Keep up to date with all the latest news happening in school at the moment.
In order to maintain Greswold's Modeshift Stars Bronze Award accreditation for commitment to sustainable travel, each class in Y1-6 took part in a travel survey this week.
This involved the children communicating how they usually travelled to school each week and how they would like to travel to school in the future.
The results were very interesting as 197 pupils wanted to cycle to school compared to the 19 that currently do. Only 43 children felt they needed to use the car compared to the 180 that currently do.
Car sharing and walking to school with another family were interesting suggestions put forward by the children.
Greswold can appreciate that for some families, a considerable distance has to be travelled to get to school each day. However, if all vehicle using families could dedicate just one day a week to travelling more actively or sustainably, it would make a big difference to congestion outside school, to the safety of the children and their families and would also help children to achieve their Travel Tracker badge awards.
This morning's House Point assembly nicely rounded off our focus on Independence this half term, by exploring the Japanese proverb of 'Send the beloved child on a journey'. This alluded to a news clip viewed by the children about a 7 year old girl from Tokyo who travelled to and from school every day using two trains, all alone. Part of Japanese culture, children are encouraged to travel to school by themselves at an early age.
Although only year 6 children at Greswold are allowed to do this, in the assembly we recognised the important part school staff and families play in providing young people with the guidance they need to become responsible enough to eventually keep themselves safe when they do travel to school independently.
Well done to Y6 Cedars who had the best attendance of this half term (96.8%) while Y3 Sparrows are still out in front with the best attendance for the whole year (96.4%).
Children received certificates for Star Pupil, the most House Points attained in each class as well as Star Reader awards for children who had read one million words at Greswold.
St George's are still first place in this year's House Point Leaderboard but only by one single point from St David's.
Our final value of Curiosity was also introduced to the children.
Dear Parents and Carers,
School has recently received a number of messages and complaints from both families and residents about vehicle use and parking. In the past week alone, there have been two incidents of cars colliding with each other, moving and parked. We have also been notified that a car, usually parked on Links Drive has been blocking part of a resident’s driveway.
As a school, we would like to encourage all of our families, particularly those that use and park vehicles, to drive with the upmost care when travelling to and from school helping to demonstrate our school values.
Please be respectful of the properties on Buryfield Road, Links Drive and Ferndown Road when parking so the residents are not inconvenienced. We take great pride in working in partnership with not only our whole school community but our local area as well.
As this week coincides with Walk to School Week, it would be a perfect chance for families to ditch the car for possibly one day and try alternative modes of transport which will not only help pupils to attain badges through the Travel Tracker but also to move Greswold up the leaderboard using Street Tag. Click on the link below for more details:
https://www.greswold.solihull.sch.uk/sustainable-travel/
https://www.greswold.solihull.sch.uk/parking-guidance-for-greswold-vehicle-users/
Thank you
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11 children from year 4 were given the opportunity of representing Greswold at the annual Orienteering festival at Lode Heath School yesterday evening.
The children had to complete a challenge involving finding a set of letters that spelt out sporting words. They also had to follow instructions given by another child to complete the course set out in front of them. The final activity was to follow instructions to make a face using bean bags, quoits and cones.
All the children perfectly demonstrated our school values and really enjoyed the experience of orienteering.
Today, the first child chose an item from the Greswold Prize Collection after collecting a further 100 housepoints after receiving a gold badge. On offer today were Greswold Gold Badges, special Greswold pencils and BRICKS keyrings. Samar from Sycamores chose a BRICKS keyring. Well done, Samar.
After a number of enquiries from parents with regards to outdoor lunchtime arrangements, below are images of how lunchtimes for junior children are structured.
As parents can see, there is a wide choice of activities to choose from each week and a large free play area where pupils can instigate their own games or use additional equipment, purchased for them by the PTA.
Year 5 and Year 6 boys also enjoy a football club ran by the Football Development Scheme on a Wednesday with girls enjoying the same opportunity on a Friday. However, in the final half term, year 4 girls will be invited to the Friday club too.
We have a sizeable compliment of staff, half of which are Lunchtime Supervisors, supplemented by Play Leaders (members of support staff) who help to instigate games.
The library is also available for children to enjoy some quieter time and this opportunity is hosted by Mrs Mason, our school librarian.
We're always looking at ways to improve our lunchtimes and so School Council will be asking for feedback from classes over the next week or so, in preparation for the final half term of the year.
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Congratulations to all of our year 6 pupils this week who have demonstrated our Greswold values with perfection during the annual SATs tests.
The week comprised of six different test papers, all undertaken in very strict test conditions and the children were not only a credit to themselves but also to their teachers, the school and their families.
During the test period, Greswold was visited on two separate occasions by visitors checking on our test arrangements and protocols. On Tuesday, a member of Greswold's governing body observed throughout the morning followed by a senior school improvement adviser from Solihull Authority on the Wednesday. Both were very impressed by the attitude of the pupils and the procedures that were put in place. Comments made during the week included:
'I have high confidence in the integrity observed and displayed by all who were involved in this morning's English Reading test'.
'A well-oiled machine, but not robotic'.
Thank you to our year 6 families who have helped to give the children the best preparation for each morning too, a real combined effort! Roll on July 4th when we can celebrate the children's achievements when the results are available!
Life and school can be so busy that sometimes it's always good to stop, think, look, reflect and be grateful for what we have around us. Our wonderful Forest School area is a perfect example of that.
Set within our own school grounds next to the KS2 field, the area has been completely transformed overtime into a useable environment, perfect for pupils to explore and learn about nature as well as learning vital outdoor skills.
Mr and Mrs Cooper have been pivotal in evolving it into such a vibrant and immersive area where many different groups of children visit and learn in weekly.
Our aim for next year is to enable every child to experience some learning time in the Forest School area so that they can transfer those valuable skills out of school in their own lives while also valuing nature and the outdoors as a whole.
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The field is now open so there's now plenty of space for the children to play a variety of games at lunchtime.
Thanks to the Greswold PTA, lunchtimes have become even more exciting with the purchase of new items to help keep the children active and entertained.
Equipment such as basketballs, cricket stumps, foam bricks, mini-football goals, giant pop up targets, croquet sets, tennis balls, Tug O War and a basketball trainer form the basis of an order of nearly £1,000, all funded by the PTA.
Thank you to our whole school community for generously donating to school through various PTA events to enable school enhancements like this to happen.
Greswold's ground's maintenance partner Fairways arrived on Monday to start painting the all important summer line markings, in readiness for Sports' Days and PE lessons.
However, this year, instead of manually marking the lines out with paint and a roller, a GPS tracking system was used to map out the school field before a robot was used to finish the job!
Pupils and staff alike were fascinated by the robot who expertly marked out a 200m oval track, a 75m track straight and two rounders pitches.
We wonder if the robot can teach too? ;)