Can you believe it’s just one week until the holidays? Where has this term gone!? It might nearly be Christmas but that hasn’t stopped Year 6 from working really hard this week as they’ve had their first taste of SATs papers. They’ve taken them in their stride and have had a really successful week. Hopefully, it’ll help settle any anxieties they may have about SATs (for now) – they asked a lot of intelligent and thoughtful questions about them so I think the experience has been worthwhile. We’ll have a ‘proper’ mock SATs week in March, before the real deal in May.
It hasn’t all been testing this week! MED Theatre came in on Tuesday afternoon to put on their latest play for us - it was a fantastic treat to break up the week. The play was about womens' experience of WW2 in Britian - we certainly learnt a lot and I had a proud teacher moment when they were wowing the actors with their own WW2 knowledge. And wasn’t the lantern parade just lovely last night? I think you’ll agree, the Y6 did us all proud with their fantastic singing of Jingle Bell Rock. We spent a fair bit of the week putting the finishing touches on the lanterns and practicing but it was well worth it! 

A huge thank you to the PTFA and Santa for their visit and presents. We enjoyed opening them this afternoon and had a great time learning to play all of the games - enjoy the photos! 
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I hope you all have a lovely weekend; have a well-earned rest everyone – Mr B

​It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas in Birch Class – it’s officially December! And we’ve been busily preparing for our lantern parade next week; singing songs and constructing/decorating our willow lanterns – they’re looking great! We’ve cracked on with the fraction unit in maths; this week we’ve tackled adding/subtracting fractions as well as comparing and ordering fractions with different denominators. As ever, they’ve been working hard and doing you all proud.
In English, we have finished planning our island stories and have been busily writing them up this week. Fantastic descriptive writing all-round. On Tuesday afternoon, OCRA came to school to set-up a cross-country course on our playground and field – all of the children in KS2 ran 1.5miles! I was very proud of every one of them for trying hard; special mention to Chloe and Abbie who ran together, steadily without stopping and paced their run perfectly. The first four girls to complete the course were Isobel, Maisie S, Harriet and Grace; the first four boys were Bertie, Luca, Jake and Charlie.
Just a quick heads-up for next week – the year 6 will be having their first taste of SATs papers. They will have a go at every paper they’re expected to sit next May, but we’ll do it in a more relaxed way to begin with. It should give us a decent idea of what gaps we need to fill over the next 5 months. We’ll have a ‘proper’ mock SATs run-through in March (in the hall, exam conditions etc).  
In more exciting news, Y6 have a treat to look forward to on Monday – MED theatre are coming to school to perform their latest play – it’s based around WW2 which complements our learning from last half-term perfectly.
Have a great weekend everybody, Mr B