St Swithun's CE Primary School

Monday 20 March 2023 Mothers Day Tea

Monday 20 March 2023 Science Day Last Thursday, children throughout school became scientists for the day and took part in a variety of investigations linked to the environment. As you may be aware, the theme for British Science Week this year was ‘Connections’, and we decided to link this with children’s interest in climate change and sustainability.

Monday 20 March 2023 Violins in Assembly Congratulations to our three violinists for playing so beautifully in assembly on Friday. Always hard to play in front of others - well done!

Tuesday 14 March 2023 Year 6 play football at Chandlings On Monday 13th March, some year 6’s went to Chandlings, to compete with partnership schools in a football competition, organised by Danny Taylor.

Thursday 9 March 2023 Children's Mental Health Awareness Week

Tuesday 7 March 2023 Moon Rocks!! Last week, a high security, secret delivery was received by children in Year 5 – Moon Rocks!

Tuesday 7 March 2023 Nerys Pearce visits St Swithuns Thank you to all who participated and sponsored the children in their circuits. We all had such a fantastic day and it was very inspirational listing to Nerys’s story!

Tuesday 7 March 2023 World Book Day 2023

Friday 3 March 2023 Science Oxford visit Year 6 On Wednesday 1st March 2023, Science Oxford visited Year 6 to carry out a workshop all about how animals are adapted to survive in their environment. The workshop was very engaging and the children learnt through a hands-on activity how some animals live long enough to reproduce where as others may not survive when they are not suited to the

Friday 3 March 2023 School Council Our school council works incredibly hard with Mrs Knighton and other staff members of our school community to work on actions that support our school to be even more great. Each councillor works with their class to listen, discuss and share views to put forward at the meetings.

Monday 27 February 2023 Nursery & Saplings visit The Story Museum Nursery and Saplings had a wonderful time visiting The Story Museum last week.

Monday 27 February 2023 Turkey-Syria earthquake appeal Thank you to everyone for bringing in coins to donate to Turkey and Syria. All classes placed their coins on the map of the two countries and, dependent on age, had a moment of silence to think of others around the world. All monies raised will go to: https://timetohelp.enthuse.com/cf/turkey-earthquake.

Tuesday 21 February 2023 Singing Squad at Young Voices - Wembley Feb 2023

Tuesday 7 February 2023 Orchestral Day at Radley College Last week, a group of Upper Junior children took part in an Orchestral Day at Radley College. Prior to the day, they had the opportunity to practice with Helen Eccleston from the Abingdon Music Centre. The children thoroughly enjoyed the day and the performance at the end of the day was very impressive, with around 200 children taking part.

Thursday 2 February 2023 Year 3 visit Natural History Museum Last week Year 3 went to The Natural History Museum in Oxford. When we were there, we went into a classroom and learnt all about the different types of skeletons that animals, including humans, have. Some have skeletons on the inside, like us humans, and some have theirs on the outside. We looked at everything from insects to horse skulls! After our very informative lesson, we used our new knowledge and went around the museum on a scavenger hunt to find the bones of different animals!

Monday 30 January 2023 Year 2 visit The Oxford Mosque Throughout the primary curriculum we learn about different faiths and in order to enhance our learning, we are fortunate to visit places of Worship.

Monday 30 January 2023 Year 6 visit Natural History Museum Year 6 had a super morning at the Oxford Natural History Museum learning more about evolution, inheritance, adaptation and variation. Our museum teacher, Chris, explained the different processes amazingly with a range of different resources to support this, including specimens of different moths, amphibians and even a polar bear foot! We learned a little more about the theories of Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace from their studies of different species. The children were amazing, attentive and inquisitive and had lots of questions and brilliant thoughts. It was a great trip!

Tuesday 17 January 2023 Year 6 trip to the Mosque Throughout the primary curriculum we learn about different faiths and in order to enhance our learning, we are fortunate to visit places of Worship.

Tuesday 17 January 2023 Epiphany at St Swithun's

Tuesday 13 December 2022 Year 6 visit Hampton Court Palace The trip to Hampton Court was amazing – the children loved exploring the home of Henry VIII and learnt lots from the workshop, where they had to look at a variety of primary sources to make a decision about what type of king Henry VIII was. The children learnt about the reliability of sources and bias and to always question what information they are presented with.

Tuesday 13 December 2022 Year 5 Viking Day The Vikings took over Year 5 for the day! Wednesday 7th December saw the invasion of Vikings in the Year 5 classrooms as pupils and staff came superbly dressed ready to explore a whole day of History learning.

Tuesday 6 December 2022 Year 5 Meet Tony Bradman Last Wednesday, we were delighted to welcome author Tony Bradman to Year 5. Many of our children had never met an author before; the excitement was heightened because children are excited by the author’s engaging historical adventure and fantasy book. Tony spoke about his childhood and told children that they should make the most of each and every opportunity that may come their way.

Tuesday 6 December 2022 Teddy Bear Hospital visit in Saplings Last Tuesday, Saplings had a lovely visit from the teddy bear hospital. The children explored three different activities, one where doctors showed us what to do in an emergency and how to dial 999. They also learnt how to use the medical equipment: we listened to our teddy’s heartbeats with a stethoscope, gave them injections, checked their temperatures and learnt how to use an inhaler. We also got to meet Sid who showed us all the different organs in our body and where they live.

Tuesday 29 November 2022 Year 3-4 Rugby Tag Event

Tuesday 22 November 2022 Eco Crew News Our Eco Crew met this week and have decided that as a school they would like us to be one of the first schools to make a change and inspire other schools to follow in their goal to SAVE TREES!

Tuesday 22 November 2022 BBC Children In Need 2022 Thank you to everyone who donated and got dressed up last week for children in need. St Swithun’s raised £269.51 which is a fantastic amount.

Tuesday 22 November 2022 Abingdon Science Partnership's Primary Science Club A few of our Year 5 & 6 children attended the after-school Science Club that started last week. The sessions are run by senior school Science Ambassadors and supervised by fully qualified Abingdon School science teachers. It is a superb opportunity for our Upper Key Stage 2 children to work in a fully equipped science laboratory and extend their science skills and knowledge. There was much interest for the club this term, we hope to secure some more places when the new sessions begin to enable a greater number of our pupils to gain this valuable experience. The first session was very popular amongst our children who came back to school the next day buzzing with excitement. Here are some comments about their experience:

Friday 18 November 2022 KS2 Space Talk On Wednesday we were lucky enough to have a space presentation from Dr Mamatha Maheshwarappa who works at the UK Space Agency. Years 3-6 were wowed with everything 'space', took part in an experiment and a couple of children were even given the opportunity to try on a real space suit! It was a wonderful experience enjoyed by the children and adults alike! Thank you again Dr Maheshwarappa for your time.

Friday 11 November 2022 Woodlands Day 4 Thursday 10th November – Woodlands Manor