Thank You



Our chalk tree

Mrs Matthews would like to say thank you for all the lovely gifts and cards McKee class gave to her for Christmas. My family have been enjoying eating the sweets and biscuits ever since!

I hope you had a lovely time with your friends and families and are enjoying playing with your presents. Don't forget to give your family the items you made and took home at the end of term. Everyone should have a variety of pictures, stamp designs, the posted card, decorations and a selection of the following...

A fingerprint tree

A hot air balloon calender

A Nativity door hanger

A Christmas cross

Two tree decorations

An Advent wreath

I hope you have already given your family their Christmas card.

This angel is special you see;
because she is a part of me.
Her wings are my hands
her body my feet.
I hope you agree she is very sweet

Enjoy the rest of Christmas time and have a happy New Year.

I will see you in 2012 - our first topic is weather.

    

A mesage from Mrs Adams

My girls  loved all the Christmas events last week - and so did I!

The Year 3/4 play was amazing - so many talented children - and so funny!! The PlaySomething assembly on Tuesday was also fantastic, it's amazing to think some of those children have only been learning an instrument since last June.

Thanks to all teachers and LSAs who made this all possible. Thank you for making a difference.

Mrs Adams

Microwave Decorations

McKee class made salt dough decorations for their Christmas tree and then took them home. They wrote some instructions to tell you how to do it at home (notes from Mrs Matthews in the brackets).

Mix the flour, salt and water together in a bowl

(1 cup salt, 1 cup flour, 1-2 cups water).

Squeeze together with your fingers.

Roll with a rolly thing (rolling pin!).

Cut out stars and angels with the cutters.

Get a grown up to make holes in their heads with a pen

(a straw works better but we did not have one to hand).

Cook them in the microwave. (Between 2-4 minutes.

 It is best to cook less than you think and gradually

add more time because they can burn.)

Paint them with glue and water mixed together.

Put them into lots and lots of glitter.

Put a pretty ribbon in the hole and put them on your tree.

Christmas Bazaar

On Saturday the 3^rd December it was the Christmas Bazaar. There was a lovely range of stalls, activities and an enchanting Santa’s Grotto.

We all think that it was a much enjoyed event because of receiving a present from Santa and because lots of cool prizes were won.

We spoke to some of the children who came out of the Bazaar.

Fletcher aged 4: “My favourite part was Santa’s Grotto and the elves”.

Helena aged 7 “I like the whack the rat game”.

The elves said “Santa was very happy to see you all opening your presents with a smile on your face”. Thanks for coming.

Written by the Elves.

Baby Jesus in a manger

In the church service today the Foundation stage children sang a Christmas song. Once they had stood up and turned around to face the everyone, most were hidden below the level of the pews and so some parents found it difficult to hear their singing. Here is one of our earlier rehearsals!

I hope you enjoy their festive offering!

Christmas Dinner

Today most of the school partook in Christmas Dinner. The children enjoyed sitting in either the dining room or the hall and listening to festive music, whilst the staff served them their meals.

Service was quick and efficient this year, the food delicious and with a choice of three deserts most people left the table satisfied.

The staff kept the tradition of wearing silly hats or tinsel, and many of the children wore their own to join in the fun. Particular  mention should go to MCGough class who really seemed to enter the spirit or the day by wearing hats and singing along to the music.

Many thanks to the kitchen staff for working so hard today to produce so many delicious meals and the rest of the term and to the MSAs for helping clear tables and supervise the children outside.

Foundation stage Christmas party



Father Christmas
giving a gift



Today McKee, Carle and Inkpen celebrated Christmas with a party. It started with all the reception children gathering together to eat their party packed lunches in the hall accompanied by Christmas music.

After everyone had finished, some of the staff took the children outside to play, whilst the others cleared the hall and got ready for Mr Tickle. Unfortunately he was very tired and so fell asleep and the foundation stage children had to go against their natural instincts and shout to wake him up, they seemed to manage it very easily! It took him a while to see us and sit down.The children very much enjoyed his slapstick humour, silly jokes and falling over.

He then entertained us with a magic show and amongst other things got the children to draw a picture of Miss Morris who is a student working in Carle class at present. He told Mrs Matthews off for saying it was a good drawing (it did not look much like Miss Morris but I still thought it was a brilliant drawing!) and he made the eyes and mouth on the picture move.

Mr Tickle

Two children helped him fill a cup with water that  was pumped from Owen's fingers and he then tested whether we had been good or naughty by tipping it over our heads. There were some very worried faces at this point, but rest assured none of the children got wet, but, Oh dear Vicky (the nursery student) what more can we say?

A quick drink and snack

After this Mckee and Carle returned to their classrooms for a drink and snack, whilst Inkpen shared some food in the nursery.They stayed eating whilst the older children returned to the hall and welcomed Father Christmas. He gave out gifts to all of the children and then chatted to some whilst he waited for Inkpen, who soon arrived and received their presents.

Everyone felt it was a success and the children went home happily telling their adults about their afternoon. Archie was surprised that Father Christmas knew what his favourite colour was and Hollie was excited he commented on her Christmassy name.

Larry’s Day out at the Toy Museum.

Larry had a great day at Bethnal Green Toy Museum with Butterworth class and here is what happened.

Larry’s day began poking his head out of Miss Glazebrook’s backpack to travel to the coach. On the coach he had a look around to see what was outside the windows throughout the journey.

When he finally arrived at the toy museum Larry was excited and wanted to look at all the toys. Larry had a good look at many different toys and had his photograph taken with lots children from Butterworth class.

Larry enjoyed sharing his lunch with Ellen, Lauren, Isabella, Fionn, Finlay, Molly and Alice.

After lunch we all went to the gift shop, Larry didn’t know what to buy. All of the children brought toys such as a train light, a set of paints or glitter bracelets.

When we had all finished at the gift shop we went to have a look around the moving toys area. Larry’s favourite moving toys were the jack in the boxes and the giant robot.



At the end of the day Larry got time to have a go on the rocking horses.

When we all got onto the coach Larry was nowhere to be found. Miss Glazebrook was very worried about where Larry had got to, she had forgotten to count him onto the coach. She kept asking if anyone had seen Larry but no one could tell her where he was. Eventually the message got back that Ella R had Larry and he was safely returned.

When we all arrived at school everyone went home and Larry had a lovely sleep after a long day exploring.

Year 3 and 4 dress rehearsal

Ruby: I thought that It was very entertaining and the solos where amazing!

The year 3s did great dancing and the Magi sang the trio brilliantly.

The children that played the teachers where very convincing, we guessed straight away who they where.

Josie: Mrs Garrett did a very good job helping with quick costume changing. Mrs Garrett and Mrs Allen did a great job with scenery.

Our class all enjoyed, we think that the parents will really enjoy it.

                                                                                                  

The Toddler Christmas Star Church Service

This morning Mckee class, Carle class and Inkpen went to church to join up with the toddler groups for a special Christmas service.

We wore our crowns and took the sheep that we had made with us. In Mckee class we were really excited to find out that the theme of the service was the Christmas star, because that is what we put on our Christmas cards.

During the service we heard The Nativity story read, we sang lots of songs, we played musical instruments and,  according to the children, the best bit of all followed Mrs Hopking around the church.....she was dressed as a star and led us around the aisles in search of baby Jesus.

At the end of the service each child was given a heart to put on their Christmas tree, to remind them that Jesus loves them. The adults were not forgotten and were given a tea light and holder with the message that Jesus is the Light of the world and a request to light it on His birthday.

It was, as always a fun, lively and noisy service with an important message and we were thrilled to be invited once again.

The Science Museum

On Thursday 8.12.11 year 3 and 4 were visited by The Science Museum. We watched a show called 'Feel the Force' which taught us about the forces magnetism, gravity, air resistance and friction.

After play, each class took part in a workshop called 'Get a Grip', where we explored the force Friction and we made hovercrafts.

A recount of the day By Phoebe
Lewis Class

The Science Museum

On Thursday 8.12.11 the science museum came to our school. Year 3 and 4 got to see a lady from the science museum. Her name was Tracy. She told us about gravity and air resistance and air. She was very silly with Phil the toy frog. She pretended it died. Mr Cadwallader and a boy went to do a silly dance la la la la.
I made a hovercraft out of a cd, balloon, bottle top and candle wax. I really like it and my class does because it works.

Helping Father Christmas

In our recent reception Lego challenge, we received a letter from Father Christmas. His elves needed help. They wanted to know what sort of Lego kits we would like to find in out Christmas stocking. These are three of the kits we designed. What do you think?

McKee Christmas delivery

Our cards arrived, we were very excited. Please look in our book bags to see which stamp design we drew and read a Christmas message. If it is not in there then please remind us to get it out of our drawer!

Christmas post



Our Advent calendar

McKee class made an advent calendar, which included envelopes and the stamps they had designed themselves. This prompted an interest in letter writing. Once the letters had been written they needed stamps and so we printed off lots of our own designs. This meant they could not be posted in a Royal Mail post box!

Our stamp designs

To solve this problem two members of the class then made a post box for us and so we now have our own Christmas postal service!

Our Post box

Mrs Matthews suggested that we sent some real cards, which we could post and then wait to see how long it took for them to be delivered. We decided to use the Scout post (to keep costs down and Mrs Matthews happy!) We posted them at school and they will be collected and returned to us.

Posting our cards

We can not wait for the postman to deliver them back and we can take them home to share with our families.

Writing in McKee

We thought you may like to see some of the ways we "write" in reception.

We use pencil and paper (although in this case the child in question was

timing himself to see how many times he could write his name before

 the sand ran out). Mrs Matthews blurred out his name,

it was actually very beautiful handwriting!

We use the word mats and writing frames to give us inspiration.

 Here it inspired writing to Father Christmas.

We sometimes write in sand, salt, cous cous, split peas or glitter.

We write in shaving foam.

We use whiteboards or laminated sheets with pens.

 

We write in the frost with our feet or our fingers.

We write in soil with sticks.

In fact we enjoy writing so much we try it out in almost anyway we can think of!

Christmas decorations

Christmas has arrived at Christ Church School!

Make sure you take time to look at the corridor display boards

and the hoops in the hall.