News

The Foundation Stage children went on an Arctic adventure during their PE lesson, as part of their winter topic. They used their imaginations to visualise animals, icebergs and boats through their explorer binoculars. The children created various yoga poses, showing balance and control, when acting out different parts of their adventure e.g. aeroplane pose, walrus pose, igloo pose. We saw many fantastic gymnasts in the making!

During our topic discussion we continued to look at animals which hibernate and the children answered questions to show what they had learnt. We have also been looking at Winter during our Maths inputs this week. The children discussed the seasons and months of the year and separated the months into the four seasons. We learnt a song to help us remember the order for the months of the year. The children recapped their understanding of the days of the week and started to look at the concept of time, whilst measuring short periods of time when carrying out various activities, e.g. how many star jumps can you do in 10 seconds?

This week’s adult-led activity required the children to create repeating patterns using counters. They were keen to share the patterns that they had created with an adult and some children were starting to answer questions about their pattern. E.g. What colour would come next in your pattern?

Hi everyone,

The term has got off to the usual hectic start as always and the clubs began this week. There is an excellent choice of 30 clubs this term for your children to access and I must thank my staff for offering their time to lead them and share their knowledge and talents with your children. Please do encourage your children to take part in these clubs.

It’s getting harder and harder to keep staff motivated in these difficult times. With the public services being stretched to breaking point, and what we are hearing about the prisons and hospitals currently is the same for schools where standards and pressures are making some of our best young talent turn away from the profession. Recruitment is hard and I would love the opportunity to speak to someone in government about this increasing problem, it has never been so bad in all my 40 years of service as a teacher and Head teacher (20 years).

At Beechwood, we can look forward to better times in the future as we build numbers and the challenge to appoint good quality teachers and support staff goes on. There is so much turbulence in the school system caused by shortages and pressure coming from government yet we must soldier on and make sure the children do not lose out.

Consistency of delivery is uppermost in our thoughts and with that behaviour and the reputation of the school in the wider community. As long as I remain in charge I will continue to put your children first and lobby for improved service and conditions despite the economic struggles our country funds itself in. Will write again soon.

Please note that had the snow come last week I would have kept the school open so that the children could have enjoyed building snowmen and throwing snowballs and that’s my answer to the adults calling for a “Snow day” alas the snow never materialised.

Gordon Davies

Head of Beechwood

Self Help Days 

Please take note of the upcoming Self Help Days, shown below.

Saturday 21st January ……………….. 9.30am – 2.30pm

Saturday 4th February ………………. 9.30am – 2.30pm

Saturday 25th February …………….. 9.30am – 2.30pm

Saturday 11th March ………………… 9.30am – 2.30pm

Saturday 25th March ………………… 9.30am – 2.30pm

The theme of Winter came alive in Foundation Stage this week. They have sung a winter song and discussed what happens in winter. The children enjoyed participating in many winter themed activities during their independent learning, which included making snowflakes, playing with snow (cloud dough), building igloos out of sugar cubes, designing winter clothes and identifying the initial sounds in winter words. The children were introduced to the concept that some animals hibernate during the winter.

This week’s Maths inputs focused on 2D shape and the children were enthusiastic when exploring shapes in the school environment, they have also made pictures using 2D shapes and tap tap.

One of this week’s highlights was seeing the children’s creative skills when designing pictures for our Little Red Hen display (which is now up in our FS cloakroom area) using the software 2Simple 2Publish.

Expansion and the growth of Beechwood

We are eagerly waiting for the first signs of construction and that sadly will be the taking away of three medium sized trees near the playground/walkways. New parents have been visiting us whilst choosing the right school for their children before the deadline of January 13^th and many have commented upon the excellent facilities we have at our disposal and it is indeed fortunate that we will not be loosing any of our field, playgrounds or amenities! The school is to be enhanced further with a new library, staffroom, changing rooms as well as four new classrooms.

As a school we have drawn up short, medium and long term maintenance and new build projects which we self-manage on our ‘Self Help’ Saturdays, do look in our front entrance for reference. The building work is due to commence after Easter, even though we have no official dates as yet.

Just a reminder about children being Safe on Line

As a school we strongly believe in the safeguarding of children online (please talk to your children about the dangers of posting online). We have recently been made aware of some ill advised comments being sent between past and present pupils and we would like to remind parents to be vigilant about what their children are doing online. It should be noted that children under the age of 13 should not be using social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter). Mr Lovegrove who is a trained CEOP (Child Exploitation and Online Protection Command) consultant is regularly teaching the children about staying safe online.

Have a good week….

Gordon Davies

Headteacher

The school has introduced a new way of managing children’s behaviour at play times and it’s called the Positive Playtime. The policy (to be published shortly and will be available to view online) will explain how the adults i.e. teachers, teaching assistants and of course lunchtime controllers will all work together and in the same way to keep your children safe, deal with behaviour and accidents. It will take time to have the maximum impact but we are confident that more consistency will benefit everyone.

Foundation put on a wonderful performance for a jam-packed hall at the end of last term, featuring video performances and wonderful singing. Have a look at our FS2 and KS1 Nativity photos taken by The Wokingham Paper.

http://wokinghampaper.newsprints.co.uk/…/WP1612-XMAS-Beechw…

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What a fantastic way to end the term… the Foundation Stage Christmas Production was a great success with many proud parents in the audience. The children sang their hearts out whilst telling the Christmas story.

They have enjoyed making Christmas cards and participating in craft activities.

A highlight of this half term was when the children constructed their own igloo, which has been used on a daily basis to read books in. It has been fantastic to see so many proud clouds being returned to school.

The children were excited to hear what they had done at home to make their parents proud of them.

We would like to thank all the parents for their continued support at home.

It has been fantastic to watch your children grow in confidence and independence, whilst making progress with their learning.

The Foundation Stage staff would like to wish all the children and parents a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Your Time to Shine:  Congratulations to Lizzie and Megan (both in 3/4LR) for winning My Journey Wokingham’s Your Time to Shine competition recently. They won individual prizes and hi-viz bags for their class too! Other children across the school won prizes for their poster and animation entries.

Your Time to Shine was a competition run by Wokingham to raise awareness about being seen in the dark.

http://www.myjourneywokingham.com/…/your-time-to-shine-com…/

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Monday 5^th December – Sportshall Athletics: More to follow…

Tuesday 6^th December – Tag Rugby, Beechwood (B) v Aldryngton: Score 10 – 12 to Aldryngton. A good fast paced handling game was seen on Tuesday from both sides. Aldryngtons first game of the season saw them do really well in attack, with some good handling from two particularly tall/bulky players. The game was guilty of playing laterally too frequently with most tries being scored on the wings. Beechwood fielded players who haven’t played that much rugby this season and initially we were slow to warm up but good leadership from Marni Stack and control of passing from Katie Sollit calmed the game, which led to an improved 2^nd and last third. There was good running from Ryley ward and Bethany Rooke and good handling from Rohan Dehi. On another day with a better controlled start we would have won the game by a healthy margin.

Thursday 8^th December – Forest Walk, Mednenham: It was a really exciting and informative walk with lots of pupils (non-sporty, SEN) being treated to see local wildlife, namely the groups of deer being seen in various places on the walk. Also seeing the grounds where the RAF trained during wartime was very interesting and hit home with many of the pupils. All pupils kept a really good pace whilst walking and behaved, in the most part, well and represented their school in a great fashion, even when we were herded over the styles by two local horses. A good location to continue walking in that the pupils really enjoy to go on.

Friday 9^th December – Football, Hawthorns v Beechwood (B): Score 2-5 to Hawthorns. An excellent 2^nd half in the main kept us in the game on Friday with four goals being scored against in the first half. The boys were guilty of starting slow, out of position and showed signs of reverting back to playground football, but with coaching they put into practice better control of the ball, special awareness of attacking play and finished of the attempts on goal better in the second half. Two excellent finishes by MOM Ryley Ward saw him make excellent runs towards the opposition’s goals, beautifully assisted by Josh Long. Good defending and man marking in second half again by Dylan Cassling and Liam Stiff saw very little attack from Hawthorns and Jake Rose played superbly in goal taking command in again a strong second period of play. With a better start and shape the game may have ended differently and a repeat fixture would rectify this. Well done to the B team.

The Foundation Stage children have been learning about the story of The Little Red Hen this week. They could identify the main characters and we discussed the meaning behind the story.

During an adult-led activity the children enjoyed learning how to write a simple sentence and some children chose to copy the sentence during their independent learning, showing a basic understanding of  using a capital letter at the beginning, a full stop at the end and finger spaces between their words. Some children drew pictures of the characters and applied their phonic knowledge to spell simple CVC words such as pig, hen, cat and rat. It was lovely to hear the children joining in with the repeated refrains in the story.

They showed great enthusiasm when watching a video of Pie Corbett telling the story using actions and incorporated them when orally retelling the story to a partner. The children were introduced to the idea of making a story map and we discussed the 3 main parts of a story.

A fantastic week of storytelling, reading, writing and communication was had by all.

We are very excited about going on the stage for our Christmas performance next Friday (16^th December) at 2pm!

The Christmas Fayre on Saturday 10th December was very well attended and was a great success and the total profit from the events leading up to and including the Fayre itself was £2590.23.

Well done to everyone and thank you very much!

Information on last week’s sport as follows:

Wednesday 30^th November – Beechwood v Oakland’s (Hockey): A good afternoon in cold weather at Beechwood, however unfortunately losing both games on the night to a strong Oakland’s team. The A team lost their game 2-0 with good performances by all the team with very little errors being shown in an end to end game. The B team lost 7-0 to a very strong, well-coached Yr.5 team whereas by comparison we fielded a mixture of year, 3, 4 and 5 pupils. We hope to be playing a return fixture in the new year where we will field two stronger teams.

Thursday 1^st December: Beechwood V St Nicholas (Year 5/6 Netball):  Playing against new opposition this year the netball teams….

Friday 2^nd December: Six Nations Rugby  Beechwood gained 2^nd place in the overall league table this year, an improvement on last year’s 4^th position. This will mean we will still play the likes of the Coombes and Rivermead again next term as well as playing new competition against the likes of the Colleton and old foes Oakland’s over the next two rounds set for Spring. On the day Beechwood won three games, lost one and drew one game, finishing on a total score of 45 points. The standard and pace of the rugby being shown on froday was really good to see and the level and expectations for teams is plane to see. A good tournament and day all round.

Fixtures this week:

(Monday 5th) Sportshall Athletics.

(Tuesday 6th) Rugby v Aldryngton

(Thursday 8th) Forest Walk – Medenham Forest, Chilterns.

(Friday 9th) Year 5/6 Football v Hawthorns.

Reports to come on these events.

This week the Foundation Stage children have continued to develop their understanding of money during maths group discussions. We recapped coin recognition for 1p, 2p, 5p and 10p; developed an understanding of coin value through the use of numicon and explored different ways to make 5p and 10p using coins.

The children have enjoyed practising their songs in preparation for their Christmas Performance on 16^th December.

During our ICT session this week the children developed their mouse skills by clicking on dots to create a picture.

This week in Foundation Stage the children have been learning about eating a healthy diet during their Topic discussions.

We looked at the importance of eating fruit and vegetables, alongside a balance of other foods.

The children sorted fruits and vegetables into groups and completed a ‘What am I?’ where they had to guess which fruit or vegetable was being described from the three clues they were given.

During their independent learning the children thought about their favourite fruits and had to choose different fruits to make a fruit face. They were encouraged to try new fruits and it was pleasing to see them enjoying these new experiences.

This week’s Maths has focused on money and coin recognition. The children loved making their own price tags to be used in the new role play shop, which has been very busy this week and full of happy customers.

During PE the children have developed their throwing and catching skills and we have started to learn some songs for our Christmas performance.

Year 5/6 Football (friendly) St Dominic’s V Beechwood: We played our first game on Woodford Park 4G Sports Pitch with our B team football squad. It was an entertaining afternoon utilising players who have not played a lot of football, but ended on a 1-0 loss at the end of the game. Playing on a really nice pitch under floodlights made the game enjoyable and the boys really dug deep and played as a team, which is good to see. Future games will be played on this pitch over the year to make use of such good facility. Well done to the B team boys, special mention to Josh Long and Dylan Cassling for excellent defending and goalkeeping.

Year 5/6 football (League) Beechwood V Rivermead: Lost 3-0. We played our last league game for this season and played a good first half, but tiredness and concentration led to three goals coming in the second half. The boys have played a lot of football this term and  tried their best to get results and play as a team, which I think they have got. A few football fixtures are coming next term and with more practice I’m sure the team will get better.

Year 5/6 Football (A, B, C teams) Dolphin School V Beechwood: We were welcomed to a really entertaining afternoon at Dolphin with teas and refreshments after the game. Our A team lost on the day 5-1 to a good dolphin side. A few lapses in defence and passing accuracy let us down, but we played well as a team and in set positions. Our B team won 3-1, with goals from Lewis Fappiano, Josh Long and Jake Rose. A really good game to watch with lots of attack and communication from the boys to lead to an enjoyable win. The best game however on the day was the C team: with MOM Oliver Giles leading exceptionally to a 4-2 win…

X-Country: Black Park: A good afternoon at Slough recording a lower combined score than the previous race. We are currently in 7^thposition in Division 1 with only around 100 points between 5^th and 6^th position. A good finish in the remaing races after Christmas should secure our place in Division 1 for next year.

In2Hockey Tournament – Sonning Hockey Club: We had an excellent night at Sonning, despite the cold. We won our first game (Early St Peters) 3-1, 2^nd Game (Shinfield) lost 1-0, 3^rd game (Finchampstead) won 2-0, 4^th (Lambs Lane ) won 3-0 and drew our last game against Farley Hill 0-0 making us runners up for the group playing old adversaries Hawkedon in the semi-final. We did lose the semi 3-1 by a good Hawkedon side (returning Champions), but will have to go back at a later date to play for final and 3/4^th position as time didn’t permit any other games on the night. Great perfomances from Kielan Sampson, Bethany Rooke, Tushar Kakar and Ronak Punia.

Fixtures this week:

Six nations Rugby at Churchend

This week the FS2 children have talked about bullying as part of Anti-bullying week and our theme has been how to be a kind friend. We have celebrated each other’s differences and talked about what makes us unique, this led onto a discussion about Children in Need.

During our English inputs we have discussed rhyming words, initial sounds in words, story settings and the parts of a story as well as writing CVC words (Consonant Vowel Consonant)e.g. cat.

Our Maths inputs this week have focused on 2D shape, making numbers up to 10 with lego bricks, looking at the spots on a dice and making a numberline matching groups of objects to a numeral.

In FSN the children looked at a map of the world and talked about where most of the children were from, where their families lived and where Alex lived before he came to Beechwood.

The children’s When I grow up I want to be…. art work is now on display in the classrooms.

Next week the children will be making their own fruit friend, please speak to your child’s class teacher regarding any dietary needs as the children will have the opportunity to eat some fruit during this activity.

The Foundation Stage children have been learning about ‘People who help us’ this week. We started by talking to the children about what a job is and asked the children “what do you want to be when you grow up?”

During their independent learning the children enjoyed taking on the role of the emergency services and being superheroes.

They have creatively used a variety of media and materials to make a person showing their possible future careers, these will be displayed in the classrooms very soon.

The children have developed an understanding of the British values with a specific focus being placed on respecting others, helping others and understanding the roles of people who help us.

On Friday 11^th November the children attended a Remembrance Service at Woodford Park and we talked to the children about the meaning behind Remembrance Day.

This week’s Maths topics have included positional language, size ordering, measuring objects with cubes, comparing heavy and light objects and measuring how tall the children are.

Beechwood pupils along with other schools and the residents of Woodley fell silent for two minutes to remember the nation’s war dead for Armistice Day on Friday 11th November. The behaviour as always was exemplary and were a credit to the school. Well done everybody.