Dear Parents and Carers, Baglan Primary News 15.12.17 Attendance Week Ending: 08.12.17 Nursery ~ Morning 86.7% Reception 97.0% Reception/ Year 1 81.7% Year 1 98.5% Year 2 89.7% Year 3 96.0% Year 4 97.9% Year 5 77.3% Year 6 90.0% Congratulations Year 1, fantastic attendance. Well done to Reception/ Year 3, Year 4; all with attendance over 95% Eco Ranger Committee ~ Fantastic news we are now an ECO Platinum School. Well done to the ECO Rangers and especially to our committee Florrie, Megan and Grace; Matt our assessor said they were outstanding. We have, over the past ten years demonstrated a commitment to making our school as environmentally friendly as possible. This involves many areas of school including litter, healthy schools, waste management, energy, school grounds, global citizenship, water, transport and clubs. We are very proud as not many schools are able to achieve this. However we will be continuing our commitment to this because we love our planet but also because they can take our status from us at any time! So we hope you enjoyed the Christmas Walk to School and please bring in your Christmas cards for recycling after Christmas and we will be continuing to get as many people as possible to use reusable containers in packed lunch. Year 2 News ~ What a busy time it has been, Christmas crafts, rehearsals for our Christmas Concert and visiting different classes to learn about Christmas traditions in other countries, as well as all our usual activities. In our own class we have been learning about all the Scandinavian countries where they have their Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve.
We have learned about Nisse, a Danish Elf who likes to play pranks on people at Christmas. We have learned that they eat a rice pudding with almonds; the one who has a whole almond in their bowl wins a Mandelgave, a little marzipan pig. We have also been to the Philippines and America. We have learned how they celebrate Christmas and we hope that you liked the crafts that we have brought home to help us remember what we have learned. We have had a lovely time on our trip to see Santa. All Santa pictures will be put on See Saw next week. Year 6 News ~ We have had a fabulous week travelling the world and learning about Christmas traditions in different countries. On Monday, Year 6 went to Germany, followed by Mexico on Tuesday, Brazil on Wednesday, Australia on Thursday and finally Poland on Friday. On Monday, we learned about how the Christmas tree is a tradition that was brought to Britain from Germany by Prince Albert. We learned about traditions involving St Nicholas and how in Germany they leave a shoe on the doorstep on December the 5th. On December the 6th, if St Nicholas has been, the shoe is filled with delicious sweets and chocolates! We made Cinnamon and almond biscuit stars to decorate the tree. We also tried bratwurst a German sausage which is commonly sold in German markets. Finally, we tried Lebkuchen. Lebkuchen is a German biscuit made from ginger and decorated with chocolate or icing. Reception News ~ The festivities of Christmas are truly being embraced this week. We have enjoyed visiting other classes in the Foundation Phase and learning about how Christmas is celebrated in different countries. We have learned about Christmas in America, Scandinavia, Philippines and Spain. In our class we have been learning about Austria. We had fun listening to traditional Christmas music, tasting food, making decorations, painting stars and finding out Santa s name in different languages.
In Austria Santa is Weihnachtsmann. One of our enhanced activities has been to recognise numbers 1-10 on the snowmen and then add the correct amount of buttons. We had fun hiding the number and getting our friends to guess the amount of buttons. We have also been counting the buttons in Welsh. We have been very busy practising for our Christmas concert Away in a Manger and we can t wait for our families to come and see us next week. All of us enjoyed the pantomime. Nursery News ~ This week the children have been learning about how Christmas is celebrated in different ways around the world. They spent time learning about the Christmas traditions in Scandinavia, America, Spain, Austria and the Phillipines. The children had opportunities to be involved in a range of fun activities which included making decorations and tasting different foods from these countries. In Spain, on Epiphany Eve children leave shoes under trees and on windowsills in hope of receiving gifts. All the children decorated and created a shoe and were lucky to receive a gold coin. This activity linked well to our class theme of Elves and the Shoemaker. The children are becoming more confident using basic Welsh language and they are able to recall the different weather language patterns we use daily. We seem to be using Mae hi n oer/it is cold quite often lately. A big Thank you to all parents/carers who have taken Tedi Twt on some fun adventures so far, he will be staying with Miss Wilson over Christmas and is looking forward to new adventures in January with the children. Year 1 News ~ This week we have had a fantastic week called Christmas Around the World where we have been moving around the Foundation classes learning about Christmas traditions in other countries. First we went to Nursery and learnt about Christmas in Spain Feliz Navidad. Next we went to Mrs Challenger class and learnt about Christmas in Austria and that they have a star decoration. Then we went to Mr Atkins class and learnt about Christmas in America and that candy canes represent a J for Jesus. After that we went to Miss Morgan in Year 2 and learnt about the elf Nisa famous in Scandinavian countries.
Lastly in our own class we learnt about Christmas in the Philippines. The Philippines is near China and they have similar traditions to us, however their main meat for Christmas dinner is a roast pig and they eat fish and spring rolls which we got to taste this week. We also learnt that they have a decoration lantern called a Parol and we made our own Parols in class. In English we have been writing the story of The Jolly Christmas Postman recounting all the settings the postman visited the characters he delivered to and what they received. The best bit was Santa giving the Jolly Postman his present at the end. We have also been writing our own letters to Santa this week telling him about good things we ve done this year and asking for some special gifts we would like. We have also been busy rehearsing for our Christmas concerts next week. We had a dress rehearsal and all our costumes look amazing (thank you grownups). Year 3 News ~ In Mrs Roosmalen s class the children have been learning about Christmas in Mexico. We have looked at the different traditions and special events that take place. Their celebrations start on the 16th of December and go on for eight days. During that time people decorate their houses with paper lanterns, candles and Poinsettia. They also take part in parades around the streets called Posadas. Children dress up in nativity clothes and knock on doors looking for a place to stay. At the end of the parade they eat special food and have fun with a Pinata. Children in Mexico open their presents on Christmas Eve and visit Church, they also set off fireworks to celebrate the birth of Jesus. In class we ate pineapples and cake and made special sugar skulls to remember loved ones at this time of the year. Mrs Randall s News ~ Good day mate! This week Key Stage 2 have thoroughly enjoyed learning about Christmas time in Australia. We talked about the traditions, understanding that they are very similar to how we celebrate at home. They have artificial trees, decorate their houses and place wreathes on their doors. They also sing traditional songs by candlelight. The year groups enjoyed finding out that Christmas is celebrated in the summer where they go to the beach, play cricket, have music and a party. They thought it was funny that they make a sand man on the beach and put a sun hat and sun glasses on him. They also enjoyed tasting hot dogs. These were to represent the Australian Christmas dinner, the good old BBQ. The year groups enjoyed finding out that when Santa arrives in Australia he changes into shorts, t-shirt and wears a pair of sun glasses.
The year groups tried very hard to make their Christmas wreaths, it was a tricky task to cut out the template, but they were very careful and all succeeded. Reception/ Year 1 ~ For our Christmas around the World week we have been learning about how they celebrate Christmas in America. We saw how spectacularly decorated some of the houses are and how they compare to our houses in Wales. We looked at the White House and how that is decorated for Christmas and other famous locations in America such as Times Square, The Empire State Building and The Strip in Las Vegas. Of course we couldn t learn about America without visiting Mickey and Minnie in Disneyland. We saw lots of lovely pictures and we made Minnie or Mickey decorations to hang on our trees at Home. To finish our lesson we learned about how candy canes became popular in the USA and how, when turned upside down the candy cane signifies a J for Jesus. All the children had one to take home. Mrs White s News ~ A big well done to Year 6 who have thoroughly enjoyed their week and have worked very hard. The children have loved finding out about traditions and the way that people celebrate Christmas around the world. Whilst visiting the Brazil workshop, the children learned about the food which is eaten there and they tasted various things such as Avocado, Pineapple and Panettone. They decorated a stocking which is a Christmas tradition that the children in Brazil take part in every Christmas Eve and once the stockings are completed they would be left out for Santa on a windowsill and he would then swap the stocking for gifts. This week has been a lovely start to the build up to Christmas. Year 4 News ~ As part of our Christmas Around the World theme this week Miss Griffiths taught the Juniors all about Christmas in Brazil. We learnt Christmas vocabulary in Portugese, listened to Noite Feliz, their most popular Christmas carol. We learnt that in Brazil they take part in an amigo secreto, which is very similar to a secret Santa. People chose a member of their family, write a kind message to them on nice card which they then handout on Christmas day and hang on their tree as a Christmas decoration. Also, children spend Christmas Eve decorating a stocking. They leave their beautiful stockings on their windowsill at night and if Santa thinks it s decorated nicely enough, he exchanges their stockings for gifts. We also tried foods that are traditionally eaten in Brazil at Christmas; panettone, avocado and pineapple.
Year 5 News ~ Last week we went on our trip to Cardiff Castle! We had a lovely time and we learnt a lot about the Victorians. We had fun creating homemade Christmas tree decorations and Christmas cards! We have been writing recounts about our trip to Cardiff Castle. We have included a lot of the facts that we learnt as well as what we thought about each section of the trip. We finished off our work on time and now most of us are confident in telling the time with analogue and digital clocks. This week we have been swapping classes in the morning to learn about how Christmas is celebrated in different countries. We have been to Poland, Mexico, Brazil, Germany and Australia. It has been really interesting to discover how different countries celebrate Christmas! We have even been able to sample traditional foods from those countries. We have done a lot of work on healthy eating in class and learnt about the food groups that make up the eat well plate. We learnt how much of each food group we should be having and why each food group is important for a well-balanced diet. We played a game in the hall putting different foods into the correct food groups! We have been working hard on our Christmas concert and we know all our lines and our songs very well. We are excited to show you all our hard work over the next week! Dates For The Diary 18.12.17 Year 1 ~ Year 6 Christmas Concert ~ 1:30 pm 19.12.17 Reception/ Nursery Christmas Concert ~ 9:30 am 19.12.17 Year 1 ~ Year 6 Christmas Concert ~ 5:30 pm 20.12.17 Reception/ Nursery Christmas Concert ~ 9:30 am 20.12.17 Year 1 ~ Year 6 Christmas Concert ~ 1:30 pm 21.12.17 Christmas Jumper Day 21.12.17 Hot party food provided by the kitchen instead of the normal cooked dinner 22.12.17 Last day of the school term. Christmas Break 08.01.18 No INSET Day ~ School open to pupils.
Shining Stars ~ Ser Disglair Miss Wilson ~ Nursery Mrs Challenger ~ Reception Mr Atkins ~ Reception/ Dosbarth 1 Mrs Giles ~ Dosbarth 1 Miss Morgan ~ Dosbarth 2 Mrs Roosmalen ~ Dosbarth 3 Miss Griffiths ~ Dosbarth 4 Miss Peake ~ Dosbarth 5 Miss Randall ~ Year 4 & 5 Mrs Smart ~ Dosbarth 6 Mrs White ~ All classes Morgan P ~ for being more confident and involved in all our class activities, well done. Sophia J ~ for always having a big smile and being helpful in class. Finley W ~ for his fantastic independent learning and helping others. Isobel R ~ for trying her very best to learn her narrator lines; thank you. Annabelle W ~ for trying really hard with her reading, well done. Aiva LW ~ for being a very good helper at tidy up time, thank you! Maja M ~ for her lovely recount writing with Dylan our class mascot. Poppy W ~ for her fantastic Welsh singing, super! Aras M ~ for trying so hard in all areas of the curriculum. Kelsey J ~ for her super work in our POPAT sessions. Aaron J ~ for his super work during our Christmas around the World topic, dal ati Aaron. Jackie CE ~ for being a good role model and always wearing his glasses in class. Jai M ~ for his contribution to our science experiment this week; gwych! Beautelle S ~ for writing an excellent recount of our trip to Cardiff Castle, da iawn. Corey P ~ for working so hard at his part in the Christmas Concert. Rowan G ~ for her excellent behaviour on our school trip to Cardiff Castle. Chloe C ~ for writing a very detailed recount of our visit to Cardiff Castle. Lovella S ~ for including all features in her recount of our visit to Cardiff Castle. Florri D ~ for her excellent contribution to the Christmas concert this year; thank you Jack E and Gwen P ~ for working so hard in geography when locating places and collecting data on population.