Nothampton High School
Junior News
Junior News

Junior Newsletter 8 March 2019

Dear Parents and Girls,

I have spoken about assemblies several times of late and this week is no different, but they really are such a special time when the whole school comes together.

This week Hania in Year 5 gave the first solo musical performance of the term in assembly, playing a truly impressive ‘Sonatina in A Minor’ on the piano. She will repeat this piece by Benda in her Grade 4 examination next week, and we wish her every success in this.

On Wednesday, Reception students gave us a most entertaining and beautifully-performed assembly on the subject of ‘toys’ and we were joined by the pre-school girls for this special occasion. Talking us through the history of toys, and flanked by pictures that they had drawn themselves, Reception showed us several classics and finished with a lovely song and a proud showing of their handmade teddy bears. Foolishly, I surmised that they had taken their inspiration from a 1970s toy box, but this served only to age me as they were, in fact, toys that would have been enjoyed by many generations before yet remain in the toy boxes of today. These included a diabolo, a spinning top, a flick book, a wooden yo-yo and Jacob’s ladder. Huge congratulations to the girls and many thanks to Mrs Farrar, too.

Today, Year 6 celebrated International Women’s Day with an assembly on inspirational women of the twentieth century, a culmination of the work that they have been doing with Year 8 on the subject. They discussed those who had made an impact on science, exploration, art and politics, including Marie Curie, Ellen MacArthur, Frida Kahlo and Rosa Parks, and challenged us to consider the effect that they had on the lives of future generations.

Yesterday was World Book Day and students and staff enjoyed dressing up as their favourite literary character. Years 3 and 4 missed out on this but arrived at school before the end of the day, dressed as a slightly grubby version of themselves as they returned from Beamanor Hall. ‘It was great’ and ‘we had such a fun time’ are shortened versions of the exclamations and summaries that were conveyed to me as they came through the door. It was clear from these – and from their tired but beaming faces – that this was the case, and their teachers could only confirm it. They ate well, slept well and wholeheartedly joined in with all the activities, further developing their skills of collaboration as well as their confidence and their ability to lead and to be led.  My thanks go to Miss Taylor and Mrs Dadge for preparing them so well and leading the trip, and to Mrs Purvey-Tyrer, Mrs Long and Mrs Knott who accompanied them.

Year 1 and 2 also had their own trip out on Wednesday, with a visit to the Sealife Centre in Birmingham which was enjoyed by all. They, too, returned full of news about what they had seen – from seahorses to sharks – and their teachers were equally proud of them and of the way that they represented the school.

Over the past two weeks we have welcomed four new pupils to our community: two in nursery, one in Year 3 and one in Year 4. With Open Events on Thursday evening and Friday morning, the interest in the school continues and we look forward to moving to two Year 5 and two Year 6 forms from September 2019.

Next week is Science Week and Mrs Hodgetts-Tate, Head of Science in the Senior School, has a fantastic list of activities lined up, with something for everyone from Nursery to Year 6. More on this next week, however, as I don’t want to reveal any spoilers!

Wishing you a good weekend.

Caroline Petryszak
Interim Head of Junior School

Mrs Petryszak's availability

Mrs Petryszak’s days on site will vary over the coming weeks in order to align with school activities and events:

  • w/c 11 March: Monday/Thursday/Friday
  • w/c 18 March: Monday/Wednesday/Thursday
  • w/c 25 March: Monday/Wednesday/Thursday
  • w/c 1 April: Monday/Thursday/Friday

She is, however, contactable on c.petryszak@nhs.gdst.net or via the school office on any day of the working week.

Achievements

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

Swimming
Rebecca P – award for 20 m

General Messages

Assemblies

Class Assemblies are held in the Junior School Hall at 8.35am on Wednesdays and parents are most welcome to enjoy refreshments from 8.00am. Here are the dates for this term:

Year 1N – 13 March

Year 3N – 27 March

Year 4N – 3 April

Dates for the diary

  • Weds 13 March – 1N Class Assembly
  • Weds 20 March – Parents’ Evening (see below)
  • Thurs 21 March – Parents’ Evening (see below)
  • Sat 23 March – Year 5 and 6 Ski Trip departs
  • Weds 27 March – 3N Class Assembly
  • Sun 30 March – Year 5 and 6 Ski Trip returns
  • Weds 3 April – 4N Class Assembly
  • Fri 5 April – Last day of Spring Term
  • Weds 24 April – INSET DAY
  • Thurs 25 April – Summer Term starts

Parents’ Evenings:

  • Weds 20 March – Nursery: 4pm – 6pm
  • Weds 20 March –  Reception to Year 6: 6pm – 8pm
  • Thurs 21 March – Nursery to Year 6: 4pm – 6pm

Sports

Under 10 and Under 11  GDST Cross Country Rally Bromley

On Thursday 7 March, six Year 5 and 6 girls travelled to Bromley to compete in the GDST Cross Country Rally. We all really enjoyed the muddy conditions and overall had a great time. The positions were:

117th Anna C
108th Charlotte F
1st Ella D
116th Emily M
114th Eryn C
64th Isla H

There were over 200 competitors and I feel we all did really well. Afterwards, we all had a great time playing football. First we did skills and then we played matches mixed with girls from the other GDST schools.

Ella D

Under 11 Netball v Condover Hall

On 1 March Year 6 and 8 travelled to Condover Hall for a weekend of netball. We had an amazing time playing netball and also taking part in lots of exciting activities, including zip lines, abseiling, tunneling and finding ourselves lost in the lazer maze. All of the girls tried their best and I was extremely proud of my team because, even when they lost a game, they didn’t give up – they persevered and got better each time! Well done everybody!

Isobel B Team Captain

Swap Shop

We have listened to feedback from parents and have decided to offer Senior School uniform to Junior School parents who are making the transition to Senior School.  The next Swap Shop will be during Junior School Parents’ Evening on Wednesday 20 March and Thursday 21 March. Please bring any items for sale into Reception on the morning of Wednesday 20 March.

The Selling Process

  • Should you wish to sell any items of uniform, swap shop labels need to be completed. These can be obtained from Reception. Without a label, we are unable to give you the proceeds of the sale and the monies would go into school funds.
  • Please do not enter a price on the label. We have set prices that the clothes sell for and 20% of that price goes to the school fund.
  • All items must be in a good state of repair and clean condition.
  • Items of uniform should be brought into school on the day of the swap shop, not before as we do not have the space to store them.
  • Please ensure, if you are new to using Swap Shop, that you also attach your name and address (on a separate piece of paper) to the item of uniform so that we know where to send your cheque. If you are sending in multiple items only one name and address sheet is required and please make sure this is placed in the bag with all clothes submitted.
  • We can no longer sell blazers and sports kit with the old logo, so please do not send any in.
  • Cheques for sold items will be issued in June each year.

Photos on Flickr

To view our latest School photos from our Flickr albums, please click here

Our week

Nursery

Kipper Room

This week in Kipper Room we have enjoyed celebrating Pancake Day.  We liked listening to a story about Pancake Day in the library, we made pancakes out of play dough and the girls especially liked eating them for pudding at lunchtime. We have also celebrated World Book Day where the children dressed as their favourite characters from a book. We went on a bear hunt for a walk and found the bears and listened to the story ‘We’re going on a bear hunt’. We played with spaghetti, pretending they were worms for the ‘Super Worm Book’. The girls have liked being helpers at snack time pouring drinks for their friends too.

Elmer Room

This week in Elmer Room the girls have continued to do activities related to ‘growing’ and they have had fun doing observational paintings of daffodils. They have also had fun celebrating Shrove Tuesday where we made pancakes out of playdough, participated in pancake races and had pancake to eat as a yummy treat. We have also celebrated World Book Day where the girls have enjoyed coming in dressed as a character from a story.  Lovely costumes girls!

Pre-School

This week we have had lots of fun with the phonic sound ‘p’.  We have planted pansies in pots, made pizzas on plates with pepperoni, pineapple and prawns for our role play and painted pigs.

On Tuesday we ordered the life cycle of a seed. On Thursday we enjoyed dressing up as our favourite character from a book and sharing books with Year 5 and on Friday making pizzas to take home.

Next week your daughter may experience the following activities:

We are joining the whole school to celebrate Science Week and have lots of science-based activities planned.

General news

Please can you send a spare set of clothes including underwear and socks on a Wednesday for after Forest School in case your daughter gets wet. We do put on waterproof overclothes but occasionally the water still gets under them. Thank you.

Reception

We hope that you enjoyed our Class Assembly; thank you all for coming. The girls were very excited, but managed to stay composed and focused, delivering a confident performance to be proud of.

This week we have been learning about halves and halving, finishing the week with making our own sandwich snack by halving a piece of bread.

We enjoyed ‘World Book Day’ and dressing up, sharing our books and listening to our Year 5 friends reading with us. We thought about rhyming words and tongue twisters! Our new sound was ‘oo’ ‘Look at a Book’.

Year 1

This week the girls have mastered the fine motor challenges set out for them as part of their ‘wake up work’. They have been making nets of 3D shapes using polydrons, building capital letters out of Lego, collaborating on a sea life puzzle, practising joined-up handwriting and making a table and chairs from Multilink. You can see how brilliant their skills are when you check out the pictures on Flickr. Fun was also had by all on our trip to Sea Life in Birmingham, more of which to come in our class assembly next week. See you there!

Year 2

An exciting week in Year 2 this week with our school trip and World Book Day. Our trip to the National Sealife Centre in Birmingham on Wednesday was fantastic! We saw so many different animals and sea creatures in their habitats. We learned so much about them from our tour guide for the day, Megan, and we asked her lots of super questions too.

“I learned that rays’ gills are underneath them” Sophie

“I liked seeing all the different patterns on the rays!” Avleen

“I enjoyed the 4D cinema. There were bubbles and water squirters!” Ellie

“I loved looking at the seahorses.” Ishani

“I liked making static with our hands and then holding our hands over the water to attract the stingrays.” Jessica

Year 3 & 4

We have had a fantastic time at Beaumanor Hall. There were many highlights: learning about Iron Age Celts, especially the battle re-enactment and playing football with a severed head(!); building dens in the wood then drinking hot chocolate round the camp fire; hide and seek in the cellars; making and testing land buggies and completing team challenges.

All the girls have learnt how to communicate, cooperate and collaborate with each other in a really fun way.

Year 5

“In Science we have started learning about planets and it’s really interesting because we don’t really know a lot about them. It’s nice exploring what they have been named after and how many moons they have got. I did some research on Venus and I found out that it is named after the Roman goddess of love and it rotates the opposite way to Earth (anti-clockwise)!”  Lilybella

“I really enjoyed creating a computer game on PurpleMash and making different levels to make it harder to complete.” Niamh

“In Maths we have been converting measurements like grams to kilograms. Also, on world book day, we read to Pre-School and it was lots of fun.”  Lucy

“We started to learn about the Vikings in Humanities. We drew a timeline and we labelled a map. We learnt that they didn’t have horns on their helmets.”  Rose

Year 6

‘This week has been extremely busy with International Women’s Day, preparation for Science Week and World Book Day. We have also all entered the BBC Radio 2 5OO word Short Story Competition!’ Charlotte and Arna

‘We have really enjoyed planning and writing short stories for the BBC Radio 2 Short Story Competition and learnt a lot from the processes involved including planning, pair sharing and editing our work.’ Imogen

‘Following on from our work with L4 we have learnt more about a diverse range of inspirational women and have asked ourselves what the world would be like today if they had not been born. We really enjoyed delivering our Class Assembly to the rest of the Junior school and would like to thank Mrs Williams and L4 for their help.’ Lola

‘The highlight of the week for me was World Book Day. I enjoyed dressing up in character and sharing recommended books with our peers, as well as sharing our favourite stories from when we were younger to the girls in Key Stage 1.’ Arna

‘Preparation for Science Week has been a fascinating journey into the world of electricity.  We have learnt how electricity is made, the journey it makes from source to home and created salt dough circuits. Next week we are looking forward to making alarms to stop Mrs Fordham from stealing our chocolate!’ Charlotte E-H

GAP Club

This week in GAP Club the girls have made spring flowers, painted pancakes to celebrate Shrove Tuesday, explored play dough and participated in a drawing competition.

Four Nursery girls have shared their highlight of the week:

‘Painting pancakes.’  Harriet

‘Making flowers.’  Annabelle

‘I’ve enjoyed playing with Maisie dancing.’  Maisha

‘Flowers and dancing.’  Maisie

Kings Camp Summer Sessions

We are happy to say that Kings Camp UK will again be bringing the fun this summer to Northampton High School. Book your places today by clicking here!

Term Dates

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