This week’s newsletter for Rossall Nursery, Pre-Prep and Prep School.
Dear All,
Last Saturday was a proud day for Rossall, as we welcomed so many pupils from schools across the region, as they took part in the final part of the scholarship process. The children, including a number of our very own Prep pupils, were an absolute delight to welcome into Big School, alongside their parents, who remained with us for tour and talks about our signature programmes.
The importance of learning beyond the confines of the classroom is hugely important for the children, as they continue their educational journey. Year 4 visited Chester to become Roman centurions for the day, and our Lords and Ladies from Year 5 joined Henry VIII to become terrible Tudors at Turton Tower. All the pupils learnt a great deal and thoroughly enjoyed their days away from School.
However… there are some places in the world that we would love to learn about by travelling to them but they are simply too far away. That problem was solved on Friday at our International Festival, where the Senior students celebrated their countries of origin through dress, dance, music and activities. With over 60 nationalities attending Rossall, there was no shortage of culture on show. The Prep pupils thoroughly enjoyed their afternoon, learning a great deal from some very passionate students – as did I! Again, I was immensely proud listening to the students describe their countries, cultures and traditions – well done to all involved!
All you needs is love ❤️ was the message from Year 3 in their Friday Chapel assembly. The children all spoke incredibly well and gave such a simple message about loving each other. Well done, Year 3!
Matilda is nearly upon us and I know that the children have been working exceptionally hard to be ready. I look forward to welcoming all of you to support us next Tuesday and Wednesday – final few tickets remaining!
Have a lovely weekend.
Mr M Turner
Headmaster of Preparatory School & Nursery
Rossall Prep Invitational Hockey Tournament 2023
On Wednesday, Rossall Prep hosted this highly anticipated annual hockey event. There were eight teams in total from across Lancashire competing. The blustery weather did not deter the players at all, with the standard of hockey as high as ever. Rossall fielded two teams, and although we were not able to reclaim the Plate Winner trophy on this occasion, the girls played some superb, intelligent hockey. They were also superb ambassadors for Rossall Prep off the pitch too, ensuring the visiting teams received the infamous Rossall welcome.
Finally, well done to Manchester High School for Girls, and St Bede’s College for winning the Cup and Plate Trophies respectively.
Year 6
What an explosive week it has been in Year 6, with gunpowder plots and sparky Suffragettes in our Topic, to racing heartbeats in our pursuit of scientific knowledge discovering about our circulatory system. Our work on ‘Politics and Parliament’ has taken us back in time to study significant events when people have disagreed with the government, which led us to research Guy Fawkes’ Gunpowder Plot, and the Suffragette movement in their fight for women’s rights.
The final preparations for our production of ‘Matilda’ are going splendidly, and tickets are selling like hot cakes, so make sure you book as soon as possible to avoid disappointment; it promises to be a Rossall Prep School spectacular!
Year 5
This week, Year 5 have been working extra hard in their final rehearsals for Matilda. They have worked fantastically as a team- showing off all their dancing and singing. We cannot wait for the actual shows to commence!
In English, they have continued to focus on the characters from our book paying particular interest to Arthur and his journey across the treacherous sea in search for the God of Storms. They recapped using relative clauses, expanded noun phrases and adverbial phrases. Some wonderful descriptions were created and shared amongst the whole class.
One of our Topic sessions ended up that little bit different this week having visited Turton Tower to experience Tudor life. Year 5 met Mistress Mary and Squire William who took the children back in time to experience what life was like during this period. They explored the Tudor house, looking at the many different rooms, and also tried on Tudor clothes and garments! During the final part of the day, Year 5 learnt a Tudor dance which tested them to keep in time with the music whilst counting their steps.
Year 4
‘Salve’ from Year 4.
The children hopped back in time for our exciting trip to the Deva Roman Discovery Centre. As Julius Caesar once said ‘Experience is the teacher of all things’, and an experience it certainly was. After meeting our Roman guide, the children began by imagining what life would be like in those times. After an in-depth discussion about life in the Roman Army they were quickly enlisted and proceeded to show off their newly acquired skills around the streets of Chester. Shields and swords in hands the children certainly gave the locals something to talk about.
In English this week, we have focused on direct speech and the children thoroughly enjoyed role playing a scene from our class book, ‘Escape from Pompeii’. The children took on the roles of the two main characters, Tranio and his best friend Livia. With pens in hand, conversations were scripted about how they should escape the impending volcanic eruption. Using role-play allowed the children to understand where speech marks should be used and the rules that need to be followed when using them.
Our Year 4 scientists have been busy experimenting with water. The children combined their knowledge learnt over the term to look at the three states of matter and how we can manipulate the states of each, including those that can be reversed. It’s always delightful to see how experiments involving everyday items; in this case ice cubes, salt and cling film, can generate countless questions and hopefully a wealth of answers.
This week has also involved further preparations for the Prep School Musical – Matilda. Songs and dances have been rehearsed, costumes worn and put to the test. The excitement in the air is palpable as the children wait in eager anticipation for the show nights next week.
Year 3
In Year 3 this week we have all been ‘MIRACLES’ with lots of practice for our performance in Matilda next week! In English, we did some writing using progressive tense to describe different activities from the Stone Age, and started to plan for our final Stone Age story writing task. In Maths, we have finished off our unit on multiplication and division, ending with a look at grid method and bus stop method. Science was exciting this week where we collected our own soil samples to make sediment jars! This investigation enabled us to observe the different layers and elements that make up soil. For Topic, we moved on from the end of the Stone Age on to the Bronze Age, and learnt about the mysterious Stonehenge. We finished off the week with our amazing Chapel Assembly. The children have worked so hard and practiced loads with their lines and singing to be ready to perform. They designed their own hearts filled with drawings of the people and things they love, to use these in the performance. The children spoke beautifully about love and Valentine’s Day. You should all be so proud of yourselves Year 3, well done!
Year 2
It has been another fabulous week in Year 2, the effort, attitude and enthusiasm of the children never ceases to amaze me. We have been working hard in our English lessons, using expanded noun phrases and subordinate clauses when describing our animal creations. In Mathematics we have begun a new unit on measurement. The children have loved the practical nature of this. Even taking the opportunity to get outside and measure the length and height of various objects in metres. In Science we completed an experiment on absorbency, the vocabulary the children used in relation to this was most impressive and I enjoyed reading their reports.
However, it is some of the work that children have completed as part of their home learning that has truly impressed. A few Year 2 have already brought in their motte and bailey castles to present to classmates. This has inspired others and we are excited to see what else comes in next week. No pressure parents!
Year 1
Year 1 have been on a roll this week in continuing to show a ‘can-do’ attitude and a hard-working stance with every activity they have taken on. It’s amazing to see our children putting more effort into each task we tackle, especially when it can be tricky! We had a wonderful time at the Rossall Farm last week for Rossall Rotation and we learned lots about taking care of the animals. In Maths we have been looking at numberlines and learning how to use a numberline to count forwards and backwards. We wanted to better understand how counting forwards and backwards can help with addition so we created our own bigger numberline and made frog jumps to show our counting. It was great fun! In Science this week we have been testing ways to melt ice. Last week we predicted and discussed that salt could melt ice and we know this as we’ve seen salt on the roads on frosty mornings! In our investigation we discovered that our predictions were correct- the salt melted the ice quicker than our other materials! In English we are getting ourselves prepared to write our story next week- ‘The Curious Case of the Missing Dodo’ and I cannot wait to see what we produce! Well done Year 1!
Reception
This week we have celebrated stories in every form during National Storytelling Week. Like its name, National Storytelling Week encourages people of all ages, genders, and cultures to indulge in stories new and old and participate in this centuries-old form of entertainment. Stories teach us about the world, they allow us to step into someone else’s shoes and feel empathy, they help us to relax and escape and they can help develop essential literacy skills.
Once upon a time, long ago, people would inscribe their stories on the walls of caves. These included animals, humans, and other intriguing as-yet-unidentified objects. Of course, scientists believe storytelling has existed in some form or another since the development of languages, and the earliest evidence we have are these cave drawings. The children have enjoyed listening to the story ‘Cave Baby’ by Julia Donaldson and even had a go at doing their own cave paintings this week.
Over time, stories changed to incorporate modern inventions. Photographs, video recordings, and television became new ways to tell stories. In the 21st century, people can explore stories in any form they choose and enjoy any kind they want. The children have explored many ways of storytelling this week, including through roleplay, puppets, music, books and cartoons. It has been lovely to observe them retelling stories and making up their own stories in every area of the classroom. They have even become storytellers themselves and written some of their own stories together. I think we may have some budding authors in the class, as their imagination was amazing!
Nursery
“The world is but a canvas to the imagination”
Henry David Thoreau
The Sanderlings have had a sensory week. The week began with Mrs Beddis making play dough, the children used their fingers to push real flowers into the play dough, the play dough looked so colourful when they were finished! Using play dough as a tool for learning is vital in strengthening fine motor skills. While the babies are busy rolling, poking and squishing play dough, they are building small muscles in their fingers and hands. As the babies progress through nursery, you’ll see that these same muscles are used for skills such as cutting and holding a pencil. To further enhance fine motor skills the big table in the room was covered in paper and the babies used egg shaped crayons, normal crayons can be hard to hold with small fingers, therefore egg-shaped crayons are instinctive for babies to play with whilst being comfortable to use for mark making. Mathematical language has been reinforced this week during water play where the babies had various containers to refill and empty. In the tuff tray the babies have enjoyed making marks in shaving foam using the tracks of various vehicles they have in the Sanderlings room. To match with this week’s learning intention in The Sanderlings room the babies have been matching objects using both the shape sorter and number jigsaws. The babies have used their knowledge of shapes and how to fill objects to complete various puzzles.
The Sandpipers started the week with an experiment involving water, the investigation began with drain pipes of different lengths and widths being placed at varying heights. The children then explored which pipe was the best for fast flowing water. It was so fun and the children discovered the pipe which was at the highest angle was the best for making water speed down the pipe, next time the children are going to try racing vehicles to the finish line. To practise strengthening gross motor skills the children have been on the school field kicking footballs and walking around cones. This helped the children to hone in on their spatial awareness whilst using big kicks to fire the ball as far as they could towards their target – the goal. There could be some future footballers amongst The Sandpipers. January’s book of the month ‘The Three Little Pigs’ is coming to an end this week so the children have used the house of sticks to make their own pictures using sticks and paint. February’s book of the month is called ‘My super power’, The Sandpiper’s team are so excited to showcase this book to all of the children and parents through fun-filled daily activities.
The Preschool has been on another hunt for shark and ray eggs after discovering some empty egg cases at the start of the week. The children used beach school to go in search of more egg cases and have been reading books with Miss Emsley about the different sea creatures that come from the eggs. Miss Ward is our expert in transient art and this week the children created their own gardens using flowers and other real life objects for reference. The Preschool children have shown an interest in buildings and have used their imagination and building bricks to create famous landmarks such as London Bridge and Blackpool tower. Mrs Trippier has been with preschool for their weekly ‘talking tin’ activity with the children who are going to reception in September, this gives the children opportunity to share their home life and the things that they enjoy doing and playing with at home – the children always look forward to this time. In dance this week the children have built upon their previous learning of movement and how we can use our bodies to move to music, this helps the children to strengthen their gross motor skills. Mrs Gaynor has been teaching the children action songs, a particular favourite musical masterpiece this week was a song called ‘The journey home from Grandpa’s’, each child actively participated in the actions and had so much fun doing so. Finally, in preparation for the new book of the month called ‘In every house on every street’ by Jess Hitchman, the children have visited the Rossall library to look for books with pictures of different houses.
Awards
Year 6
6S Award Winners:
Amelie- Courage and Determination in Sport
Xanthe- Leadership and Determination
6R:
Molly- Excellent progress in hockey
Reuben- Excellent progress in English
Year 5
5S certificate winners this week are:
Arabella for outstanding efforts throughout all Matilda rehearsals and Archie for superb efforts in his work and conduct.
Year 4
In Year 4 our certificate winners this week are Aaron for outstanding effort in Maths and Harry for excellent writing in English.
Year 3
The certificates in Year 3 this week go to Isla for fantastic home learning and to Henry for challenging himself in his learning.
Year 2
Certificates go to Junior and Rocco for outstanding effort and creativity when completing home learning
Year 1
This week’s certificates of achievement in Year 1 go to:
Teigan for writing such detailed and interesting sentences in English, using adventurous vocabulary too!
Jaxon for showing superb independence all week in Maths and for completing his work with great effort.
Reception
This week’s certificates for achievement go to Francis and Theo. Francis is an extremely good help around the classroom, from tidying up, to helping his friends with something they find tricky. Theo has tried really hard with his handwriting this week and it is becoming much neater as a result. Well done to both!
