Category: Pre-Prep News

All the Queen’s House children enjoyed a fabulous Christmas party complete with musical statues, musical bumps and team games of pass the balloon. This was followed by a sumptuous tea party; tables groaning with sandwiches, cakes, flapjacks, sausages, crisps and more! It wasn’t long before bells could be heard and Santa appeared bearing gifts for each child.  It was a wonderful afternoon.

The children in Reception have been getting ready for Christmas. They have acted out the Nativity Story in the role play area, made Christmas cards for their friends and posted them in the classroom post box, written letters to Santa and helped their friends to wrap up Christmas presents.  The classroom has been decorated throughout with the children’s handmade Christmas art work.

Reception children have been learning about nocturnal animals as part of their Night & Day topic. They went into the garden and looked for signs animals.  Then they looked for pictures of nocturnal animals and ticked them off on their checklist.  They were very good at working in pairs, reading the animal names and spotting the wildlife pictures lurking in piles of leaves and up trees.

Mr Brett presented certificates today to the children in Queen’s House.  Effort certificates were awarded to Max, Jasmine, Henry, Emilia and Martha. Table Manners certificates were awarded to Anthony, George, Arthur and Anand.  Well done to you all!

The children in Reception have been learning about Space. They have designed their own space rockets from 3D materials and produced wonderful imaginative space pictures using pastels and paint. They have also been learning the names of the planets and were able to make colourful collages to represent them. They have had great fun creating their own aliens out of playdough.

This year the children at Queen’s have visited Tanzania for Global Awareness Week.  They have loved finding out all about the wildlife, food, people and places of Tanzania.  The local artist Heather Hodgson came in for an art workshop day and the children created some wonderful animals in paint, watercolour, pastels and collage.  All their senses were used when discovering some of the fruits grown in Tanzania – mangoes were very popular, guavas and avocado were an acquired taste! The children have made masks and Masai necklaces, listened to wonderful stories set in the African savannah and collaborated in a drumming workshop.  A final Global Awareness assembly was held where all their learning was shared and celebrated. Thank you to all those w ho sent in fantastic artefacts.

The Reception children have been learning the story of “The Little Red Hen”. They have created pictorial maps so that they could sequence and retell the story verbally. Today they made their own bread in the shape of hedgehogs.

All the children at Queen’s enjoyed a Journals Workshop with artist and journal maker Rebecca Guyver.  They learnt how to make their journals out of cardboard, folded paper and elastic bands. Then they got busy decorating the pages with paint, ink stamps, cut out shapes and collage. They made mini books and zig zag books to go into pockets. They wrote on luggage tags and cut out photographs that inspired them.  Each group had a particular focus around their topics covered so far this term. The children then wrote about things that interested them – stories, lists, memories or just words to do with their favourite things. It was a wonderful creative experience and the children will carry on adding to these precious journals throughout the year.

Mr Brett presented certificates today to the children in Queen’s House.  Effort certificates were awarded to Edie, Toby, Violet, Monty, Xan, Charlie and Alfie. Table Manners certificates were awarded to Josselin, Aggie and Otto.  Otto also received the Karate certificate.  Well done to you all!

A fun morning of cross country was held at the Senior School this week for Queen’s House and The Abbey. Everyone got the chance to take part and enjoy a fun run in the sun! A slightly longer course was offered to the Year 5 and 6 pupils, which gave them a chance to enjoy the excitement of running in the valley.