Crikey how did we get to June already?? Well that’s five sixths of the academic year done and just 7 weeks to go. It’s hard to believe that we’ve just had the May half term, especially as it has felt more like the October half term!!

So much has happened in the last half term, Cross-Curricular Days looking at healthy life styles both mental and physical and the past; the Year 7s had a brilliant residential trip to France; the Year 8s have continued with their reading for the Rib Valley Book Awards as well as enjoying the reward trip to Thorpe Park for all their efforts during the Business Enterprise project; the Year 6s did their SATs and had an author visit; some of our teaching assistants walked through the night to raise money for breast cancer awareness and our Year 5 maths team won the regional maths competition and go forward to the county finals.

Inevitably with the last half term looming thoughts turn to the future, which ties in nicely with an upcoming Cross-Curricular theme but also preparing the Year 8s for transition to Freman and the rest of the school for their new classes/tutors.  We are also getting ready to welcome our new intake as well as open the school for an Exhibition Evening where we will be aiming to show off all the brilliant things your children do on a daily basis.  So you can see that the final term is pretty busy – not to mention the Sports Days, House Competitions, day trips and end of year assessments.

At the end of last half term we bode farewell…again…to Mrs Prince who seems to have worked almost full time at school since retiring – she will be back
more sporadically in the future I’m sure.  Mr Taplin joins us from Tuesday next week after completing his university course and we look forward to welcoming him more permanently into the ‘Ralphie’ fold.  The final Friday was used as an INSET Day where roles are reversed and the teachers become the students.  We had a session on embedding Growth Mindset theory into the ethos of the school as I am passionate about this being key to producing successful life-long learners, more of this to come in the future.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend and we will see you bright and early on Monday morning.

I’ve blinked and nearly a month has gone by!!

In that time there has been a whole host of sport with netball matches for all year groups with plenty of victories and passing double figures in goals in several of the matches – nice preparation for the District Tournaments this coming week.  Not to be out done there have been lots of District tournaments for the boys as well with the highlights being the Year 8 boys reaching the semis of the 6-a-side (Another highlight in this particular event was an ‘overhead’ kick wonder strike from Joe B!!) only conceding 1 goal in the whole thing and the Year 7 boys narrowly losing the cup final to Greneway, the Year 5s began their RS careers by beating the same school.  The Year 8 boys also just missed out on qualification to the County Finals of the rugby, being beaten by Barnwell school in the playoff – but being muddier by far!!

In school we’ve had World Book Day, the Book Fair, a Year 6 Parents’ Evening, an author visit and this week ended with Mrs Bingham introducing Science Week with an assembly and the House Quiz.  Congratulations to Wellington the winners and Freman who were Runner’s Up – thanks to the staff who gave up their lunch time to form a team and for ‘competing.’  The Year 8 maths team took part in the heats of the county Maths Challenge finishing a creditable 5th out of 20 schools.  Other assemblies have focused on the importance of words and using the right word and the importance of good attendance where I told the children that 90% (Which we’d all be happy with on any test) averaged over the four years would equate to missing half a day a week or nearly half a year of school.  I shared with them some research that showed that 17 missed days of a school a year meant a drop by one grade at GCSE’s and that if you got A*-Cs you would earn on average over £350,000 pounds more over the course of their working lives – just think of all the improved Mother’s and Father’s Day presents that would mean!!

Finally this week, the five, very brave and open minded teachers who participated in the Outstanding Teacher Intervention Programme completed their course and received their certificates and gave presentations, hopefully this is the start of the journey to improved learning for all pupils whom will pass into our school and become ‘Ralphies’.

Have a great weekend and remember the difference between try (6 Nations rugby reference) and triumph is just a little UMPH(sic)!!

Today started with Mr Palmen giving a hard-hitting assembly on e-safety and introducing Internet Safety Week in school.  He talked about ways to make sure you can stay safe online and what to do if you think something is wrong.  Perhaps the most interesting piece of information was surrounding Instagram and after revealing how many children in each year group had said they had an account he shared with us point 1 from the Instagram terms and conditions and the fact that only 24 children in school should technically have an account!!

On Wednesday we had the leaders from the The Village Youth Club deliver an assembly on democracy as well as do a little sales pitch for their sessions at the Community Centre on Sundays from 4.30pm to 6.30pm.

Today was ‘Wear it Red’ to raise money for the British Heart Foundation, which was a really worthwhile cause suggested by one of our families.

This week saw the return of the House Leagues for both football and netball in Key Stage 3.  The children take on many different roles other than just players, such as coaches, referees and even match reporters; earning bonus points depending on how well they do.  Over the coming weeks I will try to keep you updated on how things are going.  There was lots of other sport going on this week with our Year 6 girls football team coming a creditable 3rd in the District Tournament but playing some good football and having great fun.  Our Year 8 girls netball team beat Edwinstree and the Year 8 boys beat Hockerill at basketball.

There was much excitement in at least one third of Year 5 this week as following on from the cakes and cookies C5  made last week to raise money for endangered species, a rather exciting box arrived.  As a result of all their hard work they have been able to adopt a Giant Panda and a Snow Leopard from the WWF and a Barn Owl and Door Mouse from the Herts and Middlesex Wildlife Trust. They will receive adoption certificates for each of the animals and updates on their conservation and development.

Congratulations go to Jake P from Year 5, Daniel H from Year 6, Macey D from Year 7 and Nathan B from Year 8 who were the Ralphies of the month for January.  Special mention must also go to Sophie K from Year 6 who is the first to receive a Platinum Certificate for 60 Merits and the first House has triggered a reward for total claimed merits which they will be receiving this week.

At this point we should all spare a thought for the Year 6s ready for next week when they do their practice SATs, to counteract this they do have some exciting trips coming up…more on that to come in

later Blogs.

Have a good weekend.

So the end of the first (proper) week! Wow that extra day makes a difference!!

The Year 8s were back in full Enterprise mode on Monday, busily selling a whole range of tasty snacks at breaktime.   They are a long way to making their target figure and soon will be meeting with Miss Devine and Miss Mason to start planning the rewards trip.

Speaking of Miss Mason, she and the choir have been hard at it all week in preparation for their performance at the Royal Albert Hall.

Gymnastics has been the focus of PE this week, with plenty of group balances, cartwheels and round-offs on display in the school hall.

Congratulations must go to the Year 8 football team for reaching the last 16 of the English School’s competition with a resounding 4-0 victory over St Thomas Moore with Dom G and Luke C scoring the goals.

In Wednesday’s assembly Miss Hampshire introduced the concept of doing random acts of kindness – these weren’t necessarily limited to in school so hopefully your children will be doing these at home as well.  Today I used Andy Murray as an example of someone who had a dream and the things a successful learner does to achieve that dream – ask your children what some of them are.

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who’ll decide where to go…” Dr Seuss

This week saw the first cross-curricular day of the year, the focus was the world around us.  The children took part in a wide range of activities; from looking round the Ralphies’ National Park; saving endangered animals; reconstructing mammals from owl pellets; making bird feeders; to redesigning Puckeridge.  The children get to learn new and use a whole range of skills in non-traditional learning activities; they also have lots of fun.  A huge amount of credit goes to the staff who plan, source and deliver these sessions; a good indicator of how hard they work is that there needs to be an afternoon break – for a caffeine and sugar kick – which the children believe is for them!

On Thursday a group of Year 5 and 6 children took part in a tag rugby festival in Bishops Stortford, inspired by the World Cup (Perhaps not necessarily England) they all really enjoyed their games and put in some strong performances.  Also this week our 5 and 6 girls played netball matches against St Edmunds.

Next week is the final week of the half term, unbelievable how time flies – I must have been having fun – with two important dates in the school diary – Year 8 Parents’ Evening and an INSET training day for staff on Friday, which means school is closed to children.