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Junior News – 9 December 2022 |
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Research suggests creative dance is incredibly beneficial for primary-aged children, so it is clear why at Northampton High Junior School we place a greater emphasis in our educational offer than some other schools. At its core, dance is overwhelmingly inclusive. Those of all abilities and ages can participate in some form of dance, from basic, gentle movement to complex acro routines. Creative dance is inclusive because:
The research found that creative dance can help children develop the ability ‘to be in the body in the present moment, feeling all its sensations, both emotional and physical’. These sensations are referred to as somatic cues. Having a heightened awareness of these cues can lead to improved interoceptive accuracy (the ability to consciously listen to your body) which is ‘essential’ for emotional regulation. It also offers children a ‘structured, safe outlet for the physical expression of emotions’ and increases children’s emotional literacy by teaching children to manage their emotions symbolically. Creative dance was found to improve children’s relationship skills. While dance can be a solo activity, it also can be highly collaborative with children working together to create dances. The process of doing this allows children to:
The disruption caused to children’s lives by the pandemic has led to concerns for children’s mental and physical health. It has been suggested that exercise could be a valuable tool to address these concerns. The researchers view dance as an ‘exceptional form of exercise’ due to it utilising the whole body and providing opportunities to widen skills. Studies into the effects of dance have explored the ‘transfer effects’ (how learning in one area can improve learning in others) that dance can have. Across numerous studies, dance has been found to:
I know that many of our families recognise the value of dance and facilitate their daughters to access additional dance classes within school as well as sometimes out of school. A group of pupils will be taking examinations in dance next term and we are keen to support them through this experience and of course to celebrate their achievements. We are very pleased to be able to offer dance as part of our educational offer at Northampton High Junior School and to observe our girls enjoying it so much from a young age, to celebrate their achievements and to witness the positive impact it has on their development is a privilege. Miss Hair |
November and December in Junior School |
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Competition winner |
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You will recall the children being invited to enter the GDST Christmas card competition earlier this term. We were so impressed with the standard and range of entries which lead to a challenge when having to select just one. We chose Isabelle’s design from Year 1 and we are thrilled to share that Isabelle has been selected as the Trust-wide winner. She has won £450 for a charity and also a £50 gift voucher for herself. We have chosen to donate the prize to KidsAid, which is the charity we are supporting this year as a school. Well done to Isabelle for her creative and endearing design! |
Date for your Diaries |
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For Mother’s Day we will be hosting a very special event on Friday 17 March. All of our mums, grandmas, aunties and close friends are invited to our afternoon tea on Friday 17 March. We will serve a delicious afternoon tea in a relaxed, friendly atmosphere with the girls’ help. Our guests will also receive a special handmade gift from their Junior School pupil. To secure a ticket for this event then please do so through your daughter’s ParentPay account. Hint for the dads – perhaps this is a nice opportunity for you to arrange a ticket for the mums and female family members to wish them a happy Mother’s Day on behalf of your daughter! |
School Photos - Discount Extended |
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Pret-a-Portrait’s EarlyBird discount (25% off!) for the recent photos is due to expire today but they have extended this until Tuesday 20th December so you can take advantage of the discount for longer! Head to their website https://www.pret-a-portrait.net/ and enter your sitting ID, the discount will automatically be applied If you’ve misplaced your sitting ID, please contact Pret-a-Portrait directly on 0800 021 7626 or customerservice@pret-a-portrait.net |
Online Safety Guidance |
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Please click here for the National Online Safety guide for Roblox Please click here for the National Online Safety for TikTok |
Parking Notice |
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Please can we kindly remind parents and visitors to not park in the designated disabled parking bays when visiting the school unless they hold a blue badge. Thank you for your continued cooperation. Mr Stubbs |
Sparkle Party |
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Our final festive event is our ‘Sparkle Party’ next Thursday (15 December). Most of you have already booked your daughter’s place through ParentPay but if you are yet to, then please do so ahead of time. We will be joined by some rather special visitors from the North Pole, will be bouncing on a truly unique festive inflatable (this needs to be seen to be believed), dancing to some Christmas tunes, savouring delicious festive treats and enjoying the time together. |
Junior School Christmas Celebration - Tuesday 13 December |
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We are really looking forward to our Junior School Christmas Celebration, taking place on Tuesday 13 December! For this event, all children from Reception to Year 6 will need to be dropped off at their classrooms by 6.00pm, dressed in their school uniform with a ‘touch of tinsel’. Year 3 and 4 will be wearing a costume and their class teachers will communicate separately about this. Refreshments will be available for our parents and families ahead of the performance starting at 6.30pm. We hope you can join us! |
World Book Day - Advance Warning! |
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For World Book day next year (2 March 2023) we will be having a theme of ‘Bedtime Stories’. The children will be invited to attend School/Nursery/Pre School in their pyjamas and dressing gowns (rather than a costume of a book character) and will partake in a range of activities all centred around the enjoyment of reading and the joy of bedtime stories. We wanted to let you know this early to avoid any early preparations with regards to book character costumes! |
News from our classrooms: Nursery and Pre School |
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We are super proud of our Nursery girls sitting on the stage in front of all the parents. It is daunting for us as adults let alone two and three year olds and we thank you all for coming. Christmas has obviously been the theme with Small World Toys and Christmas crafts. Reindeer antlers were worn in ballet and our dark den now contains a frosty sparkly talking table. At Forest School we made edible decorations for the birds and in cooking we made Rudolph cookies. One more week of term – let’s see how much glitter can we use. |
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Christmas,Christmas, Christmas has dominated the Pre School and personally I couldn’t be happier. Seeing the smiles on their faces when the words Christmas, Santa and Elves are mentioned brings a smile to my face too. It has been wonderful to hear about what some naughty Elves have been up to, about visits to Santa himself and watching them reenact memories. Santa parked his sleigh in the garden and the children have helped build on this and I think he will be very pleased when he returns to collect it! Painting Christmas trees with a twist using forks instead of paintbrushes have created some wonderful pictures. Writing letters to Santa himself have focused on the all important mark making and letter formation, listening to Santa stories with the girls bringing their own ideas and thoughts have built upon the all important stepping stones for reading. I’m sure you are feeling just as proud as we are of the girls performance on Tuesday. It was truly a magical time and even though your daughter may not have sung to get on the stage in front of everybody, I feel it is a massive achievement in itself. Well done to all the girls your teachers are very proud of you! Photos from the play are on the cupboards in the Pre School collection area and if you would like to order any please take the slip with the codes and information on. Please could we remind you not to allow your daughter to bring in items from home as you can appreciate keeping track of these is becoming increasingly difficult and some smaller items can be dangerous to the girls. As we approach the end of term please check all your daughters belongings and make sure you have the correct items. Many thanks! |
Reception |
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We hope you enjoyed the Christmas Nativity and are feeling very proud of your daughter. All the class did amazingly well, showing great confidence. Having worked hard to learn the song words, dance routine and sheep jokes, well done Reception Class. This week we have used ideas from the story ‘The Polar Express’ for some of our activities. We have made a train to transport us to the North Pole and found the golden tickets to allow us to travel. We have made maps, role played making hot chocolate and in cooking made our own real hot chocolate cones to take home and try.
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In our writing we researched some true facts about the arctic, the weather, the animals and then wrote some sentences. We are busy with Christmas-themed activities and the girls have been role playing the Nativity and decorating a tree. As the weather has turned cold can you please send your daughter into school with navy gloves and the school navy hat to wear at playtimes. |
Bookworm Club |
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Isabel and Zara love Bookworm Club because they get to read fun stories and make their own books. Aurelia and Priyana love sitting in the book corner and having a quiet time reading. All the bookworms enjoyed making comprehension dice and used them to ask questions about the stories they are reading at home. Keep reading!
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Maths Club |
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The girls have enjoyed a variety of activities from using the Maths computing programs, Mathletics and Times Table Rockstars to colour by number and break the code tasks. ‘I love the colour by numbers, sometimes it is tricky to do the sums first’. Evie ‘It’s really fun because you get to do dot to dots and go on your Chromebooks’. Iman and Eloise A |
Mindfulness Colouring Club |
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Mindfulness Colouring Club gives everyone a chance to switch off from the usual activities of the school day. Miss Scott-Evans often themes each week. For example, we have had colouring activities linked to Roald Dahl Day, World Mental Health Day, Languages Week, The Queen and Christmas. We listen to relaxing music and concentrate on our colouring, being sure to take our time to help keep us calm. Grace likes celebrating different things with the colouring. Caoimhe and Amariah enjoy the right music and the calmness and Pixie likes colouring something new each week. |
Book Club |
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We have read lots of different books and we have shared the reading aloud. Some of us really enjoyed a story called ‘Jeremy’s First Day’ because we found out that Jeremy was a teacher and he didn’t want to go to school! Our next book was called ‘Cheat’ and we liked the fact that Danny finished the painting for Mr King, who was blind. When we read playscripts, the one about the alien was funny because he kept saying ‘gloddop’ and ‘burp’. We are all looking forward to relaxing with a good book over the holidays! |
Blooket Club |
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‘We enjoy playing Blooket since it is a fun and energetic game to help you learn and practice your times tables. In Blooket there are lots of different game modes that you can play, here are a few of them: Gold Quest, Fishing Frenzy and Dino Detectives. Don’t always think you can only do times table because you can do so much more. Whilst playing Dino Detectives we enjoy it when we can cheat our ways to victory. Blooket is a wonderful game that you can play at any time on any day. One of our favourite game modes is Crypto Hack where you can choose a password and gain crypto or you can hack other contestants and guess their password for crypto’ – Annabel and Eloise C |
Current Affairs Club |
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‘Current Affairs is a really fun club because it’s so interesting. We have learned lots of facts that we wouldn’t have known otherwise…you might not need them, but they might impact our future. We all love the Kahoot! section, but we have discovered that Cordelia has really good general knowledge, because she always wins the news quiz at the end of our club!’ – Aurelia, Cordelia, Maya R, Maya A and Asmi |
News from outside of our classrooms: French Focus |
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This term Year 1 have been introduced to the French language and have liked learning the basics such as greetings, the alphabet, and days of the week through games and songs. It has been lovely seeing them develop their confidence leading little conversations with each other in the target language using finger puppets. Relishing the competitive element and always keen to engage in activities they particularly enjoyed taking part in playground games around days of the week. In the first part of the autumn term, Year 2 enjoyed working on the picture book ‘Petit poisson blanc’ and learned how to describe sea creatures in French. It was the opportunity for students to revisit colours, learn new animals and start developing an awareness of the position of the adjective in the sentence. They created some colourful mini books which demonstrated a good knowledge of animals and colours. In the second part of the term, through the story of ‘Quelle heure est-il Monsieur le loup?’ students learned to recognise the time in French and were delighted to take part in a playground game using it. This term, Year 3 worked on the picture book ‘La chenille qui fait des trous’ and learned some food vocabulary to be able to talk about what the caterpillar eats over the course of the week. It was a great opportunity to consolidate their knowledge of the days of the week, numbers and to develop their understanding of the plural. It was lovely to see how students’ knowledge had developed in their sentences for their own caterpillar.
In the topic of ‘la rentrée’, or going back to school, Year 4 explored cultural differences around that time of the year in France whilst learning key vocabulary to talk about their classroom equipment. Students then started working on the picture book ‘Va-t’en grand monstre vert’, learning about body parts and physical descriptions in French. They have particularly enjoyed creating and describing their own monster. Year 5 have been learning about sports in French this term and have enjoyed being able to express their likes and dislikes on various sporting activities. We have been very pleased with their enthusiastic and confident approach in lessons and their willingness to speak in the target language. In an extended piece of writing, they were able to express their opinions. In the second part of the term, students have learned how to talk about what they wear and loved describing their weekend outfits. Year 6 have impressed us with their enthusiasm and commitment to French this term. In our topic on Matisse, they learned how to give detailed descriptions of people and shapes in some of the artist’s famous works. They particularly loved creating their own Matisse inspired paintings and describing them in French. The quality of these pieces and their descriptions were fantastic. After the October break, students started learning about places in town and how to describe their town now, and what it looked like in the past. It was very pleasing to read some detailed descriptions of their towns.
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Awards for this week |
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Star Learners of the Week – Ella K, Aadya, Nellie, Siena-Louise, Isabel, Isabella B, Amariah, Kinara, Lydia, Tharulya, Maya A, Maya J Swimmer of the Week – Marine Congratulations to Varnikha who won the Eco Team Mascot Competition for her fantastic Mascot design. Well done Varnikha! Congratulations also go to Agnes, Isabella B, Elouise S, Annie T and Tharulya who were awarded certificates and a prize for their wonderful entries for the Eco Team Mascot Competition. Well done girls! Each week girls are invited to share their achievements in activities outside of school. They are listed below for this week: Evette – awarded an orange and black belt in Karate and achieved a Water Skills Level 5
Rhoda – awarded Gymnast of the Week
Avani – achieved a green belt in Karate
Eliza – achieved a yellow belt, green stripe in Taekwon-Do
Avelyn C – performed a singing solo at the Olney Dickens Christmas Fayre
Anna H – beat her own time at a swimming gala
Cora – achieved a Gymnastics Level 5
Aurelia T – took a cello exam on Monday Maya A – awarded Gymnast of the Term |
Birthdays for this week |
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This week, we wish a very Happy Birthday to the following members of our Junior School family: Hester, Tara and Aurelia M |
New look for parent FireFly dashboard! |
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The school’s FireFly dashboard for parents has recently undergone a revamp and an upgrade! We hope that our parents will find the information platform to be user-friendly and accessible. If you have any questions or have any feedback on the upgraded portal, please do get in touch. Mr Rittler |
Community Sessions |
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Term Dates |
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Northampton High School |
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