It is that point in the year already where we have our whole school move up day!

Many of our wonderful Year 6s were off at their secondary schools, taking that very big next step. Our staff will be thinking of them all day, wishing them the best of luck. A few of our Year 6s weren't at their secondary schools today so had some great topic based activities to work on, alongside Miss Grove and Mrs James. 

As the rest of the school came in this morning, excitement filled the air! Every class was busy with enthusiastic conversations about all that next year has to offer. Of course, the nerves were there too but that is only natural with any big change. We know our children are going to thrive with the opportunity to develop new friendships and explore their new year group.

Our staff certainly experienced the mixture of excitement and nerves this morning, particularly as we are having a bit of a move round! Our staff have stayed in the same year groups for a couple of years now and we felt it was time to switch things up. This afternoon, all children will receive a letter with their new class teacher and a full list of the new staff structure. We are very much looking forward to next academic year.

The move up day theme was 'Incredible You', a book selected by the English Team. All classes listened to the story first thing and then enjoyed the rest of the day getting involved in activities linked to the text. The story really encourages being your authentic self, in whatever way suits you - something that really fits our Great Binfields ethos. There were smiling faces, laughter, creativity and huge amounts of individuality on display today throughout the whole school and we know our children made a great first impression on their new year group team.

Have a look at the pictures to see what the children got up to. 

The Year 5 children arrived at school this morning looking a little scarier than usual - dressed as Vicious Vikings and Savage Saxons! They had a great day filled with brilliant activities such as making brooches and shields, cooking and eating stew and looking at Viking artefacts. The day was finished off with a huge battle on the field between the two classes. Take a look at the photos to see what the children got up to... 

Well it's been four years in the making but yesterday we finally got to take part in our Year 3 Geography fieldwork river study! We had the BEST day! Once again, your children did you and us proud and showed all of the school values - most notably: respect, resilience and co-operation. We took part in a range of activities including: mapwork using compasses and co-ordinates, sticky river scene pictures, measuring the depth of the river at a cross-section and measuring the velocity (speed) of the river flow with... an orange! We enjoyed our picnic lunch by the park too. We clocked up 25,000 steps by the end of the day - phew! We loved getting in the water although it was super cold! Our bodies soon adjusted to that though :-) we finished the day reflecting on how lucky we are to live and go to school in such a beautiful area with a shallow river like that on our doorstep for us to walk to. Forever grateful!

A HUGE thank you to our KS2 Sports Leaders who were incredibly helpful for the entire day of Sports Day. They helped their classes in the morning then helped KS1 classes in the afternoon and all of the teachers gave incredibly positive feedback about how kind, respectful and helpful they were. KS1 pupils listened to their instructions beautifully and they did a great job at being Leaders for the day. Well done to all Sports Leaders involved last Friday. Thank you for representing our school so wonderfully.

It was wonderful to have our field filled once again with a buzz of excited parents and pupils for our annual Sports Day. Despite the drizzle in the morning, we did not let it dampen our spirits and the sunshine was out in full force for our Key Stage One pupils in the afternoon! The children displayed all of our school values in abundance, most notably resilience and respect, through sportsmanship and trying to beat their personal best. Thank you so much to those of you who were able to come and support us - we have missed you all! The results will be announced in due course (Years 4-6 just have a bit of finishing off to do in dry weather first ;-) ; but in the meantime well done to each and everyone of you GBPS - you certainly did us proud!

           Our Year Three’s proved the saying “Good things come to those who wait” this week as they previously had their Forest School sessions cancelled due to Storm Eunice. However, this week certainly made up for it! They were fortunate enough to partake in Forest Schools each day from Monday to Thursday and their grand finale was toasting marshmallows/fruit on a campfire in the woods with Mr Wood! It doesn’t get much better than that!

Last week, a group of our Year 5 and 6 girls took part in their first ever Tag Rugby tournament. Here is a match report from Lily-Grace detailing more about the day:

“On Thursday 16^th June, Francesca, Jessie, Lizzie, Anna, Lily-Grace, Esme, Charlie, Ellie, Amelia and Lilliana went to a Tag Rugby tournament at Oakley Junior School. At around 12:45pm, Mr Wood, Mrs Clarke and the girls who were representing GBP, got on the minibus from Great Binfields school and headed off to Oakley Junior School. We were all very excited on the minibus. It was one of our first ever tournaments! When we got there, there were lots of schools that had come to play as well. In total, there were 10 schools.

The tournament began and unfortunately we lost our first match however, spirits were kept high as we got a snack and some water in between games. In the tournament we lost two games, won one game and drew two games. Everyone played really well and enjoyed themselves. We got told by Mr Wood that we came third overall which is a really good achievement. The highlight from the tournament was playing altogether and the delicious snacks Ellie’s mum brought us. We had a really and exciting day out.”

A HUGE thank you to Mr Wood for helping the girls prepare for the tournament and giving them a wonderful experience of competing for their school.

Last Tuesday, Year 5 and 6 took part in a girls cricket tournament at Mays Bounty. Seven excited and energetic young ladies represented our school in their first tournament but nerved did not get the better of them. Here is a match report from Anna and Charlie detailing the results of the games:

“Our first match was up against St Mary’s school. It was a tough match considering this was the first time we had played against a different school and unfortunately we lost - but not by very much. The next match was against St Johns who were a very experienced team. We gave it our best shot but couldn’t quite beat them in the end. We then had biscuits (made by Ellie) which were delicious and gave us energy for the next game. Our final match was against St Bede’s and we beat them! This made us extremely proud of ourselves and we celebrated with a victory biscuit.

After the tournament came the awards ceremony where we found out who had won. We were nervous, excited and a little tired after a boiling hot afternoon of being in the sun. St Bede’s were 4^th and then they announced 3^rd place – it was us! We won a bronze medal each but it almost looked rose gold – which we were pleased about. Overall, I think we did a great job but want to say a big congratulations to St Johns who won the tournament. A big thank you to Mr Wood for all of his hard work and effort to help us practise and compete.”

Pictures to follow soon.

This week has been a busy one for Y4, celebrating two of our final topic highlights.

On Monday, the Celts and the Romans arrived (in their costumes) to the school gate. All other year groups enjoyed seeing all the dressed up year 4s looking very excited for their day. In the morning, the children rotated around three activities. First up, dying fabric in the style of the Ancient Celts of Brittania. The children knew the Celts probably used natural materials to dye their fabrics with, but they didn't expect to be using onions, cabbage and spinach. The results were very impressive (but a little smelly!). The second activity was building our own aqueducts. The Ancient Romans are remembered for their innovative style when it comes to many aspects of culture, including architecture. The aqueducts perfectly represent this with their clever design. The children had to use their team work skills and D&T skills to build something effective. The final activity was exploring the structure of Roman roads. They were made up of many layers and what better things to use to showcase this than ... BISCUITS! The rest of the day consisted of designing Roman shields and using our 3D drawing skills to create Celtic knots.

Now onto Tuesday. It was Treehouse Theatre day!! We love when Ben visits school and we know our Binfields community have fond memories of these theatre days. The children were allocated roles and groups to create 4 parts of the play 'The Romans are Coming'. They had to remember when to come onto stage, when to complete their part and in some cases, when to say their line. As ever, the children were in awe of Ben and his talents and we were blown away by the performance. Whilst not working with Ben, the children had a free-flow day around a range of stations including Celts and Romans reading, mosaic creating, roman numeral exploring, Ancient Roman god and goddess reading (link to the Greeks here) and hillfort building. They also got to cut, stick and stitch their Roman shield design. This definitely required a Growth Mindset but wow ... they turned out brilliantly. 

Well done Year 4 for always being up for some fun and learning something new. We love your enthusiasm! Have a look at these photos to see all the fun from the last few days.