From Mrs Hall

This week has provided many wonderful examples of our ethos. From seeing great examples of independent writing, reading and fractions in maths classes to the Year 1s proudly raising money for the RNLI by completing the Mayday Mile. The boys have produced lots of different ways that they would like to complete this distance each day, from skipping, hopping, and jumping through to egg and spoons, wellies and fancy dress. 

If you can support the Year 1s with any donation, I am sure the boys will be exceptionally grateful, as well as supporting an extremely valuable charity.

RNLI - Year 1 - The Pilgrims' School

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Pilgrims' Shell Awards

Year 2 - to William for his thoughtfulness and enquiring mind.
Year 1 - to Rhys for remembering and sharing all his knowledge with the class about his visit to the Titanic Museum. Well done, Rhys!
Year R - to Christopher for being a happy and enthusiastic member of our class and for the good listening, focus and motivation shown this week, despite having a very exciting 5^th Birthday.  

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Save the Dates!

Saturday 11 May	PPA Event: Breakfast in the Yard 08:00 Whole School Open Morning for prospective parents, 09:30
Monday 13 May	RNLI Visit the Pre-Prep
Tuesday 14 May	Year 2 Trip to Dell Quay  nb: Boys must have their long wellies and jogging/long trousers in school as we will be walking through meadows and streams.
Thursday 16 May	Year 2 Forest School with St Swithun's School
Friday 17 May	Pre-Prep Pilgrims' Play (Hungry Caterpillar theme) - for prospectives
Monday 20 May	Reception trip to the Blue Reef Aquarium, Portsmouth
Tuesday 21 May	Year 1 Trip to Portsmouth Historic Dockyard
Friday 24 May	Pre-Prep Celebration Assembly 11:15-11:45 Half-Term begins at 12:00

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Notices

Menus for next week are available here on My School Portal. 
^{Reminder: no food is to be brought into the school and/or given to boys at any time, especially at sign-out.}

Open Days

 

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From the PPA

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Cathedral Assembly

What a wonderful way to finish off last week, before heading off for the Bank Holiday Weekend: our Cathedral Assembly was lead by Canon Gary. This was made even more special by his guitar playing and the two new songs he taught us. He reminded us all about just what makes us happy, with our friends and family being a central part. 

Thank you to the parents that joined us. Please join us, if you can, for the next one on Friday 7 June at 15:00. All welcome.

Mrs Kent

 

Year 2

The Year 2 classroom was a 'hive of activity' on Tuesday morning with lots of collaborative learning to get the boys engaging with one another. First, they were working on fractions followed by a shared reading task looking for conjunctions. 

On Friday, we joined Year 1 boys, (hopping) for their daily run in support of the RNLI May Day Mile Challenge. Well done all, and keep going Year 1. We applaud you!

Mrs Kent 
Year 2 Teacher

Year 1

RNLI Mayday Mile Challenge
At the end of last week, the boys designed posters to publicise their fundraising efforts around the school. We looked at examples of fundraising posters to decide upon the information that we should include, along with a simple and clear design. These posters have been hugely effective, and we have received many donations from staff which we are very grateful for. The boys wanted to be able to say thank you for these donations, so we have designed thank you cards that we will be able to send to show our gratitude to our donors. This was another useful literacy exercise in determining what words and phrases needed to be on our thank-you cards.

We have also been joined by some special guests on our challenge route this week!

Keep looking at Tapestry for further photo and video updates. The boys are hugely excited when we look at their fundraising page each day to see if we have any new donations. The link to our fundraising page is RNLI - Year 1 - The Pilgrims' School

Maths – Fractions - This week, the boys have been introduced to the language of fractions, including whole and half, as we continue our learning about equal parts. We have really enjoyed exploring this concept with lots of practical examples. Making cakes, pizza, apples, oranges and much more out of dough and exploring cutting in half was certainly an exciting investigation! Encourage your boys to find the two halves of objects and amounts at home. Next week, we shall investigate a quarter of a shape and amount.

Mrs Ford
Year 1 Teacher

 

Reception

Continuing with our class theme about Animals Around The World and the boys' love of working with spoons, spoon animals have been created. Using a few example ideas, colour mixing, and pattern exploration, the boys have transformed the spoons into colourful animal characters.  Each took great care with adding final details to show their animal clearly.  Can you guess which animal is which?

The continent of Africa was also an inspiration, as zebras, lions, giraffes and snake patterns (to name a few) were all matched to the correct animal from this continent.  Such wonderful animals living in different habitats were also learnt about.  The different colours shown on a map were also discussed. Many boys, for example, knew that yellow showed a desert, and knew which animals live in deserts. 

In our Art lesson this week, the boys will further explore animal patterns using watercolour paints.  Watercolours are great to use as they dry quickly and when more water is added to the colour, the colours show darker and lighter shades.  I am sure the boys will enjoy having a go at using a different medium for their art work.  Photos to follow next week!

I hope you all have a super weekend in the sunshine.

Mrs Huntley
Reception Teacher
 

Forest School

This week, the boys in Year R became artists using natural paint to create some lovely images of woodland animals. The boys experimented with the natural resources within the arboretum and mixed up a lovely selection of paints. We proudly displayed our artwork in our very own woodland gallery.

Year 1 and Year 2 both had a dragon theme this week. Inspired by the story ‘The Boy Who Lived with Dragons’ we went looking for a dragon fruit tree with the boys in Year 1. After carefully removing some dragon eggs hidden in the dragon tree, the boys created their own woodland dragon using natural resources. We chatted about the different features required, and the boys used their imagination well. Some of the boys even learned how to weave a dragon’s tongue!

When Year 2 arrived at the arboretum, we discovered that a dragon had stolen all the colours and their world was suddenly black and white. The challenge for the boys in Year2 was to try and find as many examples of different colours as they could, so that all the colours could be restored. This gave me a great opportunity to chat about picking responsibly and only taking a small example of the colours. I am pleased to say we managed to restore all the colours to our world!

We also had fun using flour to create some of the many minibeasts that live in the aborertum.

Mrs Walker
Forest School Leader