Read more about the Borough Sports in the News and Views - click here

Year 5 visited the R.N.L.I. based at the end of Southend Pier this week.

Being in Year 5 myself I was lucky enough to go and what a super day it was. The talk given by Captain Brian Wood was very informative and the children were entranced. They asked very detailed questions, some of which even stumped Captain Wood, this proved that the children took a very keen interest in what was going on.

It also made me think about the fantastic job that these guys do. They are kind of the forgotten emergency service and I think that, being in the location that we live in (by the sea!), it would be good if we could support them in anyway we can. Captain Wood also said that Southend was the 2nd busiest location in the UK, only a few rescues behind the number one busiest station. My hat goes off to them.

A big thank you to Mr Bird for organising it for Year 5 - Read more about what the R.N.L.I. do here

Also, not having been down to the end of Southend pier for a very long time, can I just say it is well worth the walk, or actaully the short train ride! So if you are thinking about something to do this weekend, this maybe a good option. Read more about Southend pier here

Kentwell Hall

Year 4 visited Kentwell Hall this week. I will not spoil what they got up to, you will have to read about that on 4B and 4AB's blog, all I will say is that you all looked superb. If you want to read more about Kentwell Hall click here

So, what else has been happening this week at Darlinghurst Primary and Nursery School?

RM - Mrs McIntosh - This week RM have been looking at another book called "Jack and the dreamsack" - ask your children what Jack saw! We have also been talking about what we wore and did when we were babies. We are encouraging the children to work a little bit more independently and in a structured manner, in order to prepare them a little bit for yr1 - so far it's be a bit of a shock to them, but I am sure they will continue to try their hardest! Thanks to all the parents for your swift response and money for the trip to Maldon - the children are all very excited! Have a great weekend! Mrs McIntosh

RW - Mrs Weston - RW have had a good week looking at the book, 'Jack and the Dreamsack' and writing about something strange that they may see in their dreams! We have also continued to build and match sentences, discussed the clothes that we used to wear when we were younger and have been working on the language of 'greater than' in Numeracy.

1B - Mrs Barrington - Coming soon....

2/1B - Miss Bernard - Hello everybody!

2/1D - Mrs Dutton - We have had an exciting time with our 'Butterfly Watch' - three butterflies have emerged from their chrysalis and we have watched them walking up the sides of their house, flying around it and drinking the sugar water with their proboscic.On Friday morning we released these butterflies and will wait to see if the other two butterflies emerge too.  In our writing time we have had great fun making up tongue twisters and riddles about seaside creatures and in Numeracy we have been finding out more about division and multiplication, especially the 2 and 5 times tables. We worked very hard!  

3S - Miss Slann - Well we have had a real whirl wind of a week, mainly due to the fact that you have had a bit of a part time teacher as I was off on courses and organising the Borough Sports! Well done for coping with lots of different teachers and still managing to produce some great work. I love your dino shape poems that you have now finished, they look really effective and you have used lots of alliteration - they're fab! You have also created some super imaginary dinosaurs by looking at their skeletons and then adding in your own special adaptations. I'm also really impressed with your knowledge and interest in how fossils are formed, I think we may have some future paleantologists in 3S. Lastly I want to say a massive congratulations to Jade Anglum, Matthew Jordan, Josh Howe, Timmy Miller, Henry Swan and Caleb Daly who represented our class in the Borough Sports, they all performed extremely well and worked hard to achieve a huge amount of points to go to the overall score - we have got some grrrreat athletes in Year 3, well done!!!!

4B - Miss Bolton - I'm having to write this a day earlier today as we're finally off to Kentwell Hall tomorrow. Both staff and children are very excited and hoping the weather is kind to us.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of you at home for your support with putting together Tudor costumes for your children. It really is appreciated and will go a long way to the full learning experience of the day at Kentwell.

This week we have learnt a little more about the everyday lives of poor Tudors. With our Olympics topic, found out about some of Britains great Olympic athletes and more about the designs of the emblems and mascots being used in Beijing. I am really noticing at the moment how much the class have progressed this year as the work they are producing at the moment is superb. Well done 4B!

 

4AB - Mrs Amran + Mr Bird - This has been a very eventful week with some memorable moments both on the sporting and history fronts.

The year 4 children who participated in the Borough Sports shared their experience with the rest of the class and they received support and congratulations from everybody.

Finally after lots of preparation of costumes, research of the Tudor times and a steady increase in the level of excitement, the day of our visit to Kentwell arrived. The children looked brilliant in their various Tudor costumes and the experience really did bring history to life for them. Once again it was a pleasure to take them on a very different and extremely enjoyable visit which I am sure they will have great memories of for many years.

Thank you year 4 for the way you represented your school both in the Borough Sports and the Kentwell visit.

The chldren and I would also like to thank the other staff members who joined us for the Kentwell visit and helped to make it a real success.

 

5J - Mrs Johnston - What a great week we had 5J!  We had a fantastic visit to the lifeboat station at the end of Southend Pier on Monday.  Captain Wood was really helpful, telling us so much about the boats and the crew.  Don't forget to take your families to their open day at the end of June!  It has been an odd week with little bits and bobs here and there, you have coped really well.  Don't forget to be ready for our Coast Guard Station next week.

 

5D - Mr Duff - What a trip the R.N.L.I. day out was !! A huge thank you to Captain Brian Wood for a fantastic, informative talk and another huge thank you to Mr Bird for organising the trip. I think a good day out was had by all that went. I think we all slept well that evening. My feet were killing me !! We have worked hard on your reading comprehension this week with very pleasing results. Keep that up !! Having had Mr Yellop in our class most of the week, it was really good to hear that he thought we were a good class that picked up things well. Your rendition of "The Farmers In His Den" but in French was excellent. A special well done to both the Peters for your duet !! The class enjoyed that. You have had a super week, only another 23 schools day left, let's make the most of them.

 

6HC - Mr Hautler + Mrs Chatterton - This week we have been so worried about how we were going to do in the borough sports.But all the training that we've done has all come together and  we've managed to win the borough sports. The children all worked very hard and persevered with what they had to do. We now have won it for 5 years in a row. We came 2nd in track and field and we came 1st in overall.

Sib and Ellana

 

Update on the play

Mr Hautler has now put all our music together, so this week we have been liking it to our scenes. nearly all of the children know their lines off by heart. The children are really taking on their roles with energy and enthusiasm. They are developing thier acting skills- watch out Eastenders!!!!!

The props are coming along well, but we will need some parent help in obtaining some.

 

6M - Mr Martin - I am Mr. Yellop, a visiting teacher. I spent the last five days at Darlinghurst and have nothing but praise for the kids. Darlinghurst boys and girls are polite, courteous and respectful, taking to tasks without delay or disaster. 6T focussed on poetry, creating monsters to delight and disturb. I was stunned by their abilities with regard to reading and writing verse. They should only do well in years to come.

 

So we have had a trips to the R.N.L.I. and Kentwell Hall for Years 5 and 4. A vistor from another school that had only praise for our children. Oh, and did I forget something, of course, silly me......

 

We are the Borough Sports Champions for the 5th Year running !!!

 

What a week !!!

 

More Euro 2008 this weekend, my Germany tip at the beginning of the tournament doesn't look to bad now !!

 

If you are getting bored of the footy though, don't worry it is only on for another 9 days.

Enjoy your weekend

So what has been happening at Darlinghurst Primary and Nursery School this week?

RW - Mrs Weston -This week, RW have started their new topic of 'Adventure Books' and focussed on the John Burningham book, 'The Magic Bed'. We used props to re-tell the story in class, found classroom objects that weighed the same as our class magic bed and wrote about where we would go if we had a magic bed after discussing it in a circle time. We also had great fun on Thursday independently making our own sandwiches with healthy fillings inside. We wrote what those fillings were, told Mrs Weston on video what we had made and then drew pictures of our sandwiches.

 RM - Mrs McIntosh - We have had a very exciting first week back.  We have been sharing the story 'The Magic Bed' which is all about a boy called Georgie who has some wonderful adventures at night time visiting pirates and witches, cities and jungles as he travels on his magic bed. 

1B - Mrs Barrington - Back to school this week and back to learning, with an exciting new topic The Seaside.  Class 1B have already made a start by looking at seaside poems in literacy.  Some of you may have had children with wet clothes due to our water work on capacity which has been good fun whilst promoting learning at the same time.  We have also been extra busy  putting together our class assembly which takes place on Friday 13th  June.  Hope to see you all there.

2/1D - Mrs Dutton - This half term our topic is the Seaside. We have really enjoyed our class story 'Tiddler' this week about a story telling fish and we have written our own stories about underwater creatures. We have thought about different places we love to visit in Southend and in other countries and we have designed our own sunglasses. In Numeracy we have been adding and subtracting 2 digit numbers and in Science we  have been thinking about pushes and pulls and friction. We are also very excited about our class pets - we now have 5 caterpillars to watch feeding and growing. They have grown from 0.5cm to 3cm this week! We are waiting to see how long they will grow and what will happen next.

2/1B - Miss Bernard - Hello Everybody!

3S - Miss Slann - We have had a great start to our dinosaur topic this week by designing and writing about suitable outfits for Dinosaurland! We have been very imaginative and I'm sure that the owner will be very pleased with our ideas. We have some super hi tech designs with night vision, some interesting camouflaged outfits and even some that will fly over Dinosaurland! Everyone is very excited about the new things we will be learning about and especially going on our trip to the Natural History Museum in July - I can't wait either as it is such a great place to go! If any other parents are interested in coming please let me know asap. I would also like to say welcome and well done to Poppy and Lauren who have just joined our class, they have settled in very quickly and I hope they have enjoyed themselves. Have a good weekend and keep researching those Dino facts!

4B - Miss Bolton - You would think we've just come back from the 6 weeks holiday! 4B took till Wednesday to switch back onto school but we've got there in the end and we're back into the flow of learning.

This term the curriculum has been turned upside down and a more thematic approach is being taken. We have 2 main topics which each subject will be based around - Tudor Britain and the Olympic Games. Both have captured the children's interest and we are going great guns already with what we are learning about both.

The internet is proving to be an invaluable resource with some great interactive resources, videos and audio available for both topics.

The main ones we are using are: www.olympic.org and http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Homework/tudors/ 

 

Our trip to Kentwell Hall is fast approaching and we gave out some tips for Tudor costumes this week. We are not ecpecting anyone to make costumes but hopefully the literature given out provides you with some ideas and ways in whcih you can adapt clothes you already own.

If you have any problems or want any more help or advice, feel free to come in and ask.

 

A final trip letter will be given out late next week with details of final arrangements.

 

4AB - Mr Bird + Mrs Amran - With the final break before summer fading into the past our preparation for the visit to Kentwell Hall has stepped up a notch. The children experienced the challenge of writing with a quill whilst supervised by a suitably attired Tudor teacher.  I think our visitors from Norway were a little confused at first as they were expecting to see a UK school using high tech equipment and were not quite sure where ink bottles and blotting paper fitted in. However, the class ensured that they received a potted briefing of events from the Battle of Bosworth up to the start of Henry VIII's time as monarch.

Our topic for the afternoons has focused on the Olympic games and after a little more practise the children should be able to provide you with any number of statistics about the 'Modern Olympic Games' and event records. Perhaps we have got a budding commentator for the 2012 games in our midst?

Please do not forget your book reviews for Monday.

 

5J - Mrs Johnston - Getting better by degrees, 5J!  Your protractor work is coming along nicely! But we still need some more practice. 

Thank you to all those who touched our hearts with your Nobody projects.

Remember to bring in a shoe box (or similar) to create your Hindu temple on Tuesday. 

We will be looking at the truth behind the story of Greyfriars Bobby next week, so if you want to find out about the characteristics of Skye terriers, that would be a great start for our work on Tuesday.

 

5D - Mr Duff - You have had a great week back and we have hit the round running. The capacity and angles work you did in maths was superb and any cobwebs that may have grown during half term were certainly blown away. Your Hindu designs are looking but please remember to bring in a shoe box so you can make them. We will be looking at the Greyfriars Bobby story next week and seeing what parts of the film were actaully true. If you want to continue practising the British National Anthem click here, it's a shame we won't be hearing it during Euro 2008 !! Have a good weekend.

 

6T - Mr Martin - We're full swing into our topic and what fun we're having! Already we have designed and made monster dioramas and we are making monster masks for our end of year production. You'd think we would be all monstered out but it doesn't stop there.On Monday we start making our monster soft toys- so if you have any fabric donations they would be more than welcome!

 

6HC - Mrs Chatterton + Mr Hautler - This week year 6 have started to rehearse for the end of term assembly. Children have been rehearsing each scene and learning the songs. Yesterday auditions took place for the dancing. 32 children wanted to take part as dancers! The children are all very enthusiastic.

 

So the first week back is over and it feels like we have never been away.

 

Euro 2008 is starting this weekend, read more about it here. Come on England, we are in it aren't we??

 

I think Germany will win it myself but who knows, does anyone care?

 

Have a good weekend