Junior News 20 September 2019

Dear Parents,

Another busy week is complete at Northampton High Junior School, and there is much to share. Year 6N delivered our first Class Assembly of the year, sharing their targets and dreams for the year ahead. It is wonderful to have such positive role models in our school. We were also lucky enough to have a guitar performance from one of our Senior School students in this week’s singing assembly; opportunities such as this are just one of the many benefits of working and learning in a 2-18 school.

Spending time in classrooms this week has been one of my many highlights. I have learnt more about ‘healthy eating,’ ‘what can be done in a million hours,’ and ‘Queen Victoria’s Knickers.’ Working in a Junior School is certainly never dull!

This week I attended the GDST Head Teacher Conference and the GDST Summit in London. Key messages were delivered about the future of leadership, Artificial Intelligence and equality in the work place. It was both inspiring and reassuring to know that Northampton High School is part of such a progressive and forward-thinking group; having a network of 24 other Junior School Heads means that expertise can be disseminated across the whole network.

Next Friday we have our first fundraising event of the year to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support. We will be hosting a coffee morning and it will be a non-uniform day. Please see below for further details.

Finally, following a rigorous application and selection process, I am pleased to announce our first leadership roles of the year; NHS Junior School Sports Captains 2019/20:

Netball: Anna C
Swimming: Emily M
Hockey; Charlotte F
Summer: Rose N

Congratulations, and we look forward to a successful sporting year ahead.

Have a lovely weekend,

Chris Bailey
Head of Junior School

Achievements

Each week in assembly, girls are invited to share their achievements in activities outside of school. They are listed below for this week:

Singing
Eloise K – grade 1 distinction

Tennis
Rose N – won 2 matches and lost 2 in tournament
Frankie B – runner up in club championships

Dog Show
Holly J – 4th out of 10 for junior handling

Swimming
Fern A – individual medley 50m breast stroke PB

Horse Riding
Emiliy K – supreme champion in show, 1st in jumping, 1st in ‘first ridden’
Anna H – 1st place in dressage

Ballet
Anya R – grade 1 merit

Reading Challange – library
Odelia S – read 6 books in 2 days

Bharatanatyam – Indian classical dance
Varnikha K – distinction

Assemblies

4N – Wednesday 2 October
6H – Wednesday 9 October
3N – Wednesday 16 October
2N – Wednesday 13 November
5H – Wednesday 20 November
5N – Wednesday 27 November
1N – Wednesday 4 December

Clubs - Wednesday 25 September

Art Club for Years 2 and 3 and Mathletics for Year 1 are unfortunately cancelled.

Dates for Diary

Wednesday 25 September – Reception Information Evening, 4pm – 5pm

Friday 27 September – FoNHS Parent Forum

Friday 27 September – Macmillan Coffee Morning

Wednesday 9 October – Junior School Parents’ Evening, 6pm – 8.30pm

Thursday 10 October – Junior School Parents’ Evening, 4pm – 6pm

Wednesday 16 October – Year 5 Hobbies Morning 9am – 11am

Friday 18 October – Year 3 to Year 6 Billionaire Boy trip

Charity

Year 5 are getting ready to host:

Macmillan Coffee Morning
Friday 27 September

Girls are asked to bring in £1 to wear mufti and will be able to buy cakes and biscuits from 7:30 am for 50p each. There will be tea and coffee available for adults from 7:30 am – 9 am.

If you are able to help us by making cakes, cookies, biscuits, brownies, flapjacks or anything else delicious, that would be BRILLIANT!

Please bring these in on Thursday and leave them on the table in the entrance hall (in a named tin or box). It is really important that NO NUTS are used in recipes (including Nutella) so that all the girls can stay safe.

Please ask the Year 5 girls, Miss Brandon-Jones or Mrs Shaw if you have any questions.

Have fun baking and we look forward to seeing you on Friday morning!

Music

Miss Smith will be running two new Music Clubs at lunch times for Year 4 and above in the Junior School Music Room. These are:

• Junior Orchestra on Monday from 12.45pm to 1.15pm
• Recorder (day to be confirmed) to run from 12.45pm to 1.15pm (some experience desirable)

Nursery Kipper Room and Elmer Room

Kipper Room: This week in the Kipper Room we have continued to help all the girls settle in. It has been a joy to watch confidence grow, bonds with staff strengthen and new friendships blossom. We have made great use of the aptly named ‘Messy Area’, experimenting with water, sand and paint using a variety of tools such as rollers and toothbrushes! We are becoming more adventurous too…pretending to be pirates on the climbing equipment in the garden.

We have enjoyed a walk in the sunshine, collecting conkers and huge leaves. “My leaf is like a flower” said Anne. “I see the moon” said a very excited Nyra.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning: We will be talking about our families so could we ask that the girls bring in some photos of themselves and their families.

Elmer Room: Highlights this week in Elmer Room have included a walk in the sunshine to collect conkers and leaves, “There is some more,” Yana said. The girls have enjoyed a trip to the library to choose books to take home and share with their families. During our library visit we listened to the story of the ‘Gruffalo’ using the story sack props to bring the story to life. Jasmine enjoyed saying the next rhyme in the story “There’s no such thing as a Gruffalo?”

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning: We will be talking about the different types of weather as the seasons begin to change.

Nursery Pre-School

Highlights: This week the girls in Pre-School have been using language to describe, talk and give reasons for their choices during activities. They decided which objects a baby or a child would use and explained why. They also talked about photographs of different people, their occupations and stages of life e.g. baby, child, parents and grandparents.

Whilst exploring ice they used different tools to help the dinosaurs to escape. During Forest School they were excited to hunt for the animals from the Gruffalo after reading the story. They then made homes for them and other animals.

What the girls have said:
“I like the kitchen.” Olivia.
“Playing outside.” Millie.
“I like playing with my teachers.” Isabel.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• Using the Clever Touch board to draw self portraits.
• Planting bulbs.
• Recognising numbers.
• Exploring obstacle courses during PE and outside.
• Painting with water colours.
• Exploring capacity in the water tray.

Reception

Highlights: This week we have been investigating the rectangle shape, the colour yellow and the number 2. The girls have been making rectangles with two long and two short sides, looking at the number 2 formation and finding out about one of our senses – sight. They played ‘Kim’s Game’ and made telescopes and binoculars.
We all joined in with our French teacher, to learn some of the words to ‘Head, shoulders, knees and toes,’ in French!

What the girls have said:
Keziah and Rhoda enjoyed making the binoculars.
“I liked writing my name.” Shanaya.
“I liked the Kim’s game and using my eyes.” Grace.
Maya enjoyed the singing in French.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• The number 3 formation, the colour red and the triangle shape.
• Book characters and name matching.
• Name writing.
• The sense ‘smell’.

Year 1

Highlights: This week we have continued to learn about The Victorians and we have focused on what it was like to go to school for a Victorian child. In English we have finished the story of ‘Queen Victoria’s Knickers’ and even had a try at writing our own letters, as though we were Queen Victoria. We have explored our senses in Science and have been practising finding one more and one less in our Maths lessons. In Design Technology, we have started to build our own Victorian houses using cardboard and in Art we have looked at mixing colours.

What the girls have said:
“I liked making the Victorian house in DT.” Holly H.
“I enjoyed learning about my senses.” Eloise.
“Counting back in Maths was fun.” Thea.
“Using the Victorian role play area was so much fun.” Leah.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• English – we will be looking at ‘Daisy Saves the Day’.
• Maths – we will be starting to compare groups and introducing the greater than and less than symbols (< >).
• History – we will be finding out more about the Victorians and in particular looking at children at work.

Year 2

Highlights: In Maths this week we have continued our learning on place value and everyone has worked really hard and developed their understanding. We have also started looking at some problem solving and reasoning techniques. In English we have explored more of the story, ‘Queen Victoria’s knickers’ and we had a go at designing our own pair of knickers, suggesting reasons as to why the Queen might like them! In DT, we have made a start on our model homes and there was some fantastic team work happening throughout the lesson with girls helping one another. In humanities we looked at schools in the past and talked about the similarities and differences between them and our own schooling experience.

What the girls have said:
“I made some pancake knickers for Queen Victoria.” Priscilla.
“I loved making my house and adding the windows and chimney!” Artemisia.
“I made a Victorian sponge cake for my PREP.” Yilin.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• English – finishing the story of ‘Queen Victoria’s knickers’ and writing a review.
• Maths – comparing numbers.
• History – children at work.

Year 3

Highlights: The girls have been partitioning numbers this week to help their understanding of place value. In Science we are continuing to study light sources and discover how we see objects.

What the girls have said:
“I really enjoyed using crocodiles to learn more than and less than.” Harini.
“I liked gymnastics and got to do a new type of roly poly.” Tami.
“I enjoyed doing choir on Monday, especially when we did part singing for the last bit.” Risara.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• Maths – we will be looking at adding and subtracting multiples of 10 and near multiples as well as continuing to improve our times table knowledge.
• Science – we will be studying shadows and investigating how they are formed.
• English – we will be reading the BFG and writing our own descriptions of the giant’s character.

Year 4

Highlights: This week we have been working on rounding numbers to the nearest 10, 100 or 1000. We have also added and subtracted 1, 10, 100 and 1000 from different starting numbers. In English we have used similes and alliteration to write poems about the sun, inspired by this week’s fine weather. The girls have also enjoyed following a route on a map whilst walking around Wootton.

What the girls have said:
“I liked Computing because we were emailing each other and I got a funny reply.” Darcy.
“I liked Art because I enjoyed looking at the monochrome pictures. They are really one colour but they look like multiple colours.” Rithika.
“I liked doing English and making up our own poems about the sun.” Safiya.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• English – We will be looking at examples of information texts in preparation for some research about the Romans.
• Maths – We will be working on methods for addition and subtraction.
• Science – We are looking forward to preparing for our class assembly on 2 October.

Year 5

Highlights: This week in English we have looked at the timeline of events in the first three chapters of the Iron Man and begun to consider his use of descriptive language. We really enjoyed visiting the senior school library and discussing recommendations for more challenging texts. In Maths, we continued our work on place value and working with decimal numbers. In Science we looked closely at the anatomy of a flower and the girls had great fun identifying flower parts after dissecting them.

What the girls have said:
“On Wednesday I really enjoyed the Hockey team try outs because it was really fun and I love hockey. My favourite bit was when we passed the ball diagonally and took it in turns to try and score.” Emily G.
“I really enjoyed Humanities because we were doing things about maps. I find maps quite tricky but we had to make a key which helps the people who read the map to know where they are going, and now it’s a bit easier!” Frankie.
“This week I have really enjoyed Science. My favourite part was when we got some flowers to stick in our books.” Emily.
“My favourite thing this week was making posters for the Macmillan coffee morning because it was such fun! The best of all was English because we are reading about the Iron Man.” Daisy.

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• English – we will be looking more closely at the descriptive language in the Iron Man and planning our own piece of narrative writing.
• Maths – we will be rounding whole numbers and decimals (including money).
• Science – we will be thinking about the advantages or disadvantages of sexual and asexual reproduction in plants.

Date for your diary: Hobbies Morning Wednesday 16 October 9-11am.

There are still a few people who need to give consent for our residential trip to Grafham Water on 6 November. The email link was sent on Monday. Mrs Shaw

Year 6

HIghlights: A Year 6 report on their second week in the sunshine!

The pupils may be writing autumn poems, but all week in break-time, they have been relaxing and playing in the glorious sunshine. They are now developing a natural rhythm for their new timetable and have been taking part in a wide range of activities.

We were also very proud and impressed by the 6N Class Assembly on Wednesday, which looked at the skills and qualities we need to be successful and happy. Remember to add the 6H Class Assembly on 9 October to your diaries.
Karen Fordham and James Loveday

What the girls have said:
“In English we have written a class poem about Autumn. We also wrote a poem by ourselves using the knowledge we’ve learnt in our English lessons so far.”
“In Maths we have been working on place value and we are finding times table grids fun! Our challenge is to complete them in 5 minutes and once we have achieved this, 3 minutes! We have also been answering some challenging questions involving really big numbers!”
“In Humanities we are looking at the Ancient Greeks and are learning about two major cities, Athens and Sparta. Sparta has two Kings of the city and Athens is where democracy comes from. We had to decide which state we would like to live in- not an easy decision!”
“In Art we have been doing self-portraits and we all really enjoyed it. Some people thought theirs looked bad but we encouraged each other and in the end I think we were all fairly pleased with what we had achieved. Some of us have also loved experimenting with the different effects that can be created using oil pastels.”

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• Exploring the world of Ancient Greek myths in English.
• Understanding the value of decimal places in Maths.
• More about the fascinating world of plants and animals in Science.

GAP Club

Highlights: The girls have had a busy week at GAP Club. On Monday we hosted ‘GAP Club has Talent’ and some of the girls made play dough with Mrs Long. The girls have enjoyed being creative with the dough, setting challenges for each other by writing an object on a piece of paper, swapping and making the object. The play foam was also very popular. ‘Paws Are Here to Help Vets’ has continued to be very busy every night with lots and lots of patients.

What the girls have said:
“Play dough, I like playing with it and doing more play doughing.” Rhoda, Reception.
“I like doing playing in the vets.” Elouise, Reception.
“I have enjoyed dressing up the Barbie dolls.” Maya, 2N

Looking ahead to some of next week’s learning:

• We are going to explore clay.

Community choir hits half a decade of high notes.

The Northampton High School Community Chamber Choir is celebrating its fifth birthday this month with two key events and a rather special cake.

Members of the choir have been invited to sing with John Rutter CBE, Britain’s leading choral composer and conductor, alongside the Northampton Bach Choir on Saturday, here in our own school. The following day, the choir will make a welcome return to sing in Olney United Reformed Church celebrating the Harvest Festival service.

The fifth birthday is a major milestone for the choir, which was started by the school’s former Director of Music, Jo Drew, and is now led by professional soprano, Choir Director and music teacher Catriona German. There are about 20 members of the choir participating from the local community, the school staff, students and parents.

Thanks to strong support from the school, the choir has also gained a new accompanist, Derek Lau, who teaches piano at the school and is also a professional videographer.

To mark the birthday at rehearsals this week, expert baker and choir member Sally Robinson has created a wonderful birthday cake [see photos].

The Northampton High School Community Chamber Choir gives informal recitals at a wide range of local events and regularly at the school open days and Christmas concerts. It sings a wide repertoire with something to suit all tastes, from Bach to the Beatles, medieval motets to musicals. There is always a warm welcome for new members.

Come and make music with us. No previous experience of reading music is required, just a love of singing. The choir is a very friendly, relaxed group and it is free to attend.

You can find out more on our Facebook page or email Rachael at rachael.eden1@btinternet.com and we can arrange for you to come along to one of our rehearsal evenings to see what it’s like.

Term Dates

Northampton High School
Newport Pagnell Road, Hardingstone Northampton NN4 6UU
T: 01604 765765 nhsadmin@nhs.Gdst.Net