On Friday 15th January, we welcomed a very exciting visitor into school – Jenny McLachlan – incredible author of ‘Land of Roar’, ‘Return to Roar’ and ‘Dead Detectives’! Jenny shared her inspirations from childhood with us and some very funny stories of her imagination running wild when playing in the attic. The children were fascinated with how she was able to create fantasy settings and whole other worlds, her development of plot and characters. Jenny then shared some of her incredible illustration skills with us too and taught us how to draw a character from her book – Stink, The Fairy! Jenny even signed these for us too!
Some of us had our hands bitten by a real dragon (a puppet of course) which hatched while Jenny was with us! How exciting! The children absolutely loved their visit from Jenny and felt inspired to create fantasy worlds and creative stories of their own.

Attendance treat 

On Friday 15^th December, all of the children who had 98%+ attendance were rewarded with an attendance treat in the hall. The children brought their pyjamas and received a goodie bag, hot chocolate and a cookie made by our wonderful cook Mrs. Munson! A very well-deserved treat for all their hard efforts of getting into school even when they might not have felt amazing! Well done everyone.

The next attendance treat will be at the end of Easter half term.

The ultimate reading prize! 

On Miss Stewart has been collecting the purple reading tokens for the children’s home reads from September. Remember, for every 3 reads, the children receive 1 purple reading token. These were all put into a raffle, one per year group, to win a £20 voucher for Waterstones! On Wednesday 13^th December, Miss Stewart drew the tokens out of the ‘Ultimate Reading Prize’ Jar. The excitement was unbearable…Here are our lucky winners!

These children will be taking a trip to Waterstones next week to pick out their very own books to take home – how exciting!

Miss Stewart will be rerunning the ultimate reading prize from January-March.  Remember, you’ve got to be in it to win it!

William Barcroft does Nativity!

This week our production club put on their own version of Barcroft does Nativity. The club have worked extremely hard- staying late after school to put on a hilarious musical. These children have a real talent for theatre and had many of their parents (and teachers!) in tears at their excellent performance. The play was about a grumpy teacher, fed up with Christmas, and forced to put on the school’s annual nativity play. His   love of Christmas is reignited when Hollywood come to see his play! He is supported by the slightly unprofessional and bubbly teaching assistant, Mr Poppy. Children learnt songs such as Nazareth and Sparkle and Shine and even brought the Christmas magic when singing “One Night, One Moment” under candlelight. Children even developed their improvisation skills with each other too. A huge well done to our production club who, year on year, make us extremely proud and impress us with their unbelievable talents. A big thank you to our parents who attended too and for supporting your children learn their lines and songs!

Welcome to our Autumn Learning Showcase

This week, we invited parents into school to our Autumn Term Learning Showcases. Each year group shared their learning this term – our learning looking at in English, Reading, Maths, Science and Topic. We then shared our books (with tea and biscuits too!) and parents were able to see our learning in action. We’re very proud to show our books and the parents couldn’t believe all the fabulous things we’d been doing!

On Friday 8th December, we enjoyed our Christmas party day! The children looked fantastic in their jumpers, there were lots of sparkles! Staff and children then celebrated with a delicious Christmas dinner, made by our fabulous Mellors’ staff. This was definitely our best Christmas dinner yet! The festive fun didn’t stop there! The afternoon was filled with a Christmas disco! The children enjoyed party games, dancing and singing with their friends. We saw lots of great dance moves – from the children and staff too! We then played party games in our classes with pass the parcel, musical chairs and musical statues! It was a fabulous day all round, we certainly celebrated!

Children in Need

We have raised an amazing amount for Children In Need – £352.82 to be exact!  Thank you to everyone that donated!

Pupil governors helped sell cookies made by the lovely Donna (Mellors) along with her team at break time to help raise funds for Children In Need as well as wearing ‘spotacular’ clothes for the day!

Maths Challenge

On Wednesday 15^th November, we held the very first Maths Challenge of the year! The children were at the ready with their mathematical heads on, ready to battle it out to be crowned the Maths Challenge Champions for the Autumn term! There was some excellent teamwork on display and some even better mathematical reasoning and problem-solving skills!

The winners this term were 5HS with a fantastic score of 250 points the runners up were 3C with 240 points. Well done to everyone! Next term our focus for the maths challenge will be on measures…

Remembrance Day

On Friday 10th November, WBJS remembered those who served for our country during the war for ‘Remembrance Day’.  There were lots of respectful discussions, beautiful art work and a 2-minute silence. Our pupil governors sold poppies and there were lots of children and adults proudly displaying them on their jumpers.

Reading theme week

We enjoyed a whole-school reading theme week – The Wind in the Willows! On Tuesday 7^th November, The Image Musical Theatre Company paid us a visit and we absolutely loved their performance with Ratty, Mole and Toad! Our children were even chosen to take part in the performance! They were brilliant: we definitely have some young, budding actors and actresses! In whole class reading, each year group focused on The Wind in the Willows, discussing impressions of the characters, vocabulary and developing our deductive skills.