17 Oct 2008 - Newsletter 17th October 2008

Pantomime Letter

Last week a child from the Hermitage School was playing on the Trim Trail and jumped from a wooden stump on to a tyre in damp weather. He slipped and fractured his ankle.

This is the first accident on the tyres in the 10 years they have been in the Trim Trail. This is because all of the children at the Oaktree School know that they should not use the Trim Trail unless a member of staff has given them permission and is standing on duty by the Trim Trail. Before the member of staff gives permission they will have made an on the spot risk assessment to ensure that equipment is not faulty and that the weather does not make apparatus dangerous.

The trim trail can only be used when supervised by trained teaching and support staff to ensure that children use the equipment safely. Please be vigilant and ensure that your children do not go on this equipment before or after school.

The children who collected the highest amount of sponsorship for the Football Tournament, in each year group, were:

Foundation Stage       Jack Spiller

Year 1                        Lauren Flynn

Year 2                       Jacob Addison

They were all presented with a football award in Celebration Assembly. We raised £843 in total. Not quite enough to purchase a small wind turbine for the bus but we will keep on looking for funding for this project.

This is an opportunity to have a professional family group photo taken on the evening of Thursday 13th November between 4.00 to 7.00 pm. A list of appointment times will be in the Eco Lobby next week.

People seem to be parking on both sides of Gorsewood Road again. Please remember to park on the school side of the road which is safer for you and your child. It also means that emergency vehicles can get up the road. Remember that someone may be dying and that ambulance cannot get through or a house may be burning down.

Please remember to park carefully and also consider our neighbours by not parking over drives or too near to corners.

The Year 1 classes have acted out stories this week! In Magpies their story involved some Magpies, of course, but also some naughty woodpeckers! In Woodpeckers one of their stories involved cats and kittens and puppies and in Ladybirds you would have found a family of red ladybirds having some trouble with a lonely yellow ladybird who wanted a family to live with! Please ask your children to tell you a story! In Maths this week we have had fun learning about 2D and 3D shapes.

Due to unforeseen circumstances, we have had to change our Geography and DT focus local walk to the playground at the Lye from today, Friday 17^th, to next Thursday, 23rd October. Please let your class teacher know if you have offered to help and cannot make it on Thursday. Thank you!

In Maths next week we will be Problem Solving -finding all possibilities - and using some number puzzles and games. In Literacy we will become authors as we write our own version of our class story from this week.

We are a small group of Oaktree and Hermitage parents who meet twice a term to pray for the needs of the schools, the children, their families and the staff. Please come and join us, or contact us with any prayer needs you may have. Our next meeting is on Thursday 23rd October from 1.30 - 2.45 pm at 49 Brushfield Way, Knaphill New parents and younger children are very welcome.

Please grown ups please complete the Energy Savers Report and donate the leaves to our school. It only takes 5 minutes and it is quite interesting. We now have 4.700 towards our 27,743 total.

What a busy week we have all had. Maths work focused on number sequences. We have been learning to count in different steps, recognise the pattern in sequences and extend these. Story writing has been the focus in Literacy. We have been looking at how to start a story by using juicy describing words to describe the setting and think about how this could lead to a problem for the characters.

In ICT we have learnt how to use the search tool on a website to find the information we need and thought how this way of finding information is different than using books.

In RE we have thought about what would happen if the harvest fails in different countries. The children pretended to be newsreaders and reported from different countries. In design and technology we have been designing and will be making our own version of an African shirt.

Thank you for supporting your child with their handwriting homework. Please can you ensure that your child is sitting comfortably where they can work without any distraction. This work should take no more that ten minutes.

It was lovely to seen so many of you at Parents consultation on Wednesday and look forward to meeting lots more on Monday.

Thank you for your support. The Year Two Team.

We were delighted that so many of you enjoyed the workshops last week. Thank you for coming.

ee, z, oo as in wood, oo as in cool to, was

Dressing the doll on the interactive whiteboard.

Finding out that Jesus is a special person for some people

and the Bible story of the storm on the lake.

Tasting the fruit with our eyes closed and using our other

senses to find out what it was.

Printing with 3D shapes to make repeating patterns.

Tallying to find out who was the most accurate thrower in

each group.

Have a go writing (initial sounds)

Discussing how we could help somebody feel welcome in

our setting.

Help needed for road safety walk the week after the half term holiday. Please see teachers or teaching assistants. Leaves - please help your child to find pretty Autumn leaves to bring into school for collage work.

Science - please help your child to find an object at home that is hard and bring it in for our investigation table.