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George Spicer Newsletter - 6th December 2024

This week we were excited to announce the launch of our Kindness Advent Calendar at George Spicer Primary School! This initiative is designed to spread joy, compassion, and a sense of community throughout the school during the Advent season.

The Kindness Advent Calendar contains a different act of kindness for our pupils to complete each weekday from December 2nd to December 20th. These acts are simple, achievable, and aimed at fostering a spirit of generosity and care within our school community.

As a Rights Respecting School, we believe it is essential to develop our pupils into well-rounded, globally aware citizens who are prepared to make a positive impact on society. The Kindness Advent Calendar aligns with our school values of equality, resilience, determination, responsibility, kindness, and respect.

We encourage you to support this initiative at home by discussing the calendar with your child and helping them complete these acts of kindness. This is an opportunity for our pupils to learn the importance of empathy, understanding, and making a difference, which are all crucial life skills.

We hope that the Kindness Advent Calendar will inspire our pupils to spread kindness not only during the Advent season but throughout the year. Together, we can create a more inclusive, compassionate, and connected school community.

Thank you for your support and participation.

Kindness Advent Calendar

Remember, each act of kindness, no matter how small, has the power to make a positive difference in the lives of others. Let's work together to create a more caring and compassionate school community at George Spicer Primary School.

Important Dates for Diary

Wednesday 11th December - Christmas Jumper and Christmas Dinner Day

Friday 13^th December - Y4&5 Carol Service 10am at St Andrew's Church

Monday 16th December - Yr6 Trip to Kingsmead School

Monday 16th December - Red House Non-Uniform Day

Friday 20th December - Last Day of Term

Quote of the week

“A part of kindness consists in loving and helping people more than they deserve.” — Joseph Joubert

Attendance week ending 06/12/2024

Overall school = 94.87% Lates = 58

Best attendance: 1st Rhine 100% 2nd Lagos 97.88% 3rd Kingston 97.81%

Punctuality: Well done to Thames and Kingston with 100% for punctuality.

House Points

We have introduced a new reward system in school this term, giving House points for children using and demonstrating our Be’s for Behaviour. They have all been trying really hard to collectively earn a House reward. Overall, the table below indicates that there have been 6,731 acts of positivity since we started the scheme, so everyone deserves credit. Congratulations to Red House who have earned a non-uniform day on Monday 16^th December – hopefully they will wear something to represent their colour.

Free Sanitary Products – available to all pupils that need them, and we would like to help support them where we can. Please tell your daughter to see Mrs Truong in the welfare room or, for more information, please contact the office.

Donations - Please could we have donations of tissues, baby wipes, plasters, jogging bottoms and socks for both of our sites.

Breakfast and After-School Club Spring 1 Invoices - If your child attends Breakfast and After School Club, Your Spring 1 2025 invoice is now ready. In line with the school's zero-debt policy, Please ensure you make payment via Arbor or your child's Tax Free Childcare account in advance.

Reception

Reception: Nativity performance and Being Kind.

This week, the Reception children have performed their Nativity play to their parents. The acting and singing skills of these children have been amazing. Well done to all the children that learnt the words to the songs and the actions to go with them. Also, well done to the narrators and actors that learnt all their lines and delivered them as best they could. A special thanks to all the parents who helped with rehearsing their lines and the songs at home.

Reception also been focusing on what it means to be a good friend and how being kind can help with this. The children spoke about all the kind ways they can help each other and what they can do if they think someone is in need of help. It has been great to see the children being kind like helping each other with their coats and encouraging each other to join in with their games. Long may this continue.

Year 1

This week, the children in Year 1 became investigators! They worked scientifically to answer the question "Is all paper the same?" They learnt that paper is manufactured from wood and carried out a series of simple tests to identify the properties of different types of paper and their suitability for different uses. K noticed that the water droplets on the greaseproof paper "sat on top" and H commented "It's greasy so it stops the water from going through it."

Year 2

This week the children discovered huge beanstalks had grown in their classrooms, it transpires that we have a new book for writing which is Jim and the Beanstalk. The children have loved comparing this to the traditional tale of Jack and Beanstalk to Jim in the Beanstalk.

In their PSHE this week the pupils have been discussing how to be a good friend and how to spot bullying behaviour. They acted out some scenarios and decided how to best approach the different situations.

Year 3

In History, we have been learning about the Cradles of Civilisation.

Earlier in this unit, we learnt about the oldest story archaeologists have found: The Epic of Gilgamesh.

We learnt that an epic is a very long poem. In this epic, we met the character Gilgamesh, who was the king of Babylon. We enjoyed listening to the story and creating actions to coincide. We wrote about our favourite part.

This week, we looked at similarities between the civilisations that Historians have named the cradles of civilisations. We discussed that all cradle areas had stopped being nomadic as they now lived near rivers and could farm. We discussed over similarities and then wrote about them.

Year 4

This week, Year 4 have been learning about the Andes mountains. Did you know that they are located in South America? The Andes is the second highest mountain range in the world after the Himalayas.

The Andes is the longest mountain range in the world. We also learnt that the Andes mountain range begins north of the Equator and extends through the Equator. The Andes mountain then extends south through the Tropic of Capricorn. Did you know that the northern part of the mountain range is normally very warm and rainy? The central part of the Andes is dry. Lastly, in the south of the Andes mountain range, it can be cool and rainy.

Year 5

We have really enjoyed our week in school this week. We have been busy concluding our science-fiction stories for our current writing topic inspired by Malorie Blackman's Robot Girl. Additionally, we have been developing our understanding of multiplication procedures in Maths and learning about Alevism and in particular the Cem-Avi (the place of worship for Alevis) during RW lessons. We have also been attempting to improve the time it takes to remember and correctly spell the RRS vocabulary, in the RRS language challenge. By the end of term, we will be experts in understanding the core principles surrounding the UNCRC rights of the child and how they should be used. We are looking forward to two trips next week, one to a North London Cem-Avi to support and enhance our learning around Alevism, and the other to the Carol Service at St. Andrews Church, Enfield!

Year 6

Year 6 have come to the end of their work in Writing based on The Promise by Nicola Davies. During the work on this book they have written diary entries, letters and setting descriptions. Their final piece of work was to write an extended sequel to the story in the form of a narrative poem. They innovated the original story, adapting the characters and events to show what happened at the end of the original book. Their efforts have been hugely impressive and many of the sequels would stand alone as stories of their own. This week they started to publish their work, ready to go on display in the Year 6 corridor. They should all be very proud of their work - it's incredibly impressive!

Example Content

Sports2Inspire

Please see below for after-school activities taking place from Monday 13th January. To book, please use the following link:

https://bookwhen.com/sports2inspiregeorgespicer#focus=ev-sb7r-20241107153000

Sports2Inspire will be running a half-term camp in the school during the February half term. Please see below for more information and use the following link to book. https://bookwhen.com/sports2inspiregeorgespicer#focus=ev-sb7r-20241107153000

FoGs News

For more information about FoGS (Friends of George Spicer), details of our upcoming events, information on how to join our meetings or to read our newsletter, please visit our website