Final Forest School
We have continued to love every second of our forest school sessions.
Over the past two weeks, we have been up to lots in our forest area.
We really enjoyed the ‘bear hunt’ inspired activities. We loved squelching about in the mud!
For our final session, we were treated to a delicious marshmallow which we got to toast on our bonfire. We had to carefully follow instructions to help us stay safe.
We can’t wait to hopefully see Sarah and Spike again next year!
Being Healthy in Year One
This week, Year One have been busy exploring what it means to be healthy, for both our minds and our bodies!
We started the week by talking about mental wellbeing and how to manage big emotions in a healthy way. Together, the children created a beautiful new class glitter bottle, which they designed to show what it can feel like when our emotions feel a bit overwhelming and how, just like the glitter settles, we can calm ourselves using deep breaths, taking a quiet moment, or simply stepping away for a short break. I’ve been incredibly proud of how maturely the children shared their feelings and how respectfully they listened to each other’s thoughts and ideas.
We also learned about looking after our physical health discussing the importance of eating well, staying active and taking care of our bodies. The children thought about all the different people who help them stay healthy and came up with some fantastic ideas for keeping active at home and at school. They were quite surprised to find out they should aim for at least 60 active minutes every day although we all agreed they definitely get plenty of that during the school day!
It’s been a really thoughtful, creative and energetic week, and I’m so proud of all the children for their enthusiasm and care in learning about such an important topic.
Being healthy week
Healthy = keeping your body and mind working at its best.
We have had a busy Being Healthy themed week. We have enjoyed learning about our personal hygiene and can talk confidently about how we can keep ourselves hygienic. Some of the key things we learnt here were the importance of wearing clean clothes and how crucial it is that we wash our hands properly.
We have looked in detail at dental health and have been shocked at the sugar content of some of our favourite drinks and snacks. Did you know that an ordinary can of coke has a staggering ten teaspoons of sugar in?
On Wednesday, we had an online meeting with Olivia from Kooth. Kooth is an online platform where children and young people can access support should they be struggling with their mental health and wellbeing. There are people who can offer practical support every day and there are resources online should anyone require. We went through the process of registering and logging on too.
This week, we have also turned our hands to some new sports. In the beautiful sunshine, we had a morning of archery and fencing. We are blessed with fantastic sportspeople in our class, and they didn’t disappoint. We had lots of children hitting bullseye and displaying superb balance and coordination when dueling in fencing.
Children have spent time reflecting on their lifestyles through the My Health, My School survey. This is a national initiative where children can begin to review the choices they make regarding sleep, screens, food and exercise.
All this on top of two amazing performances of our production: Let the games begin. The children blew us away with their talent and we are very proud of what they achieved. Thank you also for your support in this.
Help at home – Review the sugar content in the food you eat at home. Speak to your child about Kooth. What is it? How might they use it? Ask your child how they can keep themselves healthy. Have they learnt something new this week that they can implement in the future?
Being Healthy – Dental Hygiene
This week, it’s Being Healthy Week. We’ve been learning about dental hygiene. Here are some of the top takeaways from our learning:
Brush your teeth morning and night. – Poppy
Floss your teeth. – Daisy
Don’t eat sweets after you’ve brushed your teeth. – Esme
Go to the dentist if your teeth are hurting. – Arthur
Eat a balanced diet. – Kupa
Help at home by reviewing this learning with your child. Does their learning reflect your dental hygiene routines?
Online vs Offline – a healthy balance
As part of our health week, Year 3 have been learning about time spent online and spotting the signs of too much screen time. It’s important to have a happy and healthy balance of online and offline activity, so we began by adding some positives of both into a scale. Our aim was to keep the scale balanced, representing a healthy balance of online vs offline. Here are some examples from both sides of the scale.
I enjoy connecting with my family online.
I enjoy playing my games online with friends.
I like learning synonyms of words using Google.
I enjoy going outside and playing with friends.
I enjoy my gymnastics in the garden.
I really like making dens outside.
We then learnt about spotting the signs of too much screen time and what to do about them. These signs can show in various ways, such as physical aches in our bodies, to devices running out of battery due to being used too much in one sitting.
Finally, we created a poster to take home as a reminder to keep a happy and healthy balance of online and offline activity.
Help at home:
Help your child find a healthy balance between the two. Being online can be really healthy for us to learn new things, but we don’t want children being lost in the internet. Maybe set up some online vs offline routines at home.
Living and Learning: Being Healthy
We kicked off our Being Healthy themed week with an energetic morning of Football and Tri Golf! The children were amazing – they worked brilliantly as a team and showed great respect to the coach with their fantastic listening skills.
In the classroom, we’ve been learning all about health and prevention. We’ve had some great discussions on topics like sun safety, healthy eating, what is a vaccine and how does it work? and how to stay clean and healthy. Together, we explored the following areas:
Help at home:
This week, try one of these easy jobs at home:
☀️ Sun Safety: Help remind someone to wear a hat or put on sun cream when outside. Why do we need to protect our skin?
🦠 Germs: Help remind your family to wash their hands before meals and after playing outside. Can you show how to wash hands well?
🧼 Keeping Clean: Help brush your teeth carefully for two minutes. Can you explain why brushing teeth is important?
Being Healthy – Archery and Golf
This week, it’s Being Healthy Week. Today, we welcomed a PE coach to school who taught the children about archery and golf. The children really enjoyed the activities and made fantastic progress in learning some new skills. We had some sharp shooters on the archery range and some impressive feats of strength in the long drive competition!
Help at home by encouraging your child to take up a sport. Perhaps you could try something new over the summer break?
Euros Football Competition!
Year 5 and 6 girls took part in a fantastic Euros-themed football competition as St Theresas Primary School on Monday. Our given country was Germany, so the pupils had to wear colours making up the country’s flag – we even had some supporters bring a huge flag to help spur the team on!
The children performed admirably, showing respect, resilience, courage and many more positive traits. They worked as a team at all times, and took on board healthy reflections after each match. The girls managed to get off to a great start, drawing their first two games 1-1 and 0-0. Things were tense and the competition was tight. Lily was a superb striker, scoring a fantastic goal for the team. All 7 pupils played every game and tried their absolute best – it was a pleasure to watch them flourish. Here are some photos from the event:
Being Healthy – Physical Activity
This week, it’s Being Healthy Week. We’ve been learning about what happens to our body when we exercise. It is recommended that children have 60 minutes of physical exercise each day. We came up with a huge list of activities that we could do to make up our 60 minutes ranging walking to school to gymnastics.
We learnt about the changes in our body when we exercise, including an increased heart rate. It was really interesting to see how our heart rate (pulse) increased even after just a few seconds of exercise!
We concluded our learning by considering how and when to find support if we’re worried about our health.
Help at home by keeping a physical activity diary. Are there any missed opportunities for physical exercise in your day?
Healthy Week – smoking and vaping
This week we had a visit from D:side Dave. The focus was on smoking and vaping.
Dave spoke to us about where smoking isn’t allowed (schools, theatres, hospitals, theme parks). Interestingly, we learnt that smoking was once allowed on aeroplanes – this really shocked us.
We looked at toys from the past which imitated the act of smoking and even Disney films from the past showed smoking.
Vaping targets young people and all our children said they had seen a teenager vape -very worrying. We learnt that smoking one disposable vape is the same as smoking 20 cigarettes.
Dave delivered a key message throughout: DON’T START SMOKING OR VAPING!
He told us that the average smoker spends £10 a day. We worked out how much this would be across a week/month/year and what we could but with this money.
Today, there are still many unknowns about the risks of vaping. The children took part in an activity to demonstrate how vaping can cause illness, but these can be hard for doctors to detect straight away. Side effects could become clear in years to come.
