembly. This term we
changed the format from the Superstar Award to a Learning Superhero Award and the
Good Conduct Award to a Value Champion Award. The Learning Superhero Award is
given to children who have been learning using some of their learning superpowers
(resilience, resourcefulness, reflection and collaboration) which are demonstrated through
our Learning Superheroes. A child from each class is chosen and their teacher talks about
their learning in our assembly, as well as showing their work. You can see all of their
wonderful work on the Learning Superhero board in the atrium. We want our children to
value the process of learning, understand how to learn and to develop positive attitudes to
learning. Our Value Champion Award is given to a child in each class who has
demonstrated our school values and it is always special to hear the children’s teachers
describe examples of friendship, wisdom, compassion, humility, trust, endurance and hope.
Posters showing our school values are displayed all around school to remind us all to be
guided by these values in our school community and beyond school too.
Next week promises to be just as busy!
I hope that you have a lovely weekend.
Best wishes
DIARY FOR WEEK COMMENCING
18th September:
Mon Year 1 Dogs Trust visit School
Y3 Ukueles Club (lunchtime)
Y1 Netball Skills
Y2/3 Tennis
Y2/3 Chess
Y3 Tag Rugby
Y3 Netball
Y2 Speech & Drama
Tues
Y2/3 Choir (lunchtime)
Y1 Speech & Drama
Y1/2/3 Ballet
Y2/3 Karate
Y1/2 Creative Crafts
Y2/3 Chess
Y2 Netball
Y3 Swim Club
Wed
Rec/Y1 Yoga Bunnies (lunchtime)
Rec Speech & Drama
Y1/2 Sign Language
Y2/3 Yoga
Y3 Sewing Club
Y2 Art Club
Y3 Recorders
Thurs
Year 1 Pets at Home visit
Rec Arts & Crafts
Y1 Street Dance
Y1 iPad Club
Y2 Tag Rugby
Y2/3 Creative Film Club
Y3 Hockey Club
Y2/3 Book Club
Y3 Speech & Drama
Y3 Badminton Club
Year 3 Sports Workshop POSTPONED by Hill House School
Fri Y1 Football
Y2 Sport
Y3 IT Club
On Monday The Great Clifton Glut opened. During the week lots of superb home
grown produce appeared including potatoes, damsons, beetroot, beans,
courgettes and spring onions. The children really enjoyed looking at all of the
fruit and vegetables and choosing some to take home with their parents. We
hope you enjoyed turning these home grown treasures into delicious meals for
your family. A big thank you to all of our parents who were able to share
produce from your gardens. Please feel free to help yourself to the remaining
produce.
If this has inspired you to do some gardening with your children there are lots of
ideas here:
https://www.rhs.org.uk/education-learning/gardening-children-schools/family-
activities/grow-it
This week in 2M we have been testing our map
skills and looking at where the Vikings came from!
We explored on google maps and used the atlas on
the iPads to trace their steps before heading out to investigate
how the Viking’s travelled into York. Did you know that they
invaded York when it was raining as people would have been
inside sheltering and so therefore would not have seen them
coming? We ended up at our school boat house next to the River Ouse where we met a
frightening (frighteningly nice!) policeman by the name of Harold Bloodaxe..we think he may have
been a Viking in disguise as he had a bushy beard to match his Viking name!
Glifton Glut leeks and
potatoes being used for a
Mary Berry sausage
recipe
The Oxleys
Chicken on a bed of tasty lentils
and leeks
Stuffed Courgettes
The Normans
On Wednesday we held our annual Charity Assembly. Some of our Year 3 children chose to tell the
school about each charity. The Year 3’s did a fabulous job telling us about three charities; The British
Heart Foundation, The Yorkshire Wildlife Trust and Water Aid. They spoke very convincingly about
each charity and shared their fund raising ideas. Each child then voted for one charity and Mr Hardy
announced the winner at our Learning Superhero Assembly.
This year our school charity will be Water Aid.
We can’t wait to get started organising exciting events to raise lots of money to bring clean water to
people all over the world.
This week in 1T we have taken our collaborative and maths learning outside. The children have been working together to make straw and brick houses that will be strong enough to withstand the wolf's huffing and puffing. Down at Forest School we have also been continuing the team work theme and having a competition to see how many of us we can fit on one tree stump. We also did maths challenges down there, with different groups collecting 10 of one object or making tally charts and
bar charts of things we found. In the back playground we used the giant Lego to make an enormous bar chart
sorting it by colour. We found it was easier to count the Lego if we stacked the blocks in columns of ten and then counted in 10s instead of 1s, tricky stuff. Great team work!
VALUE CHAMPIONS
Alexander, Bo, Henry, Elizabeth and Viktoria, Perim, Joy Elise, Sam and Zac
HOUSE POINT TROPHY
WALMGATE
LEARNING SUPERHEROES
Jinyi, Josh, Rossi, Edward, Oliver, Mattie,
Loveday, Srija, Noah, Molly and George
CORE 5 CERTIFICATES
Oliver, Rossi, Holly, Alexander, Alex, Loki, Jack and Emily
MUSIC AWARDS
Charles and Maddie
Headlice – Year 2
Please be aware that we have had a case of headlice in Year 2. Please check
your child’s hair and treat if necessary.
It was really great to see so many children at Playgroup on Thursday, your seaside pictures are great and reminded me how much I LOVE the beach!! I loved your singing too with Mrs Hayden!! I hope to see you all next week. Just a reminder to the parents and carers coming to playgroup to PLEASE sign in at reception and to sign out before you leave the building, many thanks. Mrs Deri-Clark
Josh, Rossi and Scarlett
Hettie and Thomas
This week Year 3 have had a
'hoot' learning all about owls!
The children visited Eeylops Owl Emporium to choose their owls. They then carried out their own research and became owl experts, creating little owl fact
booklets!
Then…after discovering that our owl visitors from last week had left us a little present…in the form of a pellet, we decided to cut it open to find out what
the owls had been eating!
We found lots of fur and a few bones! This told us that Owls are carnivores and the
children then created their own owl food chains.
On Tuesday we had our first session down at Forest School and we were so impressed with how well the children worked collaboratively making bird feeders and owl leaf art. A few children even made their own glue pots out of
conker shells!
In Maths this week we have been investigating magical numbers and place value. We have been making numbers in lots of different ways and have begun to work with larger 3 and 4 digit
numbers!
.
The Nursery children had a fantastic week, the highlight being our visit to ‘Forest School’.
We had snack in the forest, explored the horse chestnut trees that were dropping conkers all around us and used natural materials that we found to make faces. We enjoyed a retell of the story ‘The Gruffalo’, before returning
to school for lunch.
RB started learning phonics this week and
have found sounds everywhere! We practised writing
ssssssss in the sssand with sttticks, ttttook
ttttuurns making ttttt on the ttttarmac
ttttennis court, found aaaaaaples on our
maaaaagic ttttttree, did ppppotato pppprinting
and ppppprepared ppppppop-cakes just
like in the story! Phew, what a busy week!
2H have been making
themselves into Vikings, ready to
put into the Viking longship,
going on our display board. We
looked at the clothes the Vikings
would have worn and the
helmets too. We know that
some ‘facts’ are not
true….Vikings did NOT wear
helmets with horns!
We have also looked at maps of
York and been to find the river,
where the Vikings arrived when
they invaded and have written
about the reasons why they
chose to invade this city.
The Land of Dreams!
RS have reached the clouds…! This week we climbed through
the clouds into the ‘Land of dreams’. After starting the week
off with a question – ‘what would your land be?’ we discovered
everyone has their own fantasy ideas! During the week we
used different materials and techniques to create different cloud effects; from
bubble wrap to balloons art, bin bags and pillows! Science was also necessary
when we made candy floss clouds! The children
observed as sugar dissolved and changed, only to
create delicious fluffy clouds of candy. It
would seem that journeying through the
clouds has been an experiential week!
Co-curricular active clubs got off to a flying start this week. Great fun was had by all!
Tickets are now available for the St Peter’s School Christmas Term Public Lectures.
Dr Peter Wothers: Gods, Devils and Alcohol Wednesday 27 September 7pm
This lecture, based around a humble bottle of shampoo, will decode the language of chemistry, delving into some of mankind’s most remarkable ideas and achievements, from astrology to zoology. Book your free tickets here.
Randall Munroe: Thing Explainer
Tuesday 3 October 7pm
Abandoning scientific jargon in favour of simple words and entertaining sketches, Munroe explains how things we use
every day function, from microwaves and bridges to tectonic plates and our own bodies. Book your free tickets here.
Professor Geriant F. Lewis and Dr Luke A. Barnes: A Fortunate Universe
Thursday 12 October 7pm
If the Universe had been forged with even slightly different properties, life as we know it would be impossible. This
lecture explores our understanding of the Universe, from its most basic particles to its grandest planets. Book your free
tickets here.
Professor Keith Ward: The Christian Idea of God Tuesday 17 October 7pm Eminent theologian Professor Keith Ward takes a fresh look at the ancient philosophy of Idealism and shows that a combination of good science, good philosophy, and a passion for truth can underpin religious faith. Book your free tickets here.
Professor Anil Seth: What in the World is Consciousness?
Wednesday 8 November 7pm
Without consciousness there is no world, no self: nothing at all. Understanding its material and biological basis is now one
of modern science’s greatest challenges. Book your free tickets here.
Barbara Taylor Bradford in conversation
Monday 27 November 7pm
Leeds-born Barbara Taylor Bradford is something of a Yorkshire legend. With her books having sold nearly 100 million
copies, she will be talking about her life, her work and her new novel, Secrets of Cavendon. Book your free tickets here.
Terry Waite: Survival in Solitude
Wednesday 6 December 7pm
Terry Waite was taken hostage in Lebanon in 1987 and held in solitary confinement for 1,763 days. Following his release
in 1991, Terry has gone on to write a number of books and take up presidency of two major charities. Book your free
tickets here.
Science Society Christmas Lecture
Tuesday 12 December 7pm The St Peter’s Science staff return for their hugely popular annual lecture, featuring fascinating insights, interactive
challenges and dynamic demonstrations, this year focusing on the periodic table. Book your free tickets here.
If you have any access requirements, are hard of hearing or have any other special requests, please book your tickets using Eventbrite, then
email [email protected] or call 01904 527 315, stating which event(s) you are attending and how many tickets you have booked.
Please note that many of our events sell out, and you must bring your ticket with you to guarantee entry. Please either print off your ticket
or display it to us on your smartphone or tablet on the evening. With all best wishes, Ben Fuller, Head of Public Lectures, St Peter’s School,
York, YO30 6AB