Early Rider Balance-ability

On Monday the whole class joined in with the’ balance-ability workshop. This is a simpler version for Reception and Key Stage 1 of the ‘Bike-ability’ workshops completed in Key Stage 2. The children completed various activities to help develop coordination, balance and core strength. All the children had a fantastic time and the instructors saw big improvements in all the children as they gained better control and balance of the bike. Well done Woodpeckers!

Leonard the Lion visits school

Leonard the Lion
Leonard the Lion

On Wednesday 12th March Emma from Gulliver’s Kingdom visited with the mascot, Leonard the Lion. The children learned about the importance of exercise and healthy eating, before joining in with some of Leonard’s cool, unexpected dance moves!

Partake Theatre Ancient Egyptian Day!

In the morning the children looked at some different artefacts from tombs, they discussed the daily life of people from different stages in the hierachy and they created and then described some smells from ancient Egypt. The final part of the morning involved dressing a child as an ancient Egyptian pharoah!

In the afternoon the children all got dressed up and took part in an ancient Egyptian burial ceremony. The children thoroughly enjoyed this and they acted their roles brilliantly.

Finally the children did an arts and crafts session and made their own Egyptian cartouche.

Partake Theatre

The children thoroughly enjoyed the day and learnt a lot about the way of life in ancient Egypt.

We’d like to thank Partake theatre for the excellent day!

Partake Theatre workshop KS2 Feb 26th

‘Walk like an Egyptian’ – KS2

Wednesday 26th February

As part of our topic about Ancient Egypt we have organized a ‘Partake’ theatre workshop day in school on 26th February. (Please note there will be no violin/viola tuition on this day). Partake have visited us several times eg Ancient Greece’ ‘Victorian seaside’, ‘The Home Front’, and the sessions are always interesting and fun as well as educational.  Children will take part in a variety of workshops discovering the mysteries of an Ancient Egyptian burial ceremony – investigating and handling artefacts used in mummification ;discovering the clothing and makeup of an Egyptian princess; creating a cartouche; taking part in a atmospheric ‘burial ceremony’ where the story unfolds through the use of costume,  narration, mime, music, dance and drama.Please return slips and contributions to the class teacher or office. Thank you

Guitar tuition

guitarWe already have thriving violin / viola group lessons in school and this week all chidren attended a guitar demonstration. Please see separate letter sent out Thursday 23rd January for information/ costs about guitar tuition. Contracts and payment are organised directly with the tutor who is accredited with the Derbyshire School Music Partnership. There is a subsidy on the first six sessions of 20 minutes or longer. Please contact the tutor directly if you have any questions or need further information. Thank you.

Uni Hockey afternoon Years 3,4,5 Nov 22nd

To further develop our school PE , Sport, physical activity and well being provision and to enable others to share our good outdoor facilities, Mr Cooke has organised for children from Holy Trinity C of E Primary to visit us on Friday to share our outdoor grounds and take part in a friendly afternoon session of uni-hockey. Please remind children to have their outdoor PE kit at school. (Have indoor kit as well, just incase the weather is very bad).

Wildlife Hotel – WOW!

wildlife hotel

The children have had a great time working on the Insect Hotel with support from the Wild life Trust. The final product looks great and many parents who collected children at the end of the day were able to go and have a look and admire the children’s efforts.Thank you for all the donated items; pallets, bricks, canes etc. Remember each child can bring in an item to place on top eg. shell, stone, piece of pottery etc. We look forward to seeing what creatures take up residence over the next few days and weeks. Mrs Mahadevan will be posting some photographs soon so keep a look out on the web site.

Ofsted Inspection 24th to 25th September

Inspection of Stretton Handley Church of England Primary School by Ofsted

We have just been informed that our school will be inspected  on 24–25 September 2013. The lead inspector will be Michael Phipps. The inspector would like to know what you think about the school. Please take a few minutes to read the leaflet and letter which are coming home tonight – Monday 23rd Sept. It explains why schools are inspected, and what happens during an inspection.

Your views about the school are important to us

If you are a registered parent or carer of a pupil at the school  you can tell Ofsted your views about the school by completing Ofsted’s online survey, Parent View, at: http://www.parentview.ofsted.gov.uk.

Parent View asks for your opinion on 12 aspects of your child’s school, including the progress made by your child, the quality of teaching, dealing with bullying and poor behaviour. The inspectors will use the online survey responses when inspecting your child’s school.

To register your views, you will need to provide your email address, which will be held securely. It will not be used for any purpose other than providing access to the online survey. Neither schools nor Ofsted will have access to any email addresses.

Please complete the online survey by 11am on 24 September 2013 as this will give the inspection team more time to consider your views. However, we will consider all online responses that are completed during the inspection. Should you wish to provide written comments these should be sent to the school in a sealed envelope, marked confidential and addressed to the inspection team.

Thank you in advance for taking the time to complete the online survey.

Insect Hotel – Materials Wanted

The Wildlife Trust will be visiting the school, on Wednesday 25th September, to work with the children to build an Insect Hotel for our Learning Garden.

Insect Hotel

The main structure of the hotel will be made from 4 or 5 pallets which need to be of the same size. If you think you can source some, please let us know asap. We have also been given a list of materials which we need to collect before the day:

48 bricks – of the same size.
About 10 stones of roughly same size as bricks or smaller.
Lots of pine cones
Lots of interesting and colourful old/chipped crockery – especially cups, saucers
Old small terracotta pots, can be broken
Large bin liner of Straw
Large bin liner of damp leaves
Small straight -ish sticks – lots
Bamboo canes – lots (at least 30 x 6ft canes)
Old roofing slates (enough to cover a pallet) or roofing felt and tacs
Small stones/decorative gravel – the more interesting the better
Shells
About 10 logs about 8- 10cm diameter and up to 1ft long
Lengths of old piping –of not more than 10cm diameter and cut into 0.5ft lengths, – about 10-12. (The piping and logs need to be able to fit into the sides of the pallets so diameter is dependent on size of pallets). Drainpipe – sections 6”/15cm – is suitable.
Piping of different diameters to fit into larger pipe.
Hazel (or other) coppiced poles.

If you can help with providing some of these materials, please get in touch asap. (In school or by leaving a message on this post)

Each child may also bring in something precious/decorative to put on the top such as unusual natural objects such as feathers, stones, fossils, etc.

Violin performance for visitors – Wed 3rd July 3.00pm

Parents and friends

You are invited to come into school on Wednesday 3rd July at 3.00pm to listen to Class 2 and 3 as they play some of the pieces they have been learning on the violin. The sessions which started in February have been jointly funded by the School and the School Music Partnership as part of ‘Wider opportunities’.

If your child would like to continue learning the violin next term then small group sessions, in school time, will be provided by Jo Rynott, costing £1.50 per lesson. Information letters, contracts etc are available from the school office. Please contact us if you have any questions.