28.04.2020 THE VALE ACADEMY NEWSLETTER Message from the In this issue: Head of School • Message from the new Head of School Hi Everyone, •Messages from each year group Our second newsletter has arrived! Thank you all for your feedback and lovely messages about our new communication. It is great to hear •International Dance Competition that so many of you have enjoyed reading the first newsletter, which makes writing this message even more enjoyable than the last! •Mental Health and Wellbeing Last week blessed us with such gorgeous weather. We have seen some wonderful examples of children playing outside, others building Bug Hotels and some children have learned how to ride their bike! What a fantastic achievement! We are very proud of all of our children. The weather this week doesn’t look so favourable if you are a sun- seeker. The rain does mean that I have less of an excuse to avoid the housework. All children from Year 1—6 should now have received their Seesaw log in (Nursery and Reception should receive their codes this week). Our teachers have been setting different tasks on the app for the children to engage with and it has been great to see they way that children have responded to this. Hearing some of the children explaining how they have solved some very tricky maths problems really made me smile. I hope that this app brings us even closer together as a school community. Please do give us feedback about this app and any other communication ideas so we can continue to improve our provision during this time. We have put the link for The Oak National Academy on our school website. This is an online classroom full of high-quality resources to support you with Home Learning. You can either follow the lessons when they are scheduled or you can choose to access the lessons when you feel appropriate. The lessons are designed to be in sequence and should provide up to three hours of Home Learning each day, should you wish to access this. It’s amazing where else you can find Home Learning ideas these days. Whilst looking for a fridge on the Curry’s website, I found some great tips to get creative: The Great Indoors: The Scouts have really stepped up to the mark here. The organisation is known for its love of the great outdoors, but they’ve also managed to pull together some inspired children’s activities for the home. Head to the scouts.org webpage, and under ‘Great Indoors’ you’ll see over 100 stay-at-home activities to help kids learn new skills. You’ll find everything from creative drawing to science experiments in a tea-cup. The Drama Geezers: Meet the guys that are on a mission to bring some drama into kids’ lives. Their YouTube channel is full of fun activities for families to try at home. Drama is brilliant for unleashing your children’s imagination, and you’ll want to get involved too, right? So brush up on those long- lost acting skills! We hope you find our second newsletter a fun one to read. In addition to keeping you up to date with what our staff members have been doing, we have decided to share some different activities for you and your families to do whilst at home. Keep an eye out this week for a very special message from our staff members to you and your children! If you do have any questions, please email [email protected] and your message will be sent to the appropriate member of staff. Stay safe. We will see you all soon! Mrs Knight Hello Nursery! This week, Archie has been busy with his mummy and brother making chocolate nests with left over Easter chocolate, bird watching and taking his daily walk around the chalk pit. Dusty has been really busy! He has been making a ramp in his garden for his cars, planting flowers, cooking including making eggs, chopping bananas and cooking on his fire pit. He has also been sorting buttons, mark-making making puppets for role play and playing games with his family. This week we thought you might like some ideas for activities to do at home. We have chosen a book that you might like to read and some ac- tivities linked to the story. As it is now spring, we have chosen ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ as our book this week. You can share this story on the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75NQK-Sm1YY The Very Hungry Caterpillar Once you read the story you could: Make you own caterpillar or butterfly You could do some counting (you could use real fruit or follow the link) https://www.twinkl.co.uk/resource/t-n-568-the-very-hungry- caterpillar-maths-booklet?sign_in=1 You could make a fruit salad using some of the fruits that the hungry caterpillar ate. As always, we would love to see and hear about what you have been up to, so please share what you’ve been up to. You can do this by getting your parents to email [email protected] or they can send a message to The Vale Academy Facebook page, these can then be forwarded to us! Hello Reception, In Squirrels this week, Macey has been busy with the challenges we sent last week. She has made a sword and shield after learning about St George and made Miss Corr a lovely birthday card. She has also enjoyed dancing and painting. Giulia has also been busy doing the challenges. She acted out the story of St George and talked about how the characters were feeling. She did 13 star jumps in 10 seconds beating her daddy! Well done Giulia! In Badgers, Jake has been busy working out, baking banana bread, counting with cheerios, making a dragon out of junk modelling and being a rockstar! Archie has been busy planting tomato and pepper plants as well as doing sums on the blackboard and counting with coins. He also had a video call with Jake. It is lovely to know some of you are keeping in touch with each other. This week’s activities are based around Ramadan. On Thursday 23rd April, Ramadan started and will continue throughout the month. Please remember to try and let your children do the activities by themselves. Personal, social and Emotional Development-Play a board game with a family member. Remember to take your turn and not to cheat! This is all about tak- ing turns and following the rules of a game together. Communication and Language– Phone or FaceTime some- one special to you. This could be a relative or a friend. Be sure to speak nice and clear! Physical Development- To help with your fine motor skills (and around the house) can you help to peg the washing in the line? Understanding of the World- On Thursday, the Islamic festival of Ramadan started! Below is a video and a PowerPoint to help explain what it means to take part in Ramadan and who does this. *Talk to your family about what you notice about Ramadan? *Do you think it would be easy or hard to have no food or drink all day? https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/23286976 https://www.twinkl.co.uk/resource/t-t-2547163-eyfs-all-about-ramadan- powerpoint Expressive Arts and Design- Can you create your own moon and stars? Mathematics- Can you sort the coins according to their value. Can you use different coins to make the same value. E.g. 2p+3p=5p 1p+1p+1p+1p+1p=5p Literacy- Can you write about what you have enjoyed the most this week? Remember to try your best and if you think you can extend this please have a try! As always, we would love to see and hear about what you have been up to, so please share your lovely work. You can do this by getting your parents to email [email protected] or they can send a message to The Vale Academy Facebook page, these can then be forwarded to us! Message from Mrs Pullen, Hi everyone! I hope that you are all ok and enjoying all of the sunshine with your families. We have certainly been making the most of it. We have had the paddling pool out in the back garden. There has been lots of splashing! We have been on lots of walks for our daily exercise and Mr Pullen is using it as a chance to practise using his camera and has been taking many pictures of all the beautiful flowers that we see. Have you been out on walks? What have you seen while being out? I have also been spending lots of time with my cat Gizmo. He is not very well at the moment because he has a cold. He has been sneezing a lot and just wanting cuddles. I am missing all of the fun that we have together and cannot wait to see you all and hear about all the things that you have been up to with your families. Speak you all soon, Mrs Pullen xx Message from Mrs Ellyard, Hi guys! Well that week seems to have flown by! I have really enjoyed seeing lots of pictures of the activities and learning you have been doing at home – I am so proud of you! If you haven’t been on the Seesaw app yet, it is a really nice way for me to see what you are up to and you can see some of your classmates and send messages or videos to say hello to each other! If you are not sure of your log in details, please check your email and if you still do not have them, please contact the school email address and we can send them out to you.