I can’t believe it is half term! Where does the time go? We may have only had one week left but we filled it with lots of learning, trips, a few kilts and of course a FOSS event!

Last night, we had our very own highland fling – a slightly later than normal Burns Night but never the less an evening packed with Scottish dancing, a Ceilidh band, plenty of haggis and so much more. Thank you to everyone who joined us and especially to Louise and Justine for organising such an incredible night. I spent the evening in my kilt, which I have to say was slightly draughty!

This afternoon, we had a visit from Katie Piper, OBE. Katie has devoted her life to The Katie Piper Foundation to support those living with burns and scars. Katie has now helped over 4,000 burns survivors and has received numerous awards, accolades and doctorates for her work. Katie is a much-loved presenter for ITV’s Loose Women, BBC’s Songs of Praise, the host of the acclaimed Katie Piper’s Extraordinary People podcast and face of iconic global beauty brands – phew! Katie read her new children’s book to our Year 1 classes, answered questions and gave them all a book. She met with the House Captains for a Q&A session and soon had them all enthralled with stories from her life. Our children were superb and oh so confident! Watch out for the Daily Mail next week when we may all feature!

Year 2 are crazy about Maths!

Year 2 took us on a whirlwind tour of all things mathematical on Thursday! They even added a touch of Abba for good measure. They recited poetry, sang songs, told us all about Maths and so much more but above all had loud, resounding voices filled with expression. Fantastic!

Spoiler alert – new FOSS website launch after half term!

Children’s Mental Health Week

Miss Hall led our Collective Worship, on Monday, with the whole school focusing on Children’s Mental Health Week. With the help of some great resources from AFNCCF, the children will be starting each day planning their ‘Self-Care Plan’.

Some of our children from Year 5 really enjoyed working with Frieze Official Artist Award winner, Abbas Zahedi whose interest in holistic wellbeing and spaces that support life and living, chime so well this week particularly as we focus on Children’s Mental Health Week. Here is the film we made with Abbas.

Meet artist Abbas Zahedi and @StStephensLBHF, as they map spaces through their feelings and draw some strange new sounds.

Watch the film: bit.ly/TateAbbasZahedi

A Midwife in the school hall

What a brilliant Collective Worship, with Midwife Tara and her mum-to-be at 30 weeks. As part of our focus on NHS roles, the children learned how a modern midwife looks after expectant mothers and they listened to the baby’s heartbeat amplified around the hall. Thank you both.

Buddhist Vihara

As part of the Y4 RE curriculum, the children learn about Buddhism, one of the world’s largest religions, originating 2,500 years ago in India. Earlier this week, they visited a local Buddhist Vihara to hear how meditation, spiritual and physical labour and good behaviour are ways to nirvana.

A Spot of Debating

Our whole Y6 Debating Squad, expertly tutored by Emma Kruger, had a brilliant time at Ibstock School and loved listening to and learning from the other children. A special shout out goes to Lucas as one of the two Standout Speakers. Our team won and we are now through to the finals of the Cicero Cup! Excellent!

Year 6 learn all about Japan

Patrick-san, father of Max in Yr 6 and Joe in Nursery, delivered a brilliant interactive workshop on Japan as part of the Y6 children’s learning in Geography. A competition, with appropriately attired table captains, showing the depth of their learning so far.

Translating kanji for traditional Japanese sustenance, the final challenge was to guess the various different foods and drinks being described by some lucky children as they bravely took part in the blind tasting. Superb! Mr Gane’s brother zoomed in from Tokyo for a live Q&A session and he told the children that in Japan the children have to clean their classrooms and eat their lunches there – now there’s a thought!

Woodrow House

Year 4 had the most amazing time at Woodrow House – they spent 3 glorious days in Buckinghamshire. Lots of outdoor activities, hearty meals and of course the firm favourite – the disco! They were perfectly behaved though I should imagine a tad tired this evening!

What a long round up and I haven’t even touched on our amazing sports teams and their achievements in the Mayor’s Cup, Dodgeball, Netball, Athletics… well that can all wait till after half term and my next round up! So for now have a great weekend and half term holiday! See you on the 20th February.

Mr Schumm