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Junior News – 22 September 2023 |
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Proud to be a greenhouse In the ever-evolving landscape of education, the analogy between schools and greenhouses has gained prominence, fostering a shift in focus from the conventional hothouse model to an approach that nurtures the comprehensive development of a child. While the hothouse method emphasizes intense academic pressure and rigid competition, the greenhouse philosophy embodies a holistic approach that cultivates not only academic prowess but also emotional intelligence, social skills, and character development. A school functioning as a greenhouse embraces the idea that every child is a unique seed, each with its own potential waiting to bloom. Much like plants in a greenhouse, students are provided with an environment rich in nutrients, support, and encouragement to thrive. While academic achievement remains a crucial facet, it is not the sole purpose. A greenhouse school acknowledges that nurturing a child’s emotional well-being is paramount. Educators are attuned to the emotional needs of their students, creating a safe and nurturing atmosphere where emotional growth is as valued as intellectual growth. In this nurturing environment, students learn to communicate effectively, collaborate with peers, and develop essential social skills. They are encouraged to engage in group activities, projects and discussions that promote teamwork, empathy and respect for diverse perspectives. A greenhouse school understands that success in the real world hinges not only on individual excellence, but also on the ability to work harmoniously with others. By fostering social skills from a young age, these schools equip students with a vital toolkit for navigating life’s challenges. Character development is another core tenet of the greenhouse approach. Schools take on the responsibility of nurturing values such as integrity, empathy, resilience, and responsibility. Through a combination of moral education and reflective practices, students are guided towards becoming compassionate and responsible citizens. By emphasising character alongside academics, greenhouse schools produce graduates who are not only academically accomplished but also ethical individuals ready to contribute positively to society. Furthermore, the greenhouse philosophy promotes experiential learning. Just as plants thrive when exposed to a variety of conditions and stimuli, students flourish when they are provided with hands-on experiences. This approach encourages students to explore their interests, experiment with different subjects, and engage in real world applications of their knowledge. Whether it’s through trips, projects, or interactive learning experiences, students in a greenhouse school are encouraged to learn by doing, fostering a deeper understanding and long lasting retention of concepts. Beyond the classroom, greenhouse schools emphasise the importance of physical health and wellbeing. Just as a greenhouse requires proper maintenance for its plants to flourish, schools prioritise physical education, sports, and outdoor activities to promote a healthy lifestyle. This not only contributes to physical fitness but also instills discipline, teamwork, and stress management skills. The concept of a school as a greenhouse embodies a transformative approach to education. It recognises that the growth of a child extends far beyond academic achievement. By providing a nurturing environment that focuses on emotional wellbeing, social skills, character development and experiential learning, greenhouse schools prepare students to navigate the complexities of the real world. They produce well rounded individuals who are not only academically proficient but also emotionally intelligent, socially adept, and morally responsible. As the education landscape continues to evolve, the greenhouse model stands as a beacon of hope, promising a brighter future where schools nurture the holistic growth of each child, just as a greenhouse tends to the diverse array of plants within its walls. By embracing this philosophy, we can pave the way for a generation of individuals who are not only intellectually capable but also compassionate, adaptable, and equipped to make meaningful contributions to society. I’m proud to label us as a ‘greenhouse’ not a ‘hothouse’ where your daughters develop holistically and achieve far more than academic success. Miss Hair |
Upcoming School Events |
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Year 6 Leadership Roles |
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We are delighted to be able to introduce you to our Year 6 Leaders for 2023/24. Each of our leaders have penned a few words to introduce themselves, which you will be able to read by clicking here. We’d like to wish all of our Leaders the very best of luck for the forthcoming year! |
Aladdin Theatre Trip |
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We are arranging a family Theatre trip to see ‘Aladdin the Musical’ at Milton Keynes Theatre on Thursday 2 May 2024. If you would like to join us, please complete this form and make the payment of £45 per ticket on your child’s ParentPay account by 5pm on Friday 29 September. Cost of transport will be confirmed and charged on Monday 2 October. We hope you will be able to join us! |
Pony Club |
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Northampton High School has become the first school in the country to be recognised as an established Pony Club Centre! The Pony Club is an international, voluntary youth organisation for young people, where members enjoy coming together to participate in a range of fun activities! Despite the name, no pony is required. It is an all inclusive membership club that promises lots of fun and an opportunity to earn badges and certificates!
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The Pony Club is a new extracurricular activity for our students to enjoy and takes place every Monday at 12:15pm in S7. We would like to encourage as many pupils as possible to find out more about this wonderful opportunity, and we look forward to watching the club grow! To learn more, please email k.hodgetts-tate@nhs.gdst.net, or pop along at lunchtime on Monday! Mrs Hodgetts-Tate |
Medical News |
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As we head into cough and cold season, please can we share with you the current NHS guidance about when to send your child to school. It is usually appropriate for parents and carers to send their children to school with mild respiratory illnesses. This would include general cold symptoms:, such as a minor cough, runny nose, or sore throat. However, children should not be sent to school if they have a temperature of 38°C or above. We would encourage you to read this NHS guidance. Please email medical@nhs.gdst.net if you have any other questions relating to medical or wellbeing issues. Mrs Dunkley |
Uniform |
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Thank you for your parental support regarding uniform. It is important for the pupils that we apply our expectations consistently. Upholding our high expectations in all areas of school life supports the pupils to achieve highly. Some points to remember from our school uniform expectations are; stud earrings and watches are the only jewellery that can be worn, hair should always be tied back and hair accessories need to be black or blue and subtle in size, shoes need to be black, flat and attached to the pupils foot (i.e not slip ons), swimming costumes must be navy or black and school swimming hats are preferred or a black or navy swimming hat. We will all move to winter uniform from after half term and this half term the girls can wear winter or summer uniform. Many thanks for your continued support. |
Food Bank Collection |
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From Monday next week for a fortnight, we will have a donation station in the foyer of Junior and Senior School for a local food bank and we would appreciate any donations of food in packets or tins. Thank you in advance for your support. |
News from Our Classrooms: Nursery and Preschool |
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In Nursery this week, the girls have been busy practising their cutting skills, using different resources including paper and spaghetti. They have also been learning about the weather. When the wind blew our colourful windmills it brought lots of smiles! We have also described how the raindrops feel on our hoods and the sound the rain makes. The story of the week has been ‘The Tiger Who Came to Tea!’ and the basket full of props brought lots of reenactment and different versions of the story. |
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This week in Preschool we have been continuing our theme of ‘ourselves through imaginative play’ and more structured letter/phonics and name recognition sessions. The girls are starting to learn about the initial sound in words and we played the ‘silly soup’ game to help with this. We have continued to role play ‘tornadoes’ and we made our own mini ones with a cup of water and some sparkles. They stirred it and watched what happened. In PE, we practiced balancing bean bags on our heads whilst walking round the room and balancing along a bench. The girls have also enjoyed their weekly Forest School, Ballet, Cooking and French sessions. |
Reception |
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Following on from last week and the book ‘The Colour Monster’, this week’s focus has been ‘The Colour Monster Goes to School’. We have been thinking about our feelings and particularly about what makes us happy. Our phonics learning has included the sounds, S, A, T & P and various linked activities. |
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A task for one of our 5 senses, our nose for smelling, included trying to decide what the essence smelt of on the cotton wool – orange, vanilla, mint or caramel. In Cooking, the class enjoyed making fruit kebabs, and in Maths we have been revisiting the concepts of matching and sorting different items and playing the matching pairs game on the computer. |
Year 1 Maths Focus |
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Year 1 have been busy mathematicians this week, continuing their work with place value and enjoying the story ‘Ten Little Dinosaurs’. They have been finding one less in a group of objects, comparing groups by matching, learning the language of fewer, more and same and have moved on to less than, greater than and equal to. A big step has been the introduction of the greater than and less than symbols, which we will use when comparing numbers. |
Year 2 Maths Focus |
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In Maths this week, Year 2 have been learning to read and write numbers to 100 as ‘numerals’ and ‘words’, and that the digits in two digit numbers represent ‘tens’ and ‘ones’. We have been working very hard learning how to count in twos, and used this information to help us learn our two times tables. We have enjoyed getting to grips with ‘Times Tables Rockstars’ for the first time, and many of us have been working hard on this at home.
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Year 3 Maths Focus |
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In Maths this week we enjoyed carrying out an investigation. The questions was, “Does every packet of Haribo contain the same sweets?” The girls first had to sort the sweets into categories and then decide how to show this information on a bar chart before answering the question. Rosie said it was a lot of fun collaborating and sorting the sweets and her classmates agreed. |
Year 4 Maths Focus |
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In Maths this week, Year 4 have been working extremely hard with their place value of numbers up to 10,000. We have used the different equipment to build the numbers and partition them using flexible methods, as well as solving problems and explaining reasoning. |
Year 5 Maths Focus |
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Place value in Year 5 can seem quite scary at this time of year; 1,000,000 has an awful lot of zeros and remembering to put commas into numbers as well can be very tricky. In spite of all this, the girls have been really positive in their lessons. They have supported each other and learned both from their own mistakes, and from explaining their methods to others. We are really looking forward to our Maths lesson next Friday morning, when we can put our knowledge of big numbers into practice by counting up all the money we raise at our Macmillan Coffee Morning. |
Year 6 Maths Focus |
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We have been looking at place value and reading and writing very large numbers up to 10,000,000. Then, we have rounded them up to the nearest integer. We have used place value charts to help us and have tried really hard and made great progress, recognising and reading the numbers out loud. To help us have fun with numbers we have played a place value game, and challenged ourselves to make the biggest or smallest numbers from digit cards shuffled by Mrs Dadge. The only problem was, once we had placed a digit in the place value chart we couldn’t move it, so it was both a skilful game and a game of luck! |
News from outside of our classrooms: Year 2 Tower Bridge London Trip |
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Our visit to Tower Bridge on Monday started with a talk about how the bascules of Tower Bridge moved. We learned that the word ‘bascule’ means ‘seesaw’ and this gave us an idea of how the mechanism works. We then travelled in the lift up to the high walkway and bravely walked across and sat on the glass floor! We enjoyed watching the cars and boats pass underneath us far below. We looked out of the windows and identified the famous London landmarks we have been learning about, including The Shard and The Gherkin. After lunch, we learnt all about what the River Thames was like in Victorian times, finding out how cargo ships delivered goods from all over the world! It was a pleasure accompanying Year 2 to London; their behaviour was excellent and the staff at Tower Bridge commented on how engaged and enthusiastic they were. Well done Year 2! |
News from outside of our classrooms: Year 4 Tower of London Trip |
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Year 4 had a wonderful time at the Tower of London. Firstly, the girls enjoyed choosing their favourite crown from the Crown Jewels and should be commended for waiting patiently as it was an extremely popular exhibit. Next, the girls showed courage and bravery at the Bloody Tower, learning about the two Princes who may have been murdered there. This was followed by a quick visit to see the torture chamber! After lunch, the girls visited the White Tower and enjoyed the many interactive activities; firing canons, riffles and arrows and dressing a King in the correct order. It was a pleasure to take girls round the tower and they received compliments from several members of the public of how well behaved and polite they were. Annie T described the trip as, “Perfect in every way, I especially liked the part with the two Princes”. |
European Day of Languages |
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As part of our annual celebration of the European Day of Languages (EDL), we will be holding a t-shirt design workshop on Wednesday 27 September at lunchtime in the KS1 and DT rooms, for Junior School students Years 4 to 6. Our Senior School Language Leaders will facilitate the session, and students can decide whether to enter the internal competition or external international competition (or both!). Further information about the T-Shirt design competition for EDL day, and examples of previous designs, are available here. The deadline for the internal competition is Wednesday 4 October and the deadline for submission for the international competition is 31 December 2023. Winners will receive an edible reward, and will have the pleasure of seeing their logo used within the Languages Faculty in 2024! Please contact me for further details k.peto@nhs.gdst.net. Good luck everyone! Mrs Peto |
Awards This Week |
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Star Learners of the Week – Ishani S, Sophia R-N, Aurelia M, Orla D, Elizabeth F-W, Daisy S, Tara S External Achievements: Robyn F-W – achieved a Race for Life medal Congratulations to all the girls who took their LAMDA examinations and all achieved a Distinction. Well done! Introductory Level 1 Verse and Prose: Grace R, Sophia R-N, Zara B, Rayna N, Iman S. Introductory Level 2 Verse and Prose: Jasmine I, Emily T, Grace B, Mayu G, Elouise S, Shanaya S. Introductory Level 3 Verse and Prose: Kinara B, Cristina S-R, Leah W Entry Verse and Prose: Angelie B, Zara J |
Birthdays This Week |
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This week, we wish a very Happy Birthday to the following members of our Junior School family: Artemisia U, Avelyn C, Luna D, Daisy S |
What's On - Autumn Term |
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Community Sessions |
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Rock Concert for Year 5 and above |
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To book you tickets, please click on this link.
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Term Dates |
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Northampton High School |
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