This Term’s Virtues
This term we are trying hard to be Attentive and Discerning.
From Our Headteacher
A huge thank you to all those who helped organise and supported our Spooky Disco and Winter Ball. These two events raised over £3,500.00 for the school! We will be spending some of this money on activities for the playground (the School Council are making a list) and reading books for the classes. We are very grateful for all the voluntary hours that are put in to make these events such a success.
Hopefully, you will be reading this update on our new improved School Website. I really like the design and hope that this facility provides all the information you need. Mrs Clarke has led this initiative and continues to be in close contact with the designers as more information and more features are added. Thank You Mrs Clarke.
Finally, I appreciate the extra effort families are making to get here on time in the morning. It makes such a difference; contributing to a calm and purposeful start to the day.
Have a lovely weekend. Tom Walker, Headteacher.
St. Aloysius Breakfast & After School Club
Breakfast Club – there is no need to book, just turn up! From 7.45am the cost is £4.00 and from 8.00am the cost is £3.50.
After School Club – please remember to book your After School Club sessions online via the Schoolgateway app. No bookings after 2.30pm. Dates are available for the whole of this academic year.
Our After School Club needs some resources – do you have any Duplo, 500 piece or less puzzles, Barbie dolls, board games (all in good condition with no missing pieces)? If so, our After School Club would be glad of your donation. Also, we will be increasing the number of places available in ASC from 9th December from 30 to 35. This is necessary due to the club being full now on most days.
If you would like any further information about either Breakfast or After School Club, please speak to Jo or Chris in the school office.
This Term’s House Point Totals
Ashmolean
Bodleian
Radcliffe
Sheldonian
Dates For Your Diary
November 2019
Saturday 23rd – 11.00am – Confirmation, The Oratory
December 2019
Tuesday 3rd – Reception Class – Eye Tests
Monday 9th – 10.00am – Immaculate Conception Mass
Tuesday 10th – Last Ceramics Club
Wednesday 11th – Acorn / Tigger /Fir Class Nativity Performance
Friday 13th – St. Aloysius’ Christmas Fair
Monday 16th – Last Art Club
Tuesday 17th – Carols By Candlelight
Wednesday 18th – Beauty And The Beast, Oxford Playhouse
Spread The Word
ACORN NURSERY CLASS
(For 3+ Year Olds)
PLACES AVAILABLE NOW
For an application form, please email Jo
Reception Class Open Morning
WEDNESDAY 27TH NOVEMBER – 9.30AM
We will be holding an Open Morning on Wednesday 27th November from 9.30am. The Open Morning is aimed at parents whose children will be starting in Reception in September 2020 (rising fives). More information and an agenda for the morning is available from Jo Clarke.
Spooky Disco
Thank you to everyone who attended, helped and dressed up for our Spooky Disco recently.
You raised just under £1,000.00 which is amazing. Seb from Oak Class won the fancy dress competition – we hope he doesn’t lose his head over it!
CLASS NEWS
Acorn Nursery Class
A warm welcome back to Acorns! We have started this term with a bang, discussing our half term adventures, Halloween dressing up and fireworks! We have enjoyed making firework pictures with chalks and paints as well as thinking about all the different noises they make. I appreciate it may be the last thing you want to do when you’re three and four but all the children observed the two minute silence for Remembrance Day amazingly well and spent the day making poppies and learning about their significance. They never cease to amaze me!
Continuing our overall topic of People Who Help Us, Acorns have very much enjoyed role-playing fire fighters, learning about how they help us and even making their very own fire engines! We have also been to Ten Town to meet Seal Six and Sir Seven and continue to tune into letter sounds as well as rhythm through songs and games and during free flow play time. Keep up the excellent work Acorns!
Tigger Reception Class
The Tiggers have been so busy since we came back from half term! We returned with a bang, celebrating fireworks night with our very own bonfire. It was a fantastic experience for the children and they learned how to manage the risk safely. We enjoyed toasting marshmallows- Mr. Walker even came to join us! We are now going on journeys to different places learning about different types of transport. The Naughty Bus came to visit us and he caused all sorts of mischief! The children used their phonics to write him messages and we took him on lots of adventures. We are now sailing the seas as pirates on boats and ships. We have been making our own treasure maps and writing instructions to find buried treasure. We have been going on lots pirate adventures, developing our language and role play skills. Thank goodness none of us have had to walk the plank yet!
Fir Year 1 Class
Fir Class have been working hard since returning from half term. The children have read the story of The Three Little Pigs, they then acted out the story in small groups and put the sections of the story together to create a performance of the complete story. The class then re-told the story using actions and their own words. This week they are writing their own little books of The Three Little Pigs using all the sentence ideas they have rehearsed. In maths the children have been learning how to do subtraction problems using lots of different concrete apparatus and drawing part-whole models to help them. During this week’s outdoor learning the children fed the ducks and looked at how the trees have nearly lost all their leaves, they drew some pastel Autumn pictures. Fir Class have been very creative and made a range of little pots out of clay which they have then painted and also drew some amazing firework pictures. The whole class is constantly working very hard on all their phonic sounds and then regularly trying to use these skills to improve their reading and writing.
Fig Year 2 Class
This half term in Maths, we have been focusing on using different methods to add. This has included mentally in our heads, partitioning the number and adding the tens and ones, using a 100 square, a blank number line and we have begun to use simple column addition. Perhaps your child could show you different ways that they enjoy adding at home? Alongside this, we have been practising counting in 2s, 3s, 5s and 10s and have begun to apply this to finding times tables facts.
In English, we have enjoyed reading Paddington Bear stories so much that we have decided to write our own. We used a story mountain to plan our own stories about Paddington Bear at St. Aloysius’ and this week we have chosen our own Paddington Bear story to plan, write and edit and we are working towards creating a class book of stories to publish in class next week. Within these pieces of writing, we have been working on developing a story to create an opening, build up, dilemma (or problem), resolution and ending to structure our stories in an engaging way.
In R.E., we have been discussing Saints during the month of November and remembering people who have died. We have learnt the Eternal Rest and created poppy wreaths for Remembrance Day. We have also been looking at celebrations in the Liturgical year and have learnt about the symbols of Baptism, discussing what these represent.
In D.T., we have been looking at mechanisms and have created our own moving pictures using a lever mechanism. We have also enjoyed playing a ‘Where in the World?’ game with Mrs. Holloway to reinforce our knowledge of the seven continents and five oceans. This term we have also been very lucky to have Jo, a music specialist, to come in and teach music lessons on a Thursday morning where we have been developing our listening skills and looking at tempo and rhythm. She has also taught us a number of fun games and songs.
Oak Year 3 Class
In Oak Class, we have continued solving three and four step problems in Maths making sure we show our workings out and using bar modelling to show our thinking. Over the last two weeks I have been very impressed with the way everyone has tackled the problems and challenged themselves – it has been a delight to mark their books and see the methods used.
In English, the children have reviewed their independent writing about a battle between the Romans and Celts and considered improvements. The children reflected on their choice vocabulary, corrected errors in punctuation and made sure the story included elements from the book we have been reading. We have also begun weekly spellings and dictations to revisit and embed the spelling patterns we have learnt over the last year. The children enjoyed the dictation and, although it was read at a quick pace, all the children kept up.
In R.E., we have looked at a range of parables and thought about what Jesus was teaching his followers. We have begun to look at what we mean by forgiveness, when we forgive others, what it feels like to forgive others and how it feels when we are forgiven.
On Tuesday, we had a fantastic day at Dorchester Abbey finding out about the Romans. The children all said they learnt a lot and it was good to handle a variety of artefacts. Thank you to all the parents that came to help. In Science, we have been learning about the skeleton, using the correct names for the bones including; cranium, pelvis, clavicle, scapula, mandible, sternum, patella, thoracic cage and vertebral column and we are now looking at the function of the skeleton and different joints.
Ash Year 4 Class
Ash Class are feeling refreshed and ready to learn as they have settled into their new term. We have had an exciting couple of weeks during our swimming sessions, learning about water rescue. Children have been sharing lots of laughs swimming with their pyjamas on, as well as using their pyjamas as rescue aids to rescue each other.
In Maths, children have been using bar models to explain subtraction problems with the support of our daily Barvember challenges, that are encouraging children to share their solutions.
During topic, children are now finalising and editing their persuasive travel brochures ready for their independent write. This has led to Ash Class being extremely excited, as our writing will be developing our computing skills using Microsoft Publisher to design and layout our own travel guides. The children are very confident that our next holiday will be either Blackpool or Benidorm. Next week, children will have the opportunity to put their aprons on to learn and make some comforting soup supporting the Oxford Gatehouse.
Bay Year 5 Class
Over the past few weeks, Bay Class have been working hard learning about Ancient Greek architecture and engineering. We discovered that the catapult was first designed by the Ancient Greeks and so we made various versions of our own, based on their designs. The pictures show us testing them out in Maths, playing our own version of Greek Angry Birds!
The children also learnt about the orders of Ancient Greek columns and designed and made their own (with pediments!) to knock down with our catapults. We had a great time and even invited Year 2 to come and see demonstrations and build their own catapults. We have also been writing newspaper articles imagining that an Ancient Greek god or goddess appears in modern day society. In Maths, we have been looking at multiples, factors, prime and square numbers, using lots of cubes and counters to explore number in more depth.
Willow Year 6 Class
Willow Class have been writing in first person narrative (based around a video of a Robin travelling home). They have looked at how to use direct speech to move the action on and the power of short sentences. From listening and reading they have shown what a great group of writers they are all becoming. In Maths, we have nearly completed our work on fractions. They have added, subtracted, multiplied and starting to divide them. This has been tricky. However, they just need to learn what method to use for each operation.
Willow Class have also started learning about light and have understood what light sources are, how it travels and how light reflects off objects and into our eyes. Lastly, they have begun to design and create their own sky ship. I will post some photographs when they are complete.
What a lovely newsletter.