22nd January 2021

Parent Notices

“The 24th January is the third United Nations’ International Day of Education, and one of the themes this year is the celebration of  Learning Heroes.  What better way to describe all our fabulous teachers here at Beaudesert, our remarkable children who are so impressively enthusiastic and creative, and our parents who are offering such wonderful support at home.  Thank you to all our Learning Heroes.”

We wish you all a happy, healthy and restful weekend together.

Chris and Harriet

Headmaster and Acting Head of Pre-prep

‘Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.’ W.B. Yeats

To Infinity and Beyond

The Nursery children are continuing their topic of space and enjoyed an exciting ‘space walk’ in the sports hall on Monday! The children practised kicking a ‘shooting star’ into a net, jumping from ‘planet to planet’, avoiding the ‘asteroids’, balancing their ‘helmets’ on their heads and finally ‘blasting off’ into space again – all with the help of their top-of-the-line jet packs that they made! All of the children had lots of fun and wanted to keep exploring all afternoon.

Throughout the week they have been counting the correct number of comets to put in their moon craters, building rockets with ‘Numicon’, printing space pictures and baking alien flying saucer cakes! They also made their own pizzas for lunch – yummy.

Prepping for the Big Garden Birdwatch

It’s almost time for the Big Garden Birdwatch! Do you remember last year when TV presenter and ecologist Mike Dilger visited us? He spoke to us all about his ecological adventures and the importance of the Big Garden Birdwatch.

In Year 5 Ecology lessons this week, the children have been putting their birdwatching skills to the test. Spying on their garden visitors from their windows or out in the fresh air, a wide range of different birds have been spotted; favourites like blue tits, robins and starlings alongside rarer species such as kingfishers and song thrushes. Make sure to dust off your binoculars, make a hot chocolate and get ready to take part in the Big Garden Birdwatch next weekend. All you need to do is count the birds visiting your patch for an hour. It would be wonderful to see photographs of the children taking part or to hear what birds they saw. Join in with the biggest garden citizen science project in the world!

A Puzzling Headmaster’s Challenge

Did you take on the Headmaster’s Challenge this week? Mr Searson asked you to find as many words as you could using the letters in ‘Beaudesert Park’. Well done to all of the children who found over 100 words, and our mega-top scorers!

Practical Experiments at Home

This week our Science teachers have been so exited to see the practical work you have been completing at home!

Year 5 did an investigation into jelly, to see whether a wider surface area speeds up the rate of dissolving. We hope you all had the opportunity to investigate whether this changed the flavour of the jelly…

Our Year 6 children are learning about microbes. They have been studying photographs of microbes under the microscope and making their own models out of playdough.

To further their knowledge of microbes, the children have been demonstrating the fermentation process at home with just a bottle, a balloon and some yeast.

Work Showcase

Across the School the children have been working hard and we love seeing photographs of the children proudly showing off their work.

Sports Podcast with Alex King

In this week’s podcast, Mr Griffiths and Mr Dill speak with former professional rugby player and current Gloucester attack coach, Alex King. Alex has recently moved to the area from France and he gives a real insight into his sporting journey, what life is like in the professional game and offers some broader words of advice from the world of sport. As always you can listen on Spotify (just search for ‘Beaudesert Park School’) or listen using the link below.

Geometric Art & Mark Making

Year 5 have been continuing their topic of geometric art, and having chosen one geometric shape, they have explored the different patterns they can create with it. All of their artwork has been produced using a variety of CAD programmes.

Year 6 have continued to work on drawing insects. This week they were challenged to fill a double page spread in their sketchbooks with continuous line drawings, thinking about how they could change the size and direction of each drawing to create an interesting composition. They used different coloured felt tip pens to create a brilliant range of results.

eSafety Resources

As children are spending more time on devices during lockdown, please visit the ParentZone website. They have many additional resources on topics such as fun, educational YouTube channels and what children should know about Internet Safety.

Mindfulness Scavenger Hunt in Forest School

Miss Shearer-Manning has been so moved by the wonderful responses to her Forest School tasks. She has loved hearing that the children are sharing their experiences with their families. This week she wanted to share these lovely videos in response to the Mindfulness Scavenger Hunt activity. The children were asked to go on a walk in nature and find natural items such as ‘something to make someone smile’ or ‘something that an animal would eat’.

Many children also did the extra ‘Silly Science’ activity experimenting with pine cones.

Doughy Dragons

Dragons continue to run amok in Year 1. The children’s salt dough dragon models look fantastic – whether friendly or fierce, they have horns, claws, spikes, tails, wings and many other features to give them both colour and character.

1N received a letter from Sir Cedric, a knight who had lost his dragon and they have been writing back to him, while 1S have been writing updates on Sossy the baby dragon.