The Courier

Dear Parents

It is at this time of year, as the days shorten and the journeys to work and home are both in near, or in my case complete, darkness, that we need a few fillips to keep the spirits up. There have been a number of highlights this week to celebrate and we have got plenty of things lined up in the next three weeks that will get us over the line, ready and primed for Christmas when it comes.

We enjoyed a really exciting maths challenge for the houses on Tuesday, organised by Ms Forth, as well as plenty of sports fixtures and the Scholastic book fair during the week. The early signs are that we have managed to raise a very handsome sum of money from the book fair, which all gets ploughed back into the school library. Many thanks for all of your purchases, and special thanks to those parents who have helped out running the till before and after school.

Rehearsals for Christmas performances have begun in earnest, with lots of lovely singing coming from the music room and the hall. Next week of course we have our famous Christmas art day to look forward to and I have a nice assembly planned on advent for December 1st. Advent is all about getting ready and storing up for exciting things still to come and that's a good message to sustain us over the next three weeks. Today we have even had the first of our theatre visits, with Year 3 and 4 off to see the stage play of Nativity the Musical.

You will receive this afternoon or evening in a separate communication an invitation to take part in our parental survey. This is something we like to do quite regularly to gauge the feelings and opinions of our parent body and I hope you are able to find 10 to 15 minutes of your valuable time to complete this.

When it comes to Christmas shopping, I like to hold off as long as possible, so I am looking forward to some down time this weekend and may even indulge in some binge World Cup watching. My appetite for this may well be decided by how well England do this evening, for which fingers are securely crossed.

Be it shopping or football, I hope you all enjoy a relaxing time with your children over the weekend ahead.

Joe Thackway
Headmaster

Dear Parents

Just a request please to name all items of school uniform and ensure children are wearing their own clothing. These do periodically become misplaced. 

Any items of clothing that isn't labelled will be donated to FoC Pre-Loved clothing at the end of term.

For safeguarding reasons it's not possible for parents to come into school to search for these but staff will always do their best to support children in finding them.

Big Ted has been taking up residence in the meeting room as one of the prizes for the Christmas Bazaar raffle. We would love to have more donations (see below).  Please can these be brought into school by Tuesday 29 November.  

In addition to the usual donations of wine, chocolates, biscuits and toys etc., we'd love some bigger value items. We've had the following already, but if you have any handy contacts and feel comfortable asking for vouchers or gifts we'd be enormously grateful.

So far we've got:

• Hunt's bookshop voucher
• Cheese on the Green voucher
• Joules bag
• Amazon voucher
• Renatus beauty facial 
• Boden voucher
• Foot Spa

We'd also be grateful of any small toys and gifts for the tombola such as:

• Pens
• Games
• Lego sets
• Toys
• Craft items
• Sweets etc
• Cuddly Toys

All proceeds from the Raffle will go to Birmingham Children's Hospital, a Charity very close to the Crescent Community.

Crescent School

Weekly Calendar

Weekly Calendar - 28 November 22 

Please note the following regarding Co-Curricular clubs:

MySchoolPortal

Crescent School

Please click below to view the lunch menu for next week, children are able to have either the Main or Vegetarian option. 

Lunch Menu 28 November 2022

Crescent School

Please click on the link below to view the Music Lesson timetable for next week:

Music Lessons - 28 November 

The password has been emailed to parents. 

Keyboard lessons are also available with Mrs Fisher.  Click here for details.

The Scholastic Book Fair has been in school this week, the books arrived in their special display cases on Monday causing much excitement for all. The brightly coloured jackets and bold titles catching the imagination of all who walked past.

Every class has had the chance to visit the fair with their teacher during lesson time. They were able to look at the selection of books on offer and reserve the books they wanted to buy. On offer were books for girls and boys of all ages and reading levels. The fair was also open before and after school for parents to come along and purchase books.

As always, the book fair was very popular, there really is nothing like the sight, feel and smell of a new book!

A huge thank you to all of you who visited out bookfair, it is the first we have held in a couple of years and it was lovely to see the keen faces of the children looking for their next book to read.

This year the total made is £1930.31, of this we receive £1158.19 commission that means £128 per class to spend on new books which I am sure you agree is amazing.

A big thank you must also go out to the FOC members who assisted in the running of the bookfair, without them I could not have managed. 

Mrs Webb
Assistant Head

This year’s inter-house Maths Dash took place on Tuesday 22 November. Devised by Ms Forth, the competition challenges pupils from Year 2 through to Year 5 to complete a series of maths questions, testing their teamwork and communication skills in addition to their mathematical knowledge.

Overseen by the Year 6 House Captains, who also choose the teams, pupils enthusiastically problem solved in pairs before dashing to their Captain to check their answers and for the next question.

The children all worked exceptionally well, sharing ideas, demonstrating their impressive mathematical abilities and supporting each other. They really enjoyed the Maths Dash with many commenting "Can I do it again next year?"

Well done to everyone who took part and a special congratulations to Blue House who finished in first place overall and were awarded the sparkly diamond Maths Dash trophy in Assembly.

At the end of the competition the final scores were:

Blue Team – scored 128 points – awarded 200 House points

Red Team – scored 107 points – awarded 150 House points

Yellow Team – scored 99 points – awarded 100 House points

If any parents missed the bookfair then please take a look at the Scholastic Bookclubto browse the latest books and order online. For every £1 you spend on this month’s Book Club, our school will earn 20p in Scholastic Rewards.

Book Club

Please place your order online by 6 December 2022.

We love sharing Christmas cards here at Crescent School but we ask that all cards are put in our special Christmas postbox which we will situate near the pupil entrance from Monday 5 December.

All cards must be in before Wednesday 14 December and they will be sorted by the Year 6 children and then handed out to pupils before the end of term.

Please put the full name of the recipient and their class on the envelope.

A donation to this term's charity, the Birmingham Children's Hospital, would be appreciated.

Mrs Webb
Assistant Head

Monday 28 November 2022

The children will be decorating the school for Christmas on Monday 28 November.  They are able to wear a festive accessory with their school uniform such as a Christmas hat, hair accessory or tinsel that day.

Children must have their art aprons in school.

It is a day the children look forward to every year and you will be able to see see their work at our Christmas Open Corridors.

Crescent School

Wednesday 30 November 2022

Children in Blue House can wear one item of blue clothing on St Andrew's Day with their school unform if they wish. 

Crescent School

Friday 2 December 2022

We are looking forward to the Christmas Bazaar on Friday 2 December 2022. The playground will be open for car parking from 3.10pm. 

All children are to be collected at their usual times and normal collection points except Years 5 and 6 who will be dismissed from the pupil door. Please enter via the Main School Entrance where you will be welcomed in to enjoy all of the fun from 3.30pm for Reception and 3.45pm for the rest of the school.

Entry and exit will only be through the Main School Entrance. Please be aware that once your child is handed over to you at dismissal, they are your responsibility.

Unfortunately, children in After School will not be able to attend as they will need a parent or guardian to be with them.  

Please also note the impact on Co-Curricular activities that day.

• Choir has been cancelled
• Art Club for Year 5 has been cancelled
• Secret Agent Club will still be running 
• Didi Rugby will still be running 

Please do let the club leader know if they are not going to attend a club and also their form tutor, so that on the day we know where they need to go.

I am sure it will be a great event and we look forward to seeing you.

Wednesday 30 November 2022 - 3.45pm to 4.15pm

Following Christmas Art Day, on Wednesday 30 November, after school, we will have our Open Corridors event where we will share with you all the great work that we have been doing in school.

Please collect your child, Years 5 and 6 will be dismissed through the pupil door, before entering through the front door where you will be welcomed in to look at all the great work in school from 3.45pm. Entry and exit will only be through the front doors. Last entry is at 3.55pm.  

If your child is in a Co-curricular club then they will be expected to attend unless you arrange otherwise. Parking will not be available on the playground due to lessons.

We look forward to seeing you there.

Wednesday 7 December 2022 - 9.20am to 9.50am

Parents and Grandparents are invited to our Reception and Year 1 Classes Nativity performance of Baarmy Bethlehem.

A lot of hard work has gone into the rehearsals so far, learning the songs, memorising lines, sorting out costumes and scenery. What a spectacle it is all going to be.

Refreshments will be available from 8.45am in the Library, staff will be busy setting up the hall, therefore please do not arrive before this time. 

We are able to offer each child two tickets for the performance. 

Please book here:

Baarmy Bethlehem 

Wednesday 7 December - 4.35pm

Funstar would love to invite the families of their Wednesday Street Class group to join them at 4.35pm on Wednesday 7 December to enjoy the work the children having been doing this year. 

Please come to the front door at 4.35pm on 7 December 2022 and you will be shown to the hall to enjoy the fun.

Monday 12 December - 9.15am

Parents of the children in Year 2 are invited to share in a performance of poetry, music and readings to celebrate the Christmas festivities. You are welcome to come into school for light refreshments from 8.45am and the performace will start at 9.15am.

Tickets can be booked here:

 Year 2 Christmas Cracker

Mr Webb, Mrs Emery, Mrs Barnes and Miss Bowdige

Tuesday 13 December 2022 - 6.30pm to 7.45pm

This year we will again hold our Christmas Carol Service at Princethorpe College in the Our Lady of the Angels' Chapel. Please join us for a wonderful evening of carols, readings and re-telling of the Christmas story.

All children in Years 3-6 are required to attend. Please request permission from Mr Thackway (by emailing admin@crescentschool.co.uk) if your child is unable to attend for any reason. 

Two tickets are available per child in Upper School and can be booked here:

Christmas Carol Service 

Friday 16 December 2022

Our Christmas Jumper Day this year will be on Friday 16 December 2022. On that day, children should wear normal school uniform, but instead of their green pullover/cardigan, they can wear a Christmas jumper, if they wish.

We also invite you to make a voluntary contribution of £1 to wear a festive jumper which is in aid of Birmingham's Children Hospital.

Mrs Stapleton

Maisie has earned her full Junior da Vinci student award in English. 

Congratulations.

Mrs Symons
Junior da Vinci Lead

This week's Accelerated Reader Superstars are:

Top Quizzers are:

• 3S  Evelyn
• 4C  Max T
• 5F  Grace
• 6W Mya

Word Wizards are:

• 3S  Seren
• 4C  Matthew
• 5F  Alice
• 6W Zahra

Each week we have a Scientist and Artist of the Week who is recognised in assembly with their work displayed in the school corridor.

Well done to this week's Scientist and Artist of the Week:

Scientists

• All of 2E and 2W are engineers of the week.

Artists

• Maximillion (4C)
• Shaylan (4C)
• Albert (5F)
• Leela (5F)

Well done all.

Crescent School

It is always an exciting time for the children when they gain their pen licence, enabling them to make the move from writing in pencil to pen.

For this rite of passage, the children have to show that they can write neatly and consistently in cursive, joined handwriting in all of their work, not just handwriting tasks.

The following children have shown pride in their presentation of all of their learning tasks and have been awarded a Pen Licence and their first handwriting pen.

Well done!

Pre-Prep reading certificates have this week been awarded to:

• Feranmi
• Flora
• Henry
• Jed
• Iris
• Niamh
• Oscar
• Uma

Garage and Gigs are the most important games to show your progress.

Pupils who have reached landmark % on automatic training mode in the Garage and Gigs and therefore are awarded JDVs for Maths Practice:

• Theo Mc 3S completed 72% and 100% of the course

Results for Battle 3-10 November 2022. All classes against each other - average score per class member.

• 1st 3S 1458
• 2nd 5F 341
• 3rd 4C 150

Most valuable players in the whole competition:

• 1st Alfie 3S
• 2nd Theo 3S
• 3rd Tomisin 3S 

Well done, 3S!

Last week most improved speedsters in the studio are:

2W

• Evie - Wannabe!

3S

• Isabella - Rock Star!
• Theo - Rock Legend! 

4C

• Herbie- Support Act!

5F 

• Edward G-H - Support Act!
• Leela - Support Act!
• Grace - Headliner!

6W

Libby - Gigger!

No battle this week - back again soon!

This term Class 3S have been learning about different pattern making techniques. They have had fun repeating and reflecting their own designs.

This week Class 3S have been learning about writing effective instructions. They have learned about imperative verbs and remembering to make instructions as clear as possible with no vagaries. The first thing to do was to make their sandwiches, with their chosen fillings. They then described what they had done to a partner, making a recording of what they said. The children then turned their experience and recordings into instructions.

Eating is always the most fun part though!

Here are some examples of Class 4C’s imaginative journey paintings. They have explored different ways artists have used symbols to represent a journey and developed these ideas to create journey paintings personal to them.

In DT, Year 4 have researched different chocolate brandings, carried out customer surveys and then designed and created their own unique Christmas chocolate packaging using different shaped nets. Here are some of their creative designs.

Class 5F have been finishing off their beautiful still-life paintings this week. They have worked hard to develop their skills of observation, understanding of colour, tone, and composition.

As part of our English, Year 5 are looking at travel books. It is amazing how much great vocabulary is included in the writing. 

Last week, in their Geography lesson, the children in Year 5 took part in their own Crescent version of the COP27 conference. Working in teams, they thought about different environmental problems such as overfishing, deforestation and renewable energy. They presented their ideas to the rest of the class and discussed each others' suggestions and questions. It was fantastic to see them all so engaged!

Class 5F have been finishing off their beautiful still-life paintings this week. They have worked hard to develop their skills of observation, understanding of colour, tone, and composition.

All the children in the school came to see the books that were for sale at the book fair. It was great to see their excited faces and the anticipation of another story that they can be absorbed in.

Now all the entrance tests are over, the real work stats in Year 6 to get ready for Year 7!

Moving on with a measure topic this week, 6W have been testing their geometry skills and battling with what their brain and eyes tell them when drawing on isometric paper. We may have a few budding designers, engineers or architects yet!

Class 6W have been studying poetry about discrimination including Black Lives Matter. We have studied the poet Benjamin Zephanaiah, we have considered how to stop discrimination and also written poems about it using many elements of good English. The best part of it all was the inclusive language that the children used and the deep conversations that arose.

Class 6W made a game matching noun and adjective endings in their Latin lesson. They had great fun playing it and translating the resulting pairs – we had clever frogs, naughty rabbits and lazy wasps amongst many others!

Dear Parents

One of our key pastoral objectives of this academic year was to refresh the Crescent school promise so as to enhance the feeling of ownership for all members of the community who have joined us since it was first written.

As such I led a whole school assembly back in September to open up thoughts on what it is to be a good friend, citizen and learner.  All children were challenged during weekly form time to brainstorm as many words as they could which described each part of the promise.

These came back to me tenfold and I entered them all into word cloud type documents whereby the more times a word has been mentioned, the larger it is displayed to provide a really visual aid to the promise.

This was taken to school council who approved the results and the next steps which were then presented to all children in assembly. School council members acted out some sketches to exemplify what the words could look like in real life situations.

Over upcoming weeks the word clouds will sit alongside copies of the promise in classrooms and corridors to refresh in the children their actions and to further enhance their belonging/ownership of the promise.

Several of the swimmers who represented the School at the ISA Regional Championship took part in the Rugby Swimming Club Gala last weekend.  They brought in their medals to assembly this morning.

Good luck to those taking part in the ISA Nationals next Saturday 3 December.

The Salvation Army are looking for donations of new toys and gifts to provide to families who are struggling to afford basics let alone luxuries this Christmas and once again we are proud to support them. 

If you are able, please drop off any donation gifts at school on Wednesday 7 and Thursday 8 December - there will be collection boxes by the side entrance door like at harvest festival time. The Salvation Army Major for our area will be coming into school to collect and say thanks on the morning of Friday 9 December.

Please send all items unwrapped. This helps the SA choose the right items for each family and children. The gifts are then wrapped by the SA volunteers. Or often they provide wrapping paper to parents to do it themselves, so they can be part of the Christmas experience they’re struggling to provide for their family.

Gifts can be for any age range 0-16 years, see below for details and ideas.

Suggested Gift List for Children and Young People

We believe every child deserves a new gift at Christmas so we are unable to take used or second hand items for the Christmas Present Appeal.

0-3 years: dolls, teddy bears, cot mobiles, baby clothes, bath toys, CDs of suitable music and nursery rhymes, puzzles

3-5: dolls and action figures, cars, lorries, DVDs and CDs (music and nursery rhymes), colouring sets, pencils, crayons, books, puzzles

5-9: educational games & toys, stationery (colouring sets, pencils, crayons, school sets), CDs & family friendly DVDs, books, puzzles, wordsearch, crosswords

9-12: games and toys, stationery, DVDs, books, t-shirts, hair accessories, gloves, scarves, hats

13-16: books, make-up and toiletries (please try to ensure non-allergic ingredients if possible), gloves, scarves, hats, t-shirts, hair accessories and gift vouchers

Tickets are available through Classlist or via the following link:

Ticket Link

Tickets are available until 6.00pm on Wednesday 30 November and cost £5 per child which will include a game card and entry into the Bazaar. We will have the usual selection of games for the children to play. Once they have secured at least six stamps on their game card there will be a prize to collect. There will also be a selection of hot and cold snacks and drinks. 

Please enter the Christmas Bazaar via the Main School Entrance from 3.30pm for Reception and 3.45pm for the rest of the school. The playground will be open for car parking from 3.10pm. Please be aware that the event can be very noisy. There will be two crafting rooms which should be a little quieter and calmer!

Friends of Crescent

Dear Parents

This is one of the busiest times of the year for FoC so we hope you can bear with our many announcements! We are looking forward to seeing you at the Christmas Bazaar next Friday and I also wanted to thank all of those who have filled in the Parent Survey - your feedback has already proved very useful. The link is below if you haven't completed it, the link will close on Sunday evening:

Parent Survey

It was lovely to see so many excited little book worms at the Scholastic Book Fair this week. FoC has always supported this school initiative by supplying volunteers to process the book sales and it was one of my first events when my eldest son joined Crescent School (it was hectic even back then!). Thanks to those who put up with my very rudimentary knowledge of the iZettle machine! 

Best wishes 

Please see below for useful school contact information:

• My School Portal: MSP Login
• SOCS: SOCS Login

Click here to view the term dates for 2022/23 and 2023/24.

Crescent School