Dear Parents/Carers Year 1/2 Learning Since the beginning of November the year 1 and 2 children have been learning about amazing animals. Following their visit to the zoo and their focus on the story of the Gingerbread man, they have developed an understanding of animals in different habitats. As an art focus the children used the power of critique to develop the quality of their art work. They drafted a first attempt at drawing a penguin, a monkey or a camel, then received constructive feedback from their peers and created 3 other drawings, ending up with a much more detailed scientific drawing of a baby emperor penguin, a white-headed capuchin or a dromedary. Interview with Simon Thank you so much to Simon, one of our school governors, who kindly came into school to be interviewed by Akram and Fatima, with Hazel helping out. Simon is an actor and his interviewers asked him lots of questions. Simon gave tips about preparing for a performance, and talked about the differences between performing on stage and on television. You will soon be able to listen to the interview in the radio section of our school website. Well done to Akram and Fatima for doing a really great job.

Children in Need Huge thanks to Kathy and Julie for their outstanding effort for Children in Need. Altogether we raised £1112.12. The excitement was palpable as the Great Pakeman Bakeoff got underway with a personal good luck video message from Mary Berry herself!! Then, it was the turn of the judges—Sue, Glenda, Lee and Nicky—to taste the cakes made by the classes, as all the staff and children watched the competition in their pyjamas! There was lots of cheering and it was a wonderful atmosphere. After hard deliberation and consultation about each of the cakes, Pink Class came third with an Oreo Cheescake, Purple came second with a Very Berry Cheesecake and Brown Class were victorious with an Eton Mess. After school we had a brilliant fair with activities including face painting, a lucky dip and a tombola. There was lots of delicious food too and everyone had a great time. On Monday the Children in Need activities were rounded off with a very exciting raffle ticket draw. Thank you to everyone who took part in this amazing day and for giving so generously to Children in Need.

THE PAKEMAN

PRESS P akem an P r im ar y S choo l

Friday 20th November

Issue 9, Autumn Term 2015

BEST OF THE OSCARS

The proud winners of an Oscar this week are:

Johnny for an incredible attitude to his reading in Digismart and the Chatterbooks reading

group

Louie in Gold Class for writing confidently and using finger spaces

Thank you once again for taking the time to read this weekly newsletter. I hope that you will find its contents useful.

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

KS2 Maths Workshop —Supporting your children at home Monday 30th November 9-10am Open Morning for parents/carers of children starting Reception in September 2016 Wed 9th December 9.30am School production with morning and afternoon performances Tuesday 15th December Christmas Lunch Wednesday 16th December Christmas parties Thursday 17th December

Last day of Autumn term Friday 18th December (school closes at 1.30pm)

P4C QUESTION

Discuss this question at home, sharing your thoughts and ideas:

Do you love with your heart or your head?

Please note that holidays are

not authorised during term

time and could result in a

penalty charge.

A full colour version of this newsletter can be found on our school website at: www.pakemanprimary.co.uk

Last week’s best classes for attendance and punctuality

Year Group Best Attendance

Most improved

Attendance

Best Punctuality

EYFS & KS1 Yellow Under 95% Lilac, Crimson, Yellow &

Green

KS2 Orange Orange Orange & Blue

Incredibly Amazing Facts

Carrying on with our space theme from last week:

It took 136 space flights on seven

different types of launch vehicles to build the International Space Station.

It flies at 4.791 miles per second (7.71

km/s). That's fast enough to go to the Moon and back in about a day.

It has two bathrooms, a gym and a

360-degree bay window.

Matchbox Challenge

Thank you so much to all the children who entered our matchbox competition. The effort they put into collecting items for their boxes and also decorating them was just wonderful. Well done to everyone! Our winners who were announced in assembly today are:

EYFS Ronnie (Nursery) for the most items Yamina (Crimson) for decorating her box as a beautiful dress Mahamed (Silver) for his amazing realistic camera box Sureyya (Crimson) for her elaborate feathery bird box

KS1 Victoria (Gold) for the most items Inese (Green) for her gorgeous British flag box Emily (Green) for the variety of textures she used to decorate her box Zara (Yellow) for creating a fabulous holiday box—with the journey on the outside and a beach scene inside her box

KS2 Johnny (Brown) for managing to squeeze an incredible 55 items into his box and decorate it as Sponge Bob Shai (Orange) for creating a football player and ball out of his box Kewin (Blue) for his imaginative choice of items and stylishly decorated box Ellie (Red) producing a box that flowers both inside and out!

Special creative prize

We also gave an additional special creative prize to Shannay (Red) for writing a beautiful story and relating all the items in her box and the decoration of the box to her story.

Aren’t they brilliant?!!!

Islington on a Plate If you are looking for a present or a stocking filler, you’ll find nothing better than this fantastic cookery book, Islington on a Plate, containing recipes provided by a host of well-known Islington residents. The book is truly local, having been sourced, written, illustrated, designed and printed entirely in Islington. The idea for Islington on a Plate came from a group of friends, including Hilary, our librarian, who live in Islington, to raise money for Action Medical Research, a children’s medical charity. The book costs £10 and thanks to generous sponsorship from Savills and donations from local businesses, all proceeds from the sale of these books will go to this very worthwhile charity. If you would like to buy a book please see Layla in the office where there is a copy for you to see.

Helping your child at home with maths It is vitally important for parents to support their children at home with their maths. Here are three website that the school has signed up to for children to practise maths at home. All the children have usernames and passwords to access the online activities. Helping the children play these activities will develop and improve their understanding of mathematical concepts. www.ttrockstars.com http://www.mathletics.co.uk www.activelearnprimary.co.uk

Maths workshop discussion for parents/carers of KS2 children Parents of KS2 children are invited to join Lorna, our Maths Coordinator, at 9am on Monday 30th Novem-ber for a discussion about the new curriculum, Pakeman’s maths policy and what the children learn in different KS2 year groups. There will also be a focus on strategies to help your children, Mathletics and lots more. So, please do join us for this event, which will be both informative and useful.

School Council The School Council is formed by two children from each class who meet each half term to discuss matters that concern the children. At their recent meeting, chaired by Jaiden and overseen by Finola, the representatives brought three topics to the table, based on discus-sions they had with their classes. Lots of interesting issues were raised. For example, the children suggested putting a recycling bin in each class, painting each class door the colour of the class name, and there were several playground suggestions too. These mat-ters will now be considered by the leadership team to decide which of them are feasible to put into practice. The results will then be fed back to the school council at their next meeting. Well done to all the class representatives who are doing a great job!

Street Dance Club

Estelle has started a really exciting street dance club on Wednesdays after school. She is teaching the children dance routines to up-to-date R&B music. Once the children have got two dance routines down perfectly, they will be putting on a street dance assembly for their parents/carers to come and watch in the new year. We’ll keep you posted! Estelle said, ‘we have some really talented dancers and all the children are working hard to learn the routines. Well done to all of them for their dedication.’ Thank you to Estelle who is doing a fantastic job.

Information about payments for playcentre and clubs Just a reminder to everyone that if your child attends a club and then goes on to playcentre afterwards, you do not pay for the club; you only pay for playcentre. Also, if you have a child attending a club and you have another child or children in playcentre for the duration of the club, you do have to pay for the child attending the club and the child/children attending playcentre. Please settle your playcentre fees weekly. This helps parents/carers from falling behind with payments and also makes our job of banking and accounting easier. Regarding payments for clubs, please pay the club leader on the day of the club. Otherwise, please make sure to pay in the office during that week. Again, this helps parents/carers not to fall behind with payments and also facilitates banking and accounting. Thank you so much for your cooperation in this.

THANK YOU

We would like to say a very big thank you to HD Higgins, SOS and Woodside Contracts for their very generous donations to the school and to Steve for arranging these.

Double Club On Wednesday, Double Club played in the Arsenal Hub League against Montem and Sacred Heart schools and won both matches convincingly. Here you can see George celebrating his first goal! At the end of each game (pictured below) the teams talk about fair play, good sportsmanship and how important team spirit is. The children really enjoy playing on this state-of-the-art pitch. Thank you to Arsenal for hosting this competition.