Issue One

We’re at the end of the second week of remote learning – what a lot we have to report! Miss Danby’s Daily Wake Up dance sessions have proved themselves to be very popular; she has even inspired some of the Year Six children to make their own Just Dance videos for their friends – these have been so popular that some of these have now been shared with the whole school on the LJS Community Team – thank you, boys for sharing your efforts with us all.

Our Co-Curricular programme continues to offer breadth and range to our learning, through individual instrument lessons and our After School Activities programme which has been revised to feature a range of activities to appeal to a wide cross-section of ages. There was great excitement across the school, no matter where they were, when snow began to fall yesterday afternoon. It didn’t settle at all in Oundle but some of our children reported that there was enough of a covering to make snowballs at their homes in South Lincolnshire and Rutland! Our live morning and afternoon sessions have been well received and we have now launched a whole class live element to our delivery of English and Maths across Key Stage 2. Children in Reception, Year One and Year Two are continuing to join their teachers for live small group sessions twice per week.

This week we are putting the spotlight on what Years Five and Six have been up to over the course of the first couple of weeks of the Lent Term. It has been wonderful to see our children supporting each other on their Form Teams, as well as on the LJS Community Team, where they have sent a warm virtual welcome to new pupils who joined LJS last week.

Year Five have launched their cross-curricular El Dorado project. They have been compiling fact files on Colombia in Humanities, learning where Colombia is located, what the flag looks like and including lots of information such as the fact that Colombia is famous for its coffee, salsa dancing and fiestas, amongst other things. In English, the children have begun to learn about the writing projects that they have ahead of them whilst they become the detectives and search for the lost city of El Dorado. Their first task was to choose their detective agency name and create their three characters; they then designed a logo and wrote a motto for their agency. It’s all very mysterious and exciting – more updates to come as the weeks go on! They have enjoyed finding out about William Morris as part of their Victorians topic in History, and have begun to create their own drawings of natural objects, working towards using their drawings in patterns, just as William Morris did in his famous designs. For those children who have chosen netball for their Games lessons, footwork and movement have been the focus points; those who have opted for football for this term have been working to develop their ball control skills. Top all that with Music lessons on the Nutcracker, learning about Islam in RE and coding skills in Computing and you can see that Year Five have earned a relaxing weekend!

Life in Year Six has been a similarly busy hive of activity. In MFL lessons they have been learning vocabulary related to places you would find ‘en ville’ and are looking forward to a time when it is possible to travel to France to practise their language skills! Not linked to their MFL lessons but to their learning in Humanities relating to WWI, the children have been finding out about The Treaty of Versailles and its implications in world history. In Drama, they have filmed themselves making a speech as one of the country leaders, explaining the situation from their point of view.  Their computing lessons have been invaluable at this time whilst we are all relying on and using technology and devices more than ever – touch typing skills are a skill for life and the children have been working hard to improve their speeds and accuracy. In RE, Mrs Maslen has been teaching the children about the rituals of Bat and Bar Mitzvah as part of the their continued learning about Jewish traditions. They have been getting stuck in to some complex comprehension tasks, thinking carefully about inference and use of vocabulary to answer the trickiest of questions. In PE and Games, Miss Danby and Mr Larkin have been demonstrating exercises to build core strength and fitness, as well as developing their skills in their chosen games sports, netball or football.

This week’s Family Challenge is to have a family games session – a favourite family board game maybe? Or perhaps a new game or one that has been forgotten at the back of the cupboard. We have also shared Dice Golf, a simple game for all ages, shared with us by The Mintridge Foundation. We can’t wait to see which games our families have been playing – you are welcome to join in too!

Have a lovely weekend, everyone!