A huge well done to George Wilson, for being our class top reader with reading over 500,000 words. It’s a great achievement, which we are all very proud of.
Star of the Week 🌟
Well done Anwen Chesters, for being our superstar this week. Anwen is our star for her amazing results in our recent assessments. Your hard work and studious efforts certainly pay off.
Our learning
Stiperstones have had a busy few weeks, in PE the have been focusing on their fitness, balance, flexibility and strength.
Year 5 have enjoyed learning our forces in our science unit. They have explored many scientific enquiry skills, through investigations around friction, gravity and water resistance.
Our history unit this term is exploring the cause and impact of WW2. On Wednesday, the children had great fun learning about evacuees and participated in a ‘hot seat’ activity where by they tried to ‘put themselves’ in the shoes of an evacuee.
On Friday afternoon, we begun our DT unit of textiles. Our aim is to make a cushion cover, firstly we needed to practise our threading of a needle and simple running stitch skills. Everyone showed great perseverance with threading their needles and showed very good stitching skills.
‘Let’s Connect’ is about making connections with others in healthy, rewarding and meaningful ways. This can be online, in a team or choir or shared dance, in the community, through acts of kindness, etc. Let’s Connect is about making meaningful connections. Human beings thrive in communities, and this connection is vital for our well-being. When we have healthy connections – to family, friends, and others – this can support our mental health and our sense of well-being. And when our need for rewarding social connections is not met, we can sometimes feel isolated and lonely – which can have a negative impact on our mental health. In the week commencing 6th February, we will be exploring these ideas with the children and the whole school community.
As well as supporting Mental Health Week, we have created our very own virtual classroom full of resources, support for parents and children, helpful hints and games.
How to use the interactive classroom:
Click on any images in the bookcase to access (left) books (right) games and activities
Click on the ‘proud to support’ which will take you straight to the Children’s mental health support page.
Click on ‘need help‘ for support pages such as charities and support with school
Click on ‘activities and strategies‘ for games and activities for children
Click on the ‘grown-ups poster‘ for support for adults and our very own concerns and questions box where we will get back to you.
Many people struggle with their mental health at times and there is no shame in admitting these struggles. The sooner support is available, the better. At Holy Trinity we support students to have good mental health through our curriculum and support services. Supporting children and parents is key and through the virtual classroom, we feel support is available. We have a Mental Health and Wellbeing team at Holy Trinity who are available for both adults and children.
In science, year 5 are coming to the end of their materials and their properties unit of work. They have been busy identifying transparent, translucent and opaque materials.
Art
Stipertsones have thoroughly enjoyed their new art unit this term, ‘Typography’. They have had great fun exploring different techniques of typography and the work of Louise Fili.
Visitors
We’ve also had quite a few exciting visitors into school this month. From the Dogs Trust charity, to St John’s ambulance- giving an assembly all about first aid, and we even had a visit from the air ambulance.
At Holy Trinity CE Primary Academy and Nursery, we encourage children to become confident and resilient learners, allowing all children to achieve their full potential.
We know that in order to fulfill the full potential of our pupils, we need to be modelling the mindset of a learner to not be afraid of making mistakes or giving up when they find things hard, but who thrive upon them and understand that this is all part of the learning process. We want all our pupils to relish challenges, embrace their mistakes, value the importance of effort, respond carefully to feedback and take inspiration from others.
At Holy Trinity, we consistently endeavor to challenge and develop the attitudes of all pupils toward learning by considering what makes a successful learner. We have dedicated sessions in class on how we can positively approach challenges inside and outside the classroom and it’s lovely to see the school buzzing with talk of perseverance, challenge, risks, and celebrating mistakes.
Central to this attitude and approach to learning, are the theories and proven evidence of a Growth Mindset by psychologist Carol Dweck.
The theory behind Growth Mindset is based on two types of mindsets, that children and adults may possess, a ‘fixed’ mindset and a ‘growth’ mindset. Below is an overview of the traits of each:
Fixed Mindset
I like my work to be easy
I don’t like to try a challenge
I won’t do it
I can’t do it
I believe I cannot change how clever I am
I don’t like to try new things because I won’t be very good at it
I give up easily
Growth Mindset
I never give up
I like my work to be difficult – it means I am learning
I love challenges
How can I achieve this
I can do it
I want people to praise me for the effort I put into my work
I believe I can get more intelligent by working hard
I learn from my mistake.
We are very excited about the prospect of nurturing a growth mindset culture at Holy Trinity.
Key aspects of growth mindset at Holy Trinity:
We celebrate making mistakes – we can learn from them;
We never give up – perseverance is the key if we are to succeed;
We learn from each other;
We don’t compare ourselves with others;
We challenge ourselves and take risks;
We remember that our brains are making new connections and growing all the time.
There is a link attached below for you to share with your child:
Our Values Champion for Trust, is Jess. Over the past term Jess has been trusted with being a ‘class buddy’ to some of our younger children in the school, being an excellent role model. Demonstrating and illustrating to them how to follow follow the school and classroom expectations and helping them with their learning. Jess has been an excellent ‘class buddy’ and a true ambassador for the school.
PSHE
Year 5 had two special visitors to their lesson on Friday 9th December. We were lucky to have two nurses from Gobowen Orthopaedic Hospital, visit to talk to us about what it means to be a nurse. Part of our learning this term has been ‘first aid’. There the nurses gave us some demonstrations on how to treat cuts and grazes and apply bandages. The children even had the opportunity to listen to each other’s lungs and hearts using a stethoscope. We had a great morning and learnt a lot from Nurses Jamie Hutton and Sarah Scoltock.
It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas 🎄
Christmas lunch and jumper day. We would like to say a big thank you to all of the kitchen staff who made us a very yummy lunch.
Christmas Church Service
On Thursday 15th December, the whole school put together a fantastic service for all parents, carers and adults. Stiperstones were excellent, acting the nativity story alongside the readers from the Y6 children.
Jess, Allison and Florence, shone during the class hymen, singing solo parts of ‘While Shepherds Watched’ angelically. It was a beautiful service, telling the Christmas story perfectly and setting the perfect scene for the nearing Christmas holidays.
Finally, we had a very fun last couple of days of term, with a Christmas party and even a visit from Santa!
I would like to wish everyone a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. I look forward to all of the exciting learning opportunities and experiences 2023 has in stall.
Christmas celebrations have begun this week, with the watching of the pantomime Aladdin on Tuesday morning. It was an excellent show and we all had great fun and laughter watching it.
Our Stiperstones Superstar this week is Stefani
Stefani is our Star this week for the excellent home learning she always completes.
Science
In science this week, we started our Properties and Changes of Materials unit of study. We started our learning by looking at the difference between melting and dissolving. We then carried out inquires such as observation and fair testing, to decided which solids dissolved in 50ml of cold water. The children had great fun, and completing some great science!
PE
We are now in our third week of netball lessons. Neil is very impressed with the children, he said they are making great progress with learning the tricky footwork rules in netball. They played some excellent games on Tuesday afternoon, everyone was smiling, even though it was a particularly chilly afternoon! 🥶
DT
In our structures unit of study, we have been busy researching, designing and constructing our Greek Temples, linking our learning to our history topic. They haven’t yet finished their structures, but some excellent temples are under construction.
We have about her busy and exciting week to look forward to, with Christmas jumper day and Christmas lunch on Wednesday 7th December 🎄
Welcome back to the second half of the Autumn Term. We have had a very busy and productive few weeks, and are now preparing ourselves for the joyous and fun Christmas activities ahead.
Our half term started with the awarding of our values champion, for the value ‘thankfulness’. Harrison was our Values Champion for Thankfulness. He’s always shows great appreciation for all the staff and peers around him at Holy Trinity.
Our Stiperstones Superstars so far this term:
Isaac has been a superstar for the excellent maturity he’s shown towards his Y6 learning.
Raahith has been a superstar for all of the extra home learning and projects he completes outside of school.
Florence has been a superstar for the enthusiasm and excellent participation she shows towards her learning.
Bike ability
The first week back, saw a lot of the children participating in their bike ability course. The instructors were very impressed with the children and lots of fun was had!
DT
In DT we have started our structures unit. The children had great fun exploring different structures (semi-permanent and permanent) structures. They were then given the challenge to build a structure which would support the weight of a book. Excellent team work and engineering ideas were shared and demonstrated.
Science
Year 5, brought their Earth and Space unit of work to a close with a moon crater experiment. The children were given different size and weight balls, and investigated which one created the deepest crater.
We have had a fantastic start to this half term, and look forward to the weeks ahead.
O
