School Bell St Philips Catholic
Published Autumn 2021, by Lucy Horne Headteacher
AT the time of writing this, we are just finishing the academic year and starting the Summer break. The Summer Term, whilst restrictive in terms of events, has none the less been a busy time.
Wider learning:
Reception Class received delivery of five duck eggs in an incubator. All five eggs hatched and the children were able to watch the process happening. They were then able to hold the ducks, learn how to keep them clean and fed and even teach them to swim. The rest of the school were able to have time with the ducklings in their classroom. It is a wonderful process for all of the children to see a life cycle in action.
We were able to have two PE teachers from TLA to come into school and work with all the classes. They were focusing on athletics and in particular the triple jump. The children enjoyed having the techniques shown to them and being able to try them out. This stood them in good stead for the Sports Day.
Sports Day took place this year in the usual format but minus any parents as spectators. The children were able to participate in all of the events but stayed in their class bubbles. Sports Day is always a highlight in the school Summer calendar with children being able to take part in competitive racing with their class mates.
Our first sporting events against other schools were able to happen this term. These were the first inter school events to happen since March 2020. The Year 6 football team went through to the finals to represent the Locality and our Year 4 football team came home as winners of the Local area tournament. We also took part in a Kwik Cricket event at The Castle Grounds. Our cricket club train there weekly in the Summer term so it was super to have a tournament on our home turf. The team played three matches and won all three. They were a combination of Year 6 and year 4 children. We hope that there will be many more events opening up in the Autumn Term.
Year 6 children had a day of fun at the ‘Out of Bounds’ activity centre in Rustington. They arrived at school for a joint breakfast together then set off for a day of footgolf, rope climbing and other activities. They were treated to lunch in the restaurant too.
Year 3 children welcomed Zoolab into school as part of their topic on The Rainforest. The company brought in a range of different reptiles and insects for the children to touch and learn about including African Land Snails and cockroaches.
Year 2 have made their own bug hotel. The materials used to make the bug hotel were donated by families and are all recycled. Hopefully the children will be able to see how they are helping nature at the same time as helping the environment once the insects move in.
Community:
The children in Art Club have been making flags for Arundel Festival of Arts. They will wave the flags in the parade on the day in August. Some children will also be performing in the festival as part of the Sleepy Lagoon Orchestra slot. Children across the school have also been invited to design their own flag for a competition which will be judged by the Mayor of Arundel.
Our classes took part in the second Arundel Community Clean Up Day. The event took place on a Friday which is our whole school swimming lesson day. The classes took litter pickers kindly provided by the Town Council and collected litter as they walked to the Lido. They managed to find quite a collection of rubbish.
Our Year 6 children volunteered to help at the coffee morning held every Monday at the Lido called ‘Elevensies’. They spent one Monday in July walking down and helping to serve coffee and chatting to the people who attended.
Thinking of others:
Years 1 and 2 decided to host their own Mad Hatter’s Tea Party to raise funds for the NHS. The drinks and cakes were donated by a parent and the rest of the parents donated money to the cause. The children had great fun dressing up in their Alice In Wonderland costumes whilst raising money at the same time. They raised £120.
Year 6 have been learning about what it is to be a refugee. They had a visit from Karen Goldsmith from the Diocese who talked to the children about first hand experience of refugee camps and the plight of many families who flee their country. The children then made friendship bracelets and wrote letters to a charity who support refugees.
Next term:
We look forward to welcoming new families to St Philip’s in September in our new Reception intake. We also look forward to further restrictions being lifted. It will be wonderful to have joint celebrations and learning with other classes rather than isolated bubbles. Let us hope the Government still deem it safe to mix the year groups in September. It will take a while for us to readjust back to the old routines of pre-Covid!
We have had a school promotional video created and is available on our school website for all to see the wonderful children we have here at St Philip’s and the many opportunities that we offer both academically and wider curricular wise https://www.stphilipsarundel.org.uk/