Dear Parents and Friends of St. Mary’s Christian Value for this half-term - LoveThis half-term we have been exploring the value of ‘love’. Many thanks to the children in Orange Class who have been telling us what love means to them:

Love is giving people presents. Love is looking after your puppy. Love is receiving gifts. Love is spending time with family. Love is my cat jumping up on my bed at night. Love is showing affection for someone. Love is preserving something ancient. Love is taking your dog on a walk. Love is saying sorry to someone. Love is a mum hugging her children. Love is helping somebody.

Love is a never-ending feeling On top of all the others. Very good friends love you, Even God and your family love you more than you can imagine. Joseph C

Love is everyone’s heart beating Orange flowers for a gift. Very loving people Everyone caring for each other. Jude

Lots of love is helping a friend, Overwhelming someone with love makes them feel good. Very many people love someone. Every ounce of love is great. Joseph A

We are looking forward to a busy few weeks between now and the end of term. Please continue to keep an eye on our website and letters so as not to miss out on any of our activities!

Best wishes, Mr. Milne

Dates for your diary…

St. Mary’s C of E Primary School | Biggs Lane | Fownhope | Hereford | HR1 4PG www.stmarysschoolfownhope.co.uk | email: info@st-marys-pri.hereford.sch.uk

School Office open from 8:30am, call: 01432 860474 | Headteacher: Mr T Milne

The School Bell

Ringing in the St. Mary’s School news

“What we nurture today, flourishes tomorrow”

Issue 150 | 16th November, 2018

Good News assembly - Every Friday 2:40pm at school, parents, family and friends all welcome

AUTUMN TERMNOVEMBER: VALUE - LOVE

Monday 19th: Parents’ evening, 3:30 – 6:00 pm

Tuesday 20th: Environmental Day

Wednesday 21st: Environmental Day

Thursday 22nd: Parents’ evening, 5:00 – 7:00 pm

Friday 30th: ‘Wear what you like’ day

DECEMBER: VALUE - LOVE

Tuesday 11th: Nativity performance (Reception and Year 1) 2:00 pm

Wednesday 12th: Nativity performance (Reception and Year 1) 6:00 pm

Thursday 13th: KS1 to see ‘Peter Pan’ at the Courtyard Theatre in Hereford

Friday 14th: Christmas Fayre, 3:00 – 6:00 pm

Monday 17th: Christmas dinner for children and parents: 11:45 am and 12:30 pm

Tuesday 18th: KS2 to see ‘The Wizard of Oz’ at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre

Wednesday 19th: Christmas dinner for children and parents: 11:45 am and 12:30 pm

Thursday 20th: Christmas parties and buffet lunch

Friday 21st: School Christmas carol service in church, 2:00 pm

Friday 23rd: Church Christmas service in church, 6:00 pm

Parents’ EveningsA reminder that our parents’ evenings will take place on next Monday and Thursday. You should by now have been informed of your appointment time. Please arrive in plenty of time to look at your children’s work before your appointment. Also don’t forget to pop into the hall and sample a taster of the new winter menu!

The next School Bell will be issued on Friday 30th November

Welcome We have been delighted to welcome to the school Marley, who has joined Violet Class; we hope that he and his family will be happy with us here at St. Mary’s.

Open DayThanks to everyone who supported our Open Day earlier this week. It was a great success. Many thanks to PTA members, governors and prefects who all helped to make the day run smoothly.

Pre-School Pre-School have been learning all about magic and that includes rainbows and unicorns. We have had magician Bek doing magic tricks every day and have made our own special magic wands.

Year 1 - Indigo Class Indigo Class have been doing subtraction in maths. We have also been learning about the external parts of the human body. In geography we have been studying different landforms. Last week we made poppies and learned all about Remembrance Sunday.

St. Mary’s - News from the classes

Reception - Violet ClassViolet class has been busy opening their own soup café in the home corner and making root vegetable soup in their water play to do with the story Pumpkin Soup. They have had some exciting music lessons with River Roots, which involved making their own drums and shakers and learning new songs. There has been lots of artwork, activities and discussion around fireworks and Poppy Day. We have also been counting and writing numbers and looking at repeated patterns.

Year 2 - Blue Class In Blue Class we have just finished our topic on castles. We worked together to make 3D models of motte and bailey castles and we found out about

Hereford Castle. Did you know, it was one of the first castles in England, built before the Norman invasion?

Year 3 - Green ClassGreen Class have been enthusiastically learning how to do column addition and subtraction.

They have even been playing ‘Beat the teacher’ – and sometimes winning!

They have also been writing fantastic descriptions of soldiers leaving to fight in World War 1.

Year 4 - Yellow ClassIn English, Yellow Class have been learning about ‘The Unknown Soldier’ and listening to extracts from ‘War Horse’ by Michael Morpurgo as part of our World War One focus. We have taken an illustration from the story and written descriptive passages, thinking about powerful adjectives, adverbials and similes to make our writing varied and interesting.

In Maths we have been working on column subtraction with more than one exchange and have also looked at other efficient subtraction methods we could use when problem solving.

In science, we have finished our topic on Sound with some very interesting junk modelling around our own musical instrument designs. The children really enjoyed this and learned how to adapt / improve their designs to ensure they could play it loud / soft and even at a higher or lower pitch.

Year 5 - Orange ClassOrange Class have looked at life as an Egyptian and have just finished our brilliant class story - ‘Secrets of a Sun King’ by Emma Carroll. We have designed and written about our own gods, made cartouches in clay and found out about the young pharaoh Tutankhamun. It’s now onto ‘The Greeks’ and we have just started our new story ‘Percy Jackson and the lightning thief.’ In maths we are investigating graphs and tables, have looked at prime numbers and

in literacy we have been looking at a range of images and sources depicting life during WWI in the trenches . We have been writing some very thoughtful and emotive sentences, ready to create a final piece of descriptive writing for our whole school focus on Remembrance Week.

Year 6 - Red ClassIn maths Red Class have been learning about prime, square and cube numbers and the order of operations using the acronyms BIDMAS and BODMAS to help us. We really enjoyed the visit to St. Mary’s Church to find out about the 12 local men who died during World War 1. We have been thinking what it must have been like to have been in the trenches and have been building up a bank of vocabulary to write descriptions. We have been thinking about this term’s value - Love and have written prayers and reflections to hang on our class tree.

For all the latest news on the classes visit: www.stmarysschoolfownhope.co.uk/children

St. Mary’s C of E Primary School - Board of Governors includes:

Headteacher: Mr T Milne | Co-Chairs of Governors: Mrs Alice Hayter and Mrs Sarah Fishbourne

Parent Governors: Mrs Helen Seaborne and Mr Shane Miles

newsletter design and layout by the naked creative / tel: 01432 860666 www.thenakedcreative.co.uk

A reminder of our Christmas ActivitiesPre-school visit to Madley Environmental Study Centre: Friday 6th December

Christmas dinner: Monday 17th and Wednesday 19th December – menu available on ParentPay soon

Christmas Fayre: Friday 14th December 3:00 – 5:00 pm. Come and join us for a fun afternoon of festive activities! This is also Save the Children’s ‘Christmas Jumper Day’ when children are welcome to wear a Christmas jumper for the day in return for a donation to the charity.

Key Stage 1 production ‘A Miracle in Town’: Tuesday 11th December at 2:00 pm and Wednesday 12th December at 2:00 pm. Booking information will be sent out soon.

Pre-school nativity: Thursday 13th December 2:00 pm

Key Stage 1 theatre visit: Thursday 13th December. Children in Violet, Indigo and Blue classes will be attending a performance of ‘Peter Pan’ at the Courtyard in Hereford. More details to follow.

Key Stage 2 theatre visit: Tuesday 18th December. Children in Green, Yellow, Orange and Red classes will be attending a performance of ‘The Wizard of Oz’ at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre. More details to follow.

Pre-school Christmas party: (separate from school parties) – Wednesday 19th December

Christmas parties: Thursday 20th December. Once again the kitchen has offered to provide a hot buffet lunch of pizza, chicken goujons, sausage rolls etc. for all the children and staff. There will be no alternative cooked meal on this day. We are not charging for the buffet but would appreciate voluntary contributions towards the cost. Children may wear party clothes all day.

Pre-school church service: Thursday 13th December 10:00 am

Christmas service: Friday 21st December 2:00 pm in church. Everyone welcome!

Church carol service: Sunday 23rd December 6:00 pm in church. We hope that a group of singers from school will be performing some Christmas songs. More details soon.

Mobile Phones A reminder that for safeguarding reasons, visitors to school are requested to not use mobile phones for photos or other purposes on the school premises. Thank you for your support and understanding with this.

Thank you to everyone who has supported Children in Need today. Watch our website for an announcement of how much money we raised for the charity.

Children in NeedFriday 16th November

Environmental Days A reminder that next Tuesday and Wednesday the children will be participating in two days of art and environmental workshops. One of the activities will be working with Richard Fishbourne of Bugs and Beasties to participate in some outdoor learning. Other activities will include twig weaving, stone painting, nature pictures and a variety of ‘forest schools’ activities using our woodland and pond areas.

Children need not wear school uniform for the two days. They will need to wear warm, waterproof clothing and wellies as we will be outside for much of the time. They will also need an old shirt or painting apron to protect their clothes when working with clay and paint. We are also asking each child to bring a round, smooth stone or pebble and a vegetable such as a carrot, potato or parsnip.

We would love parents to come and join in the fun, either working with the children or helping to tidy up our outside areas before the winter. Please let the office know if you are able to give up any time on either of these days. Thank you.

Christmas DinnerThese will take place on Monday 17th and Wednesday 19th December and are open to all children and parents.

There will be two sittings on each day: 11:45 – 12:30 and 12:30 – 1:15. Children’s meals cost £3.75 and must be booked in advance using the usual ParentPay system.Adult meals cost £6.00 and must be ordered by Friday 7th December on ParentPay. Please note that your child can only have the Christmas dinner on one day and no other hot meal will be available on the other day.

Parents of Key Stage 1 children may order a sandwich from school for this day or bring in a packed lunch from home; please let the school office know if you would like to order a sandwich for your child.