This week’s newsletter for Rossall Nursery, Pre-Prep and Prep School.
Dear All,
It was wonderful to see many of you in School on Monday afternoon for our ‘Meet the Teacher’ event. I was delighted to speak to so many parents and to feel the great air of optimism that we all have for the academic year ahead. The overriding topics of conversation were that the children were absolutely ready to return to the structure and opportunities that Rossall offers, especially after such a long summer. I was especially pleased to speak with some of our new parents, who were keen to point out the positive changes in their sons and daughters since starting with us. Rossall is a friendly community that embraces new pupils as if they have always been here; long may that continue!
The term has begun splendidly with a real sense of purpose and enjoyment. You will find the newsletter pieces from both last week and this, along with all the photos, if you follow the link. This should provide you with a flavour of the term to date.
The sun was shining and the course was marked for some excellent displays at our annual House Cross Country event, this afternoon. Rossall is well known for our rugged run that often takes place in gale force winds and horizontal rain – thank goodness we broke from that tradition today! Well done to all children who took part and gave their all – as someone who always found cross country somewhat of a challenge, my admiration goes to all those who dug deep and still managed a smile at the finish line!
I was delighted to announce our Year 6 leaders earlier in the week, including our new School Captains, Jessica and Lex. Both children have been at Rossall since Reception and epitomise the characteristics and enthusiasm that we seek in all our pupils. Every pupil in Year 6 has a role, be it House Captain, Sports Captain, Digital Leader, Playground Monitor, Library Monitor or Choir Captain. They are all individuals and have something to offer; we embrace their skills and attributes by awarding these roles of responsibility. Congratulations to you all.
Have a wonderful weekend,
Mr M Turner
Headmaster of Preparatory School & Nursery
School Council
This week we elected our new year’s School Council for Prep School. Many pupils from all year groups applied and were brave to present their election speeches to their classes. We are proud of all who applied and also proud to announce the successful candidates. Well done and welcome to our new School Council members:
Bow, Nektarios, Valencia, Junior, Stanley, Isla, Alfie, Dolly, Lulu, Eleanor, Sophie, Hollie, Keiran, Grigori, Reuben and Hugo.
We can’t wait for a fantastic and exciting year ahead!
Year 6
Week 1
‘It’s great to be back!’ was the clear message from the pupils and teachers in Year 6 this week, and the children have thoroughly enjoyed settling into their new classrooms and sharing their exciting news from the long summer break. It’s been an action packed few days with plenty of discussion about our hopes and aspirations for the new academic year. We’ve made a creative start to brighten our classroom displays, designing a class charter and personalising kites with our termly targets; one thing for sure- the sky really is the limit!
We have introduced our first topic on Peace and Conflict with a thought-provoking activity, which generated a lively class debate. We have also taken advantage of the sunny weather by completing our first science investigation on light and shadows.
Our new Year 6 are certainly a ray of sunshine, and we are delighted to welcome two new starters to the year group and to Rossall. Well done to Muhammad, Joshua, and all of Year 6 for a wonderful start to the term!
Week 2
Another busy and productive week for Year 6.
We have enjoyed learning about the end of World War 1 and have started looking at the reasons World War 2 began. The children amazed Mr Condon and I with their prior knowledge about the wars and the maturity that they showed throughout the discussion.
We have also taken part in some drama activities in our English lessons. The children showed empathy towards the characters and created some super small group pieces. A highlight of the week was the first Rossall Rotation of the year. Year 6 had a super time cooking in the Rossall Kitchen. I am assured that you will be receiving a steady supply of treats over the course of the Half Term.
Mr Condon and I enjoyed meeting many of you at the Meet the Teacher event. We hope you enjoyed it too!
Year 5
Week 1
We have had such a fantastic start to the year in our classes this week! The week has completely flown by – so much learning and extra-curricular activities on the go to keep our Year 5’s super busy and actively learning.
In Maths this week we have recapped place value: creating posters and displaying how they are able to show different digits in different ways. This was through using methods such as partitioning, base 10 and in written words.
English seems to have our Year 5’s hooked onto all things daredevilish as we research famous talented people such as Danny Maccaskill. This has led to our book of the term ‘Queen Of The Falls’ which is a true story based on Annie Edson Taylor, a woman who finds fame and fortune by going over the thundering waters of Niagara Falls in a…BARREL!
We have also been exploring Indigenous Peoples who inhabited the Great Plains of the USA. They have learnt about their wide communities and how they made tipis from buffalo hide in which they lived.
We cannot wait to carry on our learning and fun next week. Thank you for such a great first week back Year 5!
Week 2
This week, in Year 5, we have learnt more about the story of Annie Edson Taylor and her incredible daredevil adventure. We have started reading our class book ‘The Queen of the Falls’. We have written descriptive paragraphs using our senses and postcards from Niagara Falls, thinking carefully about the audience and purpose of our writing.
In Topic, we have been learning more about the indigenous people of America and the way they lived before settlers arrived in America, and in Science we have continued to learn more about David Attenborough and his amazing work towards the natural world.
We were really excited with the announcement of this year’s musical ‘Matilda’ and practising has already begun during our Music and Drama lessons.
In class we shared the speeches put forward by our candidates for the school council election and are delighted to announce that Eleanor, Seleluko, Sophie and Hollie have been chosen as our Year 5 representatives. Miss Whitehead and I were relieved that the decision was out of our hands as the competition was fierce. Well done to all those who prepared speeches and presentations.
This week also saw the start of our Rossall Rotation sessions. This half term we are doing Forest Schools. The children showed some excellent cooperation, collaboration and teamwork skills during our first session to build the strongest, tallest, sturdiest stick towers.
Year 4
Week 1
And they are off…
Monday saw enthusiasm and passion propel through the door of the Year 4 classroom with children eager to move up another year group. The first day of the new school year is always an exciting time and the children appeared to take the first day of school in their stride. I could fill a page of adjectives with my first impressions of Year 4 which would include; enthusiastic, passionate, captivated, engrossed and friendly.
The rest of the week saw the children bouncing from Dance to Music, then on to Games, Drama and Spanish. One has to admire their relentless energy and capacity to move between a variety of topics and then go on to engage in a diversity of After-School clubs.
The beginning of a new academic year offers the chance to reflect on accomplishments from the previous year and establish new targets. The children have been busy setting themselves goals for the year which range from improving geography skills by studying the globe, developing writing by increasing handwriting speed and refining swimming techniques through continuous practise of back stroke. With these ambitions in mind, let the exciting journey in Year 4 begin.
Week 2
At the beginning of the Michaelmas Term the classroom display boards were empty and stood waiting invitingly for children’s work to be added. Less than two weeks later self-portraits adorn our walls adding colour and personality to the classroom.
In addition to self-portraits the children are linking art to the English curriculum and the book ‘Gorillas’ by Anthony Brown. We are beginning the term by focusing on the possible meanings depicted by the pictures and I look forward to guiding the children through the narrative as they interpret the connotations within the book.
We have also started this term’s Science subject – the digestive system; always a winner with children as it involves the fascinating subject of ‘poo’. This will lead on next week to detailed discussions of the alimentary tract and the commencement of various science experiments; so be prepared for some interesting conversations.
This week we also journeyed back in time to live with the Anglo-Saxons and what it was like to live in this time; however I think the children were quite relieved when we returned back to the safety and comforts of the twenty-first century.
In Maths, we covered rounding and representing numbers in different ways using a range of learning aids. The children find these really helpful and are looking forward to developing this next week.
Year 3
Week 1
Wow, what a fantastic first week for Year 3! We have had a busy, jam-packed week of different activities, and getting used to the new routines in the Prep school. We have welcomed three new pupils to our class – Sarah, Lexi and Felix – who are settling in well and enjoying their new Rossall life. To mark the start of the year, we made our own Year 3 Time Capsule, filled with our goals and predictions for the year, which we have now hidden and will open in July! We have been arty and put our mark on our classroom by creating our own bunting depicting what Year 3 pupils’ attributes are, and by drawing our self-portraits. We have been getting our brains back into gear after the long summer by doing writing, reading and maths activities. We have also started our new topic, ‘Our Coasts’, and we used atlases to identify the different bodies of water around the British Coast! This topic fits directly with our story book for this term: Seal Surfer. We wrote predictions about the book and described a scene using expanded noun phrases. In Science we started our first unit: Keeping Healthy! We learnt about nutrition, the different food groups and how important it is to have a balanced diet. As well as all this we have had our first specialists lessons in Spanish, Music, Dance, Drama and Sports! All in all, an absolutely wonderful start to the school year, well done Year 3 for such a brilliant week!
Week 2
Well what a wonderful start to Year 3 we have had! It has been a jam-packed and fun-filled two weeks to begin the year. The class have settled well into the Prep building and getting used to all the new routines and expectations. It’s great having that more grown-up feeling! We have done loads of English – we started our new book Seal Surfer and we have done writing using expanded noun phrases and prepositions. We have started our new phonics units as well as done reading, comprehension and spelling. Our book relates directly to our Topic – Our Coasts! So far we have learnt about the bodies of water surrounding the UK and the features of coasts. We even had our first Rossall Rotation as Beach Schools and looked for those coastal features in person! In Maths we have started the year with place value looking at 3-digit numbers and explored different ways to represent them. We have also begun our new Science unit all about keeping healthy and learnt about what food groups we need for a balanced diet. We have also done some Art, creating our own self-portraits and decorative bunting.
We held our School Council elections this week and it was wonderful to have so many candidates put themselves forward and be brave to present in front of the class! Well done to Stanley and Isla who were voted in and well done to all who applied.
All in all we have been super enthusiastic and keen to learn which is amazing to see! Great start to the term, Year 3!
Year 2
Week 1
What a first week it has been in Year 2, the children have enjoyed getting back into the routine of school and loved sharing their news from the Summer holidays. The class has certainly kept Mr Rund on his toes, his daily steps have doubled since being in Year 6, which tells the story. This week has been incredibly busy, it has involved orientation, mainly for Mr Rund. The children have been most helpful, showing him the ropes and ensuring everything runs smoothly. In our Mathematics lessons we have been working with numbers up to 100, in English the class have been introduced to our new book Troll Swap, which has been the inspiration for some impressive writing. We have even managed to squeeze in the time to complete some impressive self-portraits in Art. However, the most important thing for the majority of the children has been the opportunity to enjoy a yummy hot chocolate at lunch time. The class have really impressed over the first week of Year 2, they deserve a good rest this weekend. I assure you Mr Rund will certainly be having one!
Week 2
The cat is out of the bag! Year 2 is definitely the place to be, the children are full of fun, enthusiasm and a desire to learn. It’s the perfect combination for any successful classroom.
The children have been working incredibly hard whilst ensuring they enjoy themselves. If this week is anything to go by it is going to be an incredibly busy term. We have been learning about base 10 and working with place value grids in Mathematics, completing some quality written pieces in relation to our book “Troll Swap”, strengthening our phonics knowledge, completing mind maps on people who help us, doing astronomy for Rossall Rotation, creating some Lowry inspired artwork and enjoying all our specialist subjects. All this as well as joining the Prep School at the House Cross-Country competition to take part in our own fun run.
All the children have really impressed in their attitude towards school this week, keep it up and we will simply go from strength to strength!
Year 1
Week 1
What a wonderful first week in Year 1! We have been very busy learning new routines, playing with our friends (old and new) in our new classroom, and creating some solid foundations for our learning this year. We’ve worked hard to write CVC words in Phonics and we know and can write our numbers too.
Also, we have been sorting using counters in Maths- what fun! It’s been an active week for us; enjoying Dance, PE, and even using Kung Fu Punctuation in our English lessons! Well done Year 1, let’s bring on another exciting week next week!
Week 2
It’s been a week of ‘wows’ in our Year 1 classroom; starting with learning new sounds in Phonics, to practising counting our numbers…and we even had a surprise discovery of a penguin egg too!
Amongst all of our daily learning this week we have been busy solving the mystery of how a penguin egg happened to arrive in our classroom and where it may have come from.
We believe we have cracked this mystery- it must have something to do with the story we are reading of ‘Lost and Found’, by Oliver Jeffers. The children have been so clever and curious, and asked keen questions with the intent to answer them all!
Will the egg hatch? Did it come from the South Pole? Watch this space because Year 1 are on the case!
Reception
Week 1
This week has been full of ‘firsts’ for the Reception children. The first is always the best as it marks the beginning. The start of their learning journey through Rossall School.
The Reception children have all settled fantastically well into the school routines and activities. They are quickly learning their way around school and the classroom rules. They won’t learn it in a day but we will continue to emphasize and practice for the first few weeks.
The children have had their first PE lesson, which was a big hit! On our first afternoon at the Rossall Kitchens we made shortbread biscuits – I hope you enjoyed eating them as much as the children did! Their first music lesson taught the children about simple rhythm and pulse. The children sat very sensibly and quietly for their first assembly with the rest of the school. We finished off our first week with a Swimming lesson … What an action packed, busy week for our new starters!
Please can I remind parents to bring in PE bags and swim bags on a Monday. These will then go home at the end of the week. All uniforms should be named … We have several blazers, shirts and ties not named, which causes upset for the children when they can not find their belongings and we are not sure whose is whose!
Week 2
The beginning of formal schooling comes with a myriad of change and responsibility. We are learning to dress and undress independently, cut up our own food, go to the toilet ourselves, concentrate on classroom discussions, listen to instructions and the list goes on…
Regardless of the structure of Reception or rigor of our standards, it’s safe to say Reception is hard work for our children.
Things to remember during this transition
- Remember every week won’t be like the first few weeks. The first weeks of Reception are an emotional rollercoaster for everyone. Children are crying, parents are crying, and sometimes after school, you can even find teachers crying if they aren’t falling asleep from exhaustion! The first weeks of school are about survival. Don’t try to predict the whole year based on the first few weeks.
- Remember they are little. Reception are not little adults. They may not adjust quickly and they really aren’t designed to. A little understanding can go a long way in the first few weeks of school. After the first few weeks are in the books, we will have had the opportunity to teach some simple coping skills and inch every child closer to adjusting to their new environment and situation.
- Remember their purpose. They are coming to Reception to learn. We will learn to count, read, and write this year. But they are also (and more importantly, in my opinion) coming to school to learn how to be part of a community. They will learn to share, be kind to others, wait their turn, clean up after themselves, serve their own snack, and wash their hands after they go to the bathroom (we hope, right?!). If we get bogged down in emotions and problems, we might lose sight of why our children are at school in the first place.
Nursery
Week 1
Play give children a chance to practice what they are learning
Fred Rogers
With a few new Sanderlings starting over the summer, the babies have been out and about exploring our lovely grounds. The Sanderlings have been learning nursery rhymes that are used as a calm down time and have even incorporated musical instruments. The Sanderlings have taken part in physical activities through music and movement where they further enhanced their balancing and coordination skills. Our gross and fine motor skills have also been used as we have been building towers and knocking them down, it was so much fun. Finally, the babies enjoyed solving puzzles such as a farmyard jigsaw where the challenge was to match the product such as milk to the cow.
The Sandpipers have been learning lots about numbers and trying to match the numeral to quantity for numbers 1 to 5. The Sandpipers have been making marks in different textures in the tuff trays, we have started to make marks in rice, paint and play dough. This week’s wellbeing Wednesday was with Miss Southern, the children were encouraged to try new textures and tastes such as tomatoes, carrots, breadstick and melon and talk about what they could see, hear, taste and test. Our outdoor exploration took us onto the field for a bike ride.
The Preschool children have been settling into the preschool classroom and starting all the activities based around school readiness. Miss Simms and Miss Ward have been leading our teacher time, during this lesson we learn about letter sounds and subitising (number quantity and recognition). Our book of the week is ‘The Colour Monster’ so the preschool children have been on colour walks around the grounds linking colours to feelings, we have seen an angry red car, a sad blue sky and a happy yellow sign. The children have been showing their artistic sides with colourful string paintings. It’s been a lovely start to the term and we look forward to giving you further updates in the coming week.
Week 2
If you can light the spark of curiosity in a child, they will learn without any further assistance
Ron Robinson
The Sanderlings have had a very busy week learning lots of new information through play. Mrs Beddis has encouraged the children to take part in a colouring activity with the egg crayons, this helps the babies to strengthen their fine motor skills ready for early writing. The babies have also been learning the names of the primary colours – red, blue and yellow – trying hard to repeat the word the adult was saying. The babies have been getting out and about on our school grounds, the children who are starting to walk have been holding onto the prams for support whilst the smaller babies enjoyed being pushed along whilst looking at all the beautiful things there are to see here. Finally, one of the learning intentions in the Sanderlings room this week was to be able to recognise and name body parts, Miss Schofield, Miss Heatley and Mrs Beddis having been singing head, shoulders, knees and toes and the babies really enjoyed joining in with the actions.
The Sandpipers have enjoyed activities based around the book ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’. Miss Southern, Mrs Mayer and Mrs Gaynor have planned lots of creative activities such as colouring and creating patterns on the butterfly and caterpillar from the story on a large scale using different thickness of pencils and crayons. The Sandpipers have been on a trip to our petting farm to visit the animals as this is linked to a conversation the children started about going to a farm with their families and how much they had enjoyed themselves. The farmyard jigsaws were also set up on our tables so that the children could match the pieces together and complete a farmyard picture. To support the Sandpiper’s problem solving and prediction skills they have also been mixing colours together to make new colours, we now know that red and blue make purple and yellow and blue make green – it was very interesting to see new colours appear before our eyes.
The Preschool children have continued with their book ‘The Colour Monster’ with more focus on our own emotions. We talked about what makes us feel happy, sad, scared or angry and shared our own views on why we may feel that way about a certain emotion. We also had the opportunity to see an interactive version of ‘The Colour Monster’ which gave us a different perspective and allowed for further discussions on the events in the story. The pre-schoolers have gone on a trip to the farm to look at all the animals and talk about how we look after the animals. We now know that animals need a warm place to sleep, they need food and water and shelter especially when the weather changes – we were so happy to observe that our animals have access to all of this at Rossall Farm and we even had the opportunities to feed the rabbits ourselves. Our week ended on Friday with a cross country run on the school field with the other classes in school. We love to race and it was lovely to see the pre-schoolers that have now moved into reception class.
Awards
Year 6
Week 1
Award Certificates:
6S:
Muhammad – Making a wonderful start to life at Rossall
Roman – Outstanding contribution in class activities and support of others
6R:
Joshua – Excellent start at Rossall
Alfie – Fantastic start to Year 6
Week 2
Award Certificates:
Roman – Showing integrity
Jacob – Fabulous work in Topic
Hugo – Support of others
Amelie – A super role model
Year 5
Week 1
5R: Nilanth and Rio for such a fantastic start to the term.
5S: Arabella for settling in so well and Annabel for trying her very best through out the week.
Week 2
Well done to this week’s award winners.
In 5R, Tommy, for excellent effort in Maths, and Karanjot for fantastic Prep.
In 5S, Caitlin and Cara, also for excellent effort, resilience and perseverance in Maths.
Year 4
Week 1
This week our certificate winners are Harry and Ralph for settling into Rossall brilliantly.
Week 2
In Year 4 our award winners are Florence and Ethan for outstanding enthusiasm in Science.
Year 3
Week 1
The Year 3 certificates this week go to Ryan and Hope for being so brave and making a great start to the year!
Week 2
This week Sarah gets a certificate for always smiling, being friendly and kind.
Year 2
Week 1
Arla and Aidan for making a fabulous start in Year 2 and Rossall
Week 2
Rex for Outstanding effort.
Junior for Outstanding contribution in class.
Year 1
Week 1:
This week our awards in Year 1 go to:
Theo for being so responsible and helpful in class all week.
Yuha for having a fabulous, happy attitude each day.
Week 2:
This week our awards in Year 1 go to:
Bow for always trying her hardest, even when something is challenging.
Olivia for always having a positive attitude and for developing her growth mindset.
Reception
Week 1
This week’s certificates of achievement awards go to Francis and Isabelle.
Francis has been extremely helpful around the classroom this week. Helping to tidy up and helping his friends with different tasks.
Isabelle has shown a positive approach and eagerness to complete all classroom activities this week.
Week 2
This week’s certificate of achievement goes to Joshua and Ares. Both children have settled quickly into their new routines and set an excellent example to all the other children in the class.
