The Cranmore Chronicle 25th January 2021

25th JANUARY 2021

Message from the Headmaster Dear Parents, The week certainly began with a wintery feel and there was a picturesque view of the school following the heavy snowfall on Sunday. This gave us an opportunity to take some lovely photos of the grounds which have been included with the many photos pupils have sent from home this week. My thanks to the facilities team for their efforts in clearing the snow at short notice and for making the school site safe to reopen.

Our Monday assembly focused on the importance of leadership and understanding how we all can be inspirational leaders. We highlighted qualities such as communication, being calm and fair, maintaining perspective, being be able to listen and keeping a positive attitude in difficult situations, attributes that are important for pupils as they go about their school work and take on roles and responsibilities both in and outside of education.

Our school values of Faith, Character, Intellect, Community and Compassion were also emphasised as contributing to our Cranmore community. On Friday, pupils were reminded that we should embrace the many opportunities we have during our educational years; we should try to get involved in different activities to help us unlock our hidden talents.

Hard work and perseverance are key when refining our gifts so we are able to celebrate and share them with others.

I have enjoyed reviewing the Biography posters created by the Year 2 pupils and seeing the research during the Year 7 science lessons. In History, our pupils took part in the Holocaust Memorial Day Workshop that was arranged by Mr Cross and delivered by Protection Approaches. Thank you also to our school council for meeting virtually to discuss some of the activities and fundraising events we intend to run throughout the rest of the academic year.

Finally, I’ve placed a little positive message in the post for all the pupils this weekend, I hope they enjoy it.

I wish everyone a restful weekend.

Mr Everitt

Our beautiful Cranmore School site —with blue skies and snow!

Stunning photos, above from Mr Monks, below from Mr Pulford.

Creative Re-enactment challenge!

Cranmore Current Affairs Quiz Champions - the Results!

Thank you to everyone for taking part in our Current Affairs Quiz.

The results are in!

In first place with 7 out of 10, 6,569 is Ben K 6EF in second place 6 out of 10, 5,687 is Alex G 5SJ And in third place with 6 out of 10, 5,554 is Billy C 6EF Mr Cross

Cranmore School Council Charity Fundraising Our Cranmore School Council met virtually this week to discuss possible fundraising ideas. The pupils had plenty of suggestions as to how the whole school community can be involved in raising money for charity.

Watch this space for exciting announcements next half term!

Mrs Spooner

Year 7 Biology studying Microbes and Disease This term Year 7 have started a new topic in Biology studying Microbes and Disease. Microbes are very small organisms that are, mostly, too small to see without the use of a microscope.

This is why they are called microbes or micro-organisms. We look at them in three categories, Bacteria, Viruses and Fungi.

A lot of Bacteria are really useful, making yoghurt and cheese for example, not to mention the essential help that they give to our digestion. However, in the form of salmonella and tuberculosis they are less friendly and are best avoided!

The role of the fungus is popular, particularly with the microbe version yeast. This single celled organism (a prokaryote) is responsible for making the dough rise and for fermenting the wine and beer. Clearly important.

However, in today’s times, much attention is focussed on the virus. At up to 100 times smaller than a bacteria, this ‘thing’ is approximately 50 times smaller than a single wavelength of light. I use the word ‘thing’ because the virus does not exhibit all of the usual processes of life that an accepted living organism does. It has a structure that is simply a protein coat over a strand of genetic material.

As the term progresses we will study the role of vaccines over the years and will look, with great respect, at the impressive speed with which the current range of Covid-19 vaccines have been developed. The progress that Science has made since the pioneering days of Edward Jenner is astonishing. This is in no part due to developing technologies and facilities and I am very excited about the rapid development of the new Science and Technology building for Cranmore which will certainly allow us to expand our learning for the future.

Mr Minikin, Head of Science

Holocaust Memorial Day Workshop in History with years 6-8 Students at Cranmore were fortunate to partake in a workshop from ‘Protection Approaches’ on the Wednesday 20th, January. This was in conjunction with the Holocaust Memorial Day which is held each year to remember those who have died.

This year the day falls on the Wednesday 27th January.

In what was a hugely informative session, Cranmore students demonstrated their enthusiasm throughout and there was never a shortage of hands displayed in response to questions. It was also pleasing to see how mature they were in exemplifying their sensitivity to what is clearly a difficult topic.

Looking ahead, students in Year 9 will have the opportunity to further develop their understanding of the Holocaust, where a whole unit is dedicated to the teaching and learning of the topic in History.

What is the theme for the Holocaust Memorial Day in 2021?

The theme for Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) 2021 is Be the light in the darkness. It encourages everyone to reflect on the depths humanity can sink to, but also the ways individuals and communities resisted that darkness to ‘be the light’ before, during and after genocide.

Be the light in the darkness is an affirmation and a call to action for everyone marking HMD. This theme asks us to consider different kinds of ‘darkness’, for example, identity-based persecution, misinformation, denial of justice; and different ways of ‘being the light’, for example, resistance, acts of solidarity, rescue and illuminating mistruths.

Mr Cross, Head of History

Year 6- Who can build the biggest snowman?

Year 5—Making arrays in maths Here are some photos and news entries from my class having fun in the weekend’s snow—Mr Fagan Left, Billy C: ‘The snow on Sunday morning was a much-welcomed distraction to the usual “lockdown” weekend. Instead of “Shall we go for a walk?” - “Shall we build a snowman?” was much better received!

The snow was so thick and sticky; I have never experienced snow like it in the UK before! We rolled the snow from a small ball to the size of me, my sister and Alice! It was great fun - hot chocolates were definitely well deserved at the end!’

Bottom left, Henry C-B: ‘My sister Steffi and I started rolling the body in the back garden and by the time we got to the front, the body was so big that it needed all four of us to push it into place!

Our snowman is now in the front garden keeping any eye on the walkers going past on the lane.’ ****** Bottom right: In our practical work in Maths, 5CC arranged a variety of objects at home into arrays to help them find factors of numbers—Mrs Conlan

Year 3 using alliteration in winter snow poems and photos of Cranmore in the weekend’s newly fallen snow from Mr Everitt I am very proud of Year 3 pupils for their excellent work writing imaginative winter snow poems using alliteration. I would like to publish them all in full, but here are just few sample excerpts around the page from Nino, William, Monty, Luka, Lucas, Charles F, Anthony and Max in 3CS. ‘White winter, soggy socks, squelching slowly south, Broken boots and frozen feet feeling frostbite.

Children chattering cheerfully Biting blizzard and frostily freezing frost.’

‘The woods white with soft sparkling snow While boys huddled under bundles of blankets.’

‘They skated down the slippery slopes, Frosty frozen flakes fluttered down and The children cheered on the first snowflakes!’

‘White whispering winter.’

‘Boys blindly played games in the blizzard.’

Mrs Sinclair

Year 2 researching and writing biographies, making posters and giving presentations to their class!

In English Year 2 have been reading and learning about biographies of significant people, linked to our Explorers topic.

They have been working on creating their own biography posters of a person that is important to them. They carried out research, wrote a plan, created a poster and presented it to the class. I have attached a few examples. Excellent work!

Mrs Carpenter

Year 2 use imagination making Biography Posters!

The children in Year 2 completed fantastic Biography posters during our online English lessons. They chose a special/important person, researched them and then produced a biography about them.

I am so delighted and proud of the children for the huge effort they put into this.

Miss Freeman

Year 1 still life drawings in art and investigation challenges in maths!

In year 1 we have read ‘Handa’s Surprise’ and the pupils chose some fruit to copy and created their own still life pictures. Here are some examples of their super work! Work below, top left to right, Niko, Basty and George, and second row, left to right, Matthew, and Thomas, with a photo of Thomas, the artist at work!

Mrs Bowen

Still life by Luke, left , and Colson, right. ******** Maths Investigation Challenge below! How many eggs in each basket? Can you solve it ?

Mrs Hastings

Another busy week in Nursery—Pirates, snow, scrimbling and treasure hunting!

Ahoy There! In Nursery we had an exciting Pirate-themed week; the children dressed up in flamboyant costumes and engaged in lots of different fun activities including a treasure hunt around the Cranmore grounds.

In Write Dance they experienced ‘scrimbling’ whilst following the story and accompanying music to ‘The Gruffalo’s Child.’ It was so exciting to have the snow on Monday and the children demonstrated great team work building a snowman in our garden.

Note- ‘Scrimbling’ is the term is used to describe various ways of making marks, including scribbling, wriggling and doodling movements. It also refers to the various ways children can make the movements needed for early writing. See photo bottom left!

Mrs Luke, Head of Nursery

Sport - Class Distance Running Challenge

Sport- Cranmore pupils keeping physically active and healthy taking part in: distance running, HIIT, rugby skills, staircase challenge and ‘Cranmore creatures’!

For regular updated sporting action, please follow: instagram.com/cranmoresport twitter.com/cranmoresport

Sport- Lower Prep Staircase Challenge

Cranmore Faith Family

I am pleased to inform you that you are all most welcome to attend The Cranmore Faith Family which will be meeting, via Teams, on Monday 1 February at 4.30pm. This will be a time of prayer, support and fellowship for families in these challenging times.

Please click here to access the meeting. Subsequent meetings will be held on the first Monday of each month during term time.

If you have any questions regarding Chaplaincy or if I can be of any support during these times, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Mr Jakubowski, Head of RE and School Chaplain Stephen.jakubowski@cranmore.org

Here is the assembly link for this week Here is this week’s Wednesday Word link

A Message from our Chaplain

Mr Jakubowski, School Chaplain