Find out what's happening in school:
Plenty of exciting activities have happened in school so far in 2024 to enhance our curriculum and make sure the children have the opportunity to enjoy a range of experiences.
In the second week of January, our Y6 children all went on their residential to Robinwood. Despite some very cold temperatures and a covering of snow, they had a brilliant time sampling all kinds of activities, challenging themselves and making memories. They were a credit to our school and the staff were so proud of them.
Our Y5/6 children also visited the National Holocaust Museum in February, to complement their topic about the Second World War. The children dealt with some very serious subject matter maturely and came away with plenty of food for thought. Once again, their attitude and conduct was excellent.
We have held our second Inspire events of the year for our Y1/2 and Y5/6 classes already this term, this time themed around oracy. It was great to be able to showcase the oracy work the children have been doing this year, and impress parents, carers and grandparents with the children confidence in talk.
Last week, Mrs Mumby took 45 children from years 4, 5 and 6 to Young Voices at Sheffield Arena. The children had been preparing for the whole year and the event lived up to expectations. Everyone (staff and children) came back tired but happy, and many are already looking forward to next year's event.
Staying on a music theme, our school choir took part in 'Sing and Swing' this week. We were lucky to have a small jazz band (drums, bass and keyboard) visit school, along with choirs from four other schools to learn and perform some jazz songs. Thanks so much to Claire Rivers, from Artforms, for co-ordinating and leading this event. It was amazing how quickly the children learned the songs and got them up to a performance standard.
Our eco-council have been out litter picking in the area around the scout hut and Barley Hill Close at the back of the school. We filled FIVE bin bags in a little over half-an-hour. When we had finished, the area looked very different. Well done to all of them for their hard work.
Thank you so much to the staff, children and families who support the school to make all these wonderful events possible. There is plenty more planned for the second half of the year!
The last couple of weeks of term have been busy with all kinds of important festive activity! Our Key Stage 2 choir have been busy on a mini-tour of the area. They have visited two local care homes to sing - St Armand's Court and The Hollies - where they brought plenty of Christmas cheer to the residents. They also sang at The Spring and at our school fair. Well done to all the children who have worked so hard to learnt the songs.
Thank you too to our wonderful PTA, the Friends of Strawberry Fields. They have been super busy, organising our Christmas fair, which was a wonderful success and featured a visit from Santa Claus himself! They also helped with treats at our Christmas Film Night. Finally, money raised by the FoSF over the previous year paid for the pantomime all the children school enjoyed last Thursday.
We also enjoyed our Christmas jumper and Christmas dinner day earlier this week! We are looking forward to our final Christmas event, our carol service, on the last day of term.
It began to feel very festive at Strawberry Fields in the first weeks of December, when our Foundation Stage children performed their nativity, Whoops-A-Daisy Angel. It was absolutely wonderful - the singing, the acting, the dancing and the costumes were all tremendous. We know many of the parents will have been singing those songs for days afterwards!
The following week, Key Stage 1 performed Baarmy Bethlehem. Once again, every aspect was amazing! Audiences left proud, wowed and happy.
We believe there is so much important learning and confidence building that takes place as a result of these shows, and they are such a highlight of the school calendar! Congratulations to all our brilliant children in both phases of school for their efforts, and to all the staff for making the shows so incredible.
We completed our final round of 'Inspire' events last week, with our Year 3/4 classes. Once again, thank you so much to all those parents, carers and grandparents who were able to attend. The feedback was so lovely and it is great to hear how useful the event was to so many. A small selection of the feedback we received can be found here.
Look out for our next round of events, focused on oracy, in the spring term. Following feedback from attendees, next year's Inspire events will certainly feature one event with a maths focus.
Mr Hervo took nine Year Five children to Cockburn Academy to take part in a mixed football tournament. We took 5 boys and 4 girls. It was brilliant to see them playing together. Although we did not win any games, drawing twice and losing twice, Mr Hervo said we were very unlucky and probably deserved to score a few more goals. Thanks to Mr Hervo for taking the children, and to the team for representing our school so brilliantly.
Last week we took twelve Year Three children to Garforth Academy to take part in a curling tournament. One of our teams won their group, with three wins and a draw! When the results were added up across all three teams, we came third out of five. Thanks to Mrs Dodson and Mrs Campbell for taking the children. As ever, the children were a credit to themselves and to us!
Thank you to all those parents/carers/grandparents who attended our Y5/6 Inspire events last week. As usual, the feedback was excellent. It was lovely to be able to share an insight into how spelling and reading are taught at Strawberry Fields. Feedback from the event can be seen here.
We took a team of Y3/4 athletes to Garforth Academy to participate in the Sports Hall athletics competition last week. They all worked hard to practice their events and we were really proud to finish third! Well done to everyone involved!
Last week, we held our first Inspire mornings of the new year, for Key Stage 1. Thank you so much to all those parents, carers and grandparents who were able to make time to attend. We chose to focus on phonics and reading and we know from the comments received that the sessions were really helpful! A small sample of the feedback received can be seen here.
After the events were so popular last year, this year, each class will have two Inspire events, with a focus on one of our big school improvement drives, oracy, planned for the second half of the year.
Thank you to all the staff and parents/grandparents who helped us with our Halloween Disco yesterday. We had lots of fun and some of the costumes were incredible!