Abbey Lens a Year in review 2021-22

Abbey Lens a Year in review 2021-22

BB8Y LENS September 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. One Excellence Through Partnership

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We’re back! 8th Year of our Abbey Lens

MEET THE STAFF Fun, short videos that introduce some of our staff. http://www.abbeyfederation.co.uk/whos- who/ CALENDAR OF EVENTS Planned out for the year, including a link to add the dates to your smart device. https://www.abbeyfederation.co.uk/diary/ grid/2020/9/ OUR CURRICULUM A detailed guide to the national curriculum and how we tailor it for our children. http://www.abbeyfederation.co.uk/parent- guide-to-the-national-curriculum/ KIDS’ ZONE Educational based games that change every month supporting many areas of the curriculum http://www.abbeyfederation.co.uk/special/ kidszone/ CLASS PAGES Year group pages and lots of great events that our children have taken part in. http://www.abbeyfederation.co.uk/topic/ class-pages ON-LINE SAFETY Advice and guidance for parents on keeping our children safe in the ever growing technological world. https://www.abbeyfederation.co.uk/on-line- safety-information/

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published.

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk All submissions to office@abbey-

jun.sandwell.sch.uk or [email protected]

BB8Y LENS September 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Two Excellence Through Partnership

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What is it? 8th Year of our Abbey Lens

SHARE & SHINE

We try to celebrate the work of our school through our weekly Abbey Lens. It’s a way to shine a light on curriculum experiences. Sometimes it’s a way to share trips, visits and visitors. We also like to see what our children and families are getting up to in the local community. Many of our children share their outside interests and charity work. We keep every issue and make a digital flip-book as it builds a sense of pride across our school. It also shows the range of experiences that our children get during their time at Abbey. We’d love you to contribute with short stories and a picture or two. We can’t promise to publish all but we’ll certainly try. Our last seven years can be found here :

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS September 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Three Excellence Through Partnership

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The gift of the Nile. Workshops begin

EGYPTIAN DAY Year 5 were straight back to work with an inspiring start to their topic of Egyptians. It was a content rich day of workshops and activities. 5P commented on Dr Worrell and her fun and engaging delivery. Stand out moments included: mummification process; writing and decoding hieroglyphics; Egyptian board games. Information, facts and interesting bits of history peppered the experience and a great day was had by all. Did you know that Egyptians would hunt wild cats but domestic cats were sacred? Thanks to 5P for the story! GROWING UP GREEN Growing Up Green is a free Children’s Arts Festival happening in Bearwood that celebrates action on climate change as part of The Great Big Green Week 18- 26 September 2021. https://www.growingup.green/bearwood Growing Up Green Bearwood: Toy Swap St. Mary's Church Hall , St. Mary’s Church Hall, Bearwood, Smethwick B66 4BQ / 18th Sep, 11:00 – 13:00 Join us for a community event where kids can swap up to 5 toys with other children. The swap is free to attend, but you must give away a toy to get someone else’s toy. Toys will be divided into categories and assigned a value sticker. Toys should be clean and given in good condition. Toys can be dropped off before the event from 9am. Toys must be received by 10.45am on the day to be included in the swap.

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS September 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Four Excellence Through Partnership

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McCoos. Stephen Brown art knowledge.

SCOTTISH DAY On Wednesday 8th September, Year 2 had a wonderful Scottish day, linked to their Autumn topic ‘Super Scots’. The children enjoyed finding out facts about Scotland and taking part in some traditional activities. They looked at artwork by Steven Brown and even created their own individual art pieces. Highland cows, using lines of colour, were everywhere! Energetic too, the children took part in some Highland Games. They learnt the ‘Scottish Fling dance’ and created a class Loch Ness monster. Throughout the day there was plenty of fun and laughter, especially when we shared The Gruffalo in Scot together. The teachers tried their very best to use a Scottish accent! Thanks to Miss Stocking for the story! BARNEY’S BARNET When Barney's auntie lost her hair through cancer treatment, he wanted to do something to help. We found out about the Little Princess Trust and he decided to support their work. He has been growing his hair for two years, ready to donate it to them! He's put up with all of the brushing and extra hair care that having long hair takes; he's dealt with people confusing him for a girl or telling him that he looks girly with long hair (thankfully no one from school - his friends have been awesomely supportive ! ) and now it's done!! He's also raised over £1800 for the charity! [Ed - Magnificent effort Barney - we are all really proud of you!] Thanks to Barney’s mum for the story!

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS October 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Five Excellence Through Partnership

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Raw recruits. PCSO return

ON THE BEAT This week the new Junior PCSOs met for their first meeting and were welcomed to the Junior PCSO programme, which is a community initiative in conjunction with West Midlands Police. They considered the qualities needed to perform their role and agreed to be approachable - easy to talk to or deal with and friendly. Polite - showing good manners; being courteous, considerate and tactful; helpful- providing assistance; proud - feeling or showing justifiable self-respect; reliable - dependable and trustworthy and smart - someone who wears their Junior PCSO uniform with pride. Our Junior PCSOs have a full programme of work ahead of them. They will; use the PCSO Pledge to know what is expected of them; learn essential information about the laws of the road to support safer parking and road safety; promote the message of reduce, re-use and recycle with a poster competition; learn about the Clean Air Charter with respect to air pollution around the school; attend a virtual meeting with the UN at the Climate Summate; work with a charity called ‘Living Streets’ to promote a campaign called ‘WOW’ which encourages pupils to walk to school then deliver monthly WOW badges to classmates; meet the Sandwell Litter Watch Team to learn about the impact of litter on the local environment and local wildlife; register with the charity Hedgehog Street; train to be a ‘Safeguarding Champion’ to support with pupil wellbeing and safeguarding across the school, including training to support the schools anti-bullying campaign and have lots of fun along the way! Thanks to Mrs. Flanagan for the story!

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS October 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Six Excellence Through Partnership

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Kick off! What a difference one week makes.

COME RAIN OR SHINE On the 23rd September Abbey Junior's Football Team Kicked off their season with an away match vs St Phillips. The sun shone down and it was a fantastic occasion with the team super excited to get started. Despite a competitive performance and ideal playing conditions the team fell to a 4-1 defeat in their first game. Still full of excitement they looked forward to the next game vs Hargate the following week. Fast forward to Tuesday 28th September and what an unbelievable change! The rain had set in but it did nothing to dampen the confidence of the Abbey team. As the rain poured in, so did the goals! Abbey played magnificently and ran out 13-2 Winners! Well done!

Thanks to Miss. Hinton for the story! AUTUMN DAYS

This week, the children in EYFS celebrated the start of Autumn with an Autumn Day. Everyone came dressed in Autumn colour clothes, we made salt dough hedgehogs, leaf crowns and Nursery made pumpkin soup. The children all had a go at chopping the pumpkin, Mrs Arif cooked the soup for us, the smell in nursery was amazing! Once it had cooled down we enjoyed tasting the soup with a delicious bread roll. A great day was had by all

[Ed - I can confirm it was delicious!] Thanks to Miss. Harwood for the story.

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS October 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Seven Excellence Through Partnership

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Oscar worthy! WOW PR.

AMBASSADORS Our wonderful Abbey Junior PCSOs did a brilliant job last year in setting up and promoting the WOW programme, working with the charity Living Streets. The WOW programme encourages children to ditch the car and walk, cycle or park- and-stride to school. Children learnt about the benefits of walking to school which included benefits to physical and mental health; protecting the environment with less carbon emissions from cars; protecting the air quality around our school and saving our young lungs. Children who walked to school, at least once a week, were awarded a badge at the end of the month. Our school became the most successful school in the West Midlands and both Abbey Juniors and Abbey Infants took the top two places in the WOW Leadership Board. WOW! Due to our great achievements and interest in the programme we were asked by Living Streets, who work in partnership with Transport for West Midlands, to work with a videographer and photographer. They filmed the children talking about why walking and active travel to school was a benefit. The material will be used for promoting the walk to school and safer streets message. The children had a fantastic experience and provided the researchers with a wealth of material (they were very impressed with how much they knew). What an exciting opportunity for our Abbey Junior PCSOs to help and make a difference to their community - it's the very heart of everything that they do. Thanks to Mrs. Flanagan for the story!

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS October 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Eight Excellence Through Partnership

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Heart! Dissection.

THE HEART DISSECTION In Science, we have been learning about the circulatory system. We put our safety goggles, aprons and gloves on and got to work! We discovered the main artery is called the Aorta, where the oxygenated blood travels to the rest of the body. We looked at the external structure and labelled the parts. Then, we made incisions to explore the insides of the heart to look at the different chambers. We noticed the right atrium and ventricle were much smaller, as this carries the deoxygenated blood to the lungs. This was a fantastic experience to physically hold and dissect a real lamb's heart up close. We have learnt so much about the heart and the circulatory system.

By Alex 6H, Ewan 6H and Diyan 6Y

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS October 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Special Excellence Through Partnership

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Community Spirit Working to support others

SMETHWICK FOODBANK HARVEST APPEAL Every day people in the UK go hungry for reasons ranging from redundancy to receiving an unexpected bill on a low income. A simple box of food makes a big difference, with foodbanks helping prevent crime, housing loss, family breakdown and mental health problems. Schools, churches, businesses and individuals donate non- perishable, in-date food to a foodbank. Large collections often take place as part of Harvest Festival celebrations and food is also collected at supermarkets. Abbey is supporting our local food bank and even one donation can make a difference. Last year we collected over 1000kg of donations and our local foodbank was really appreciative. Let’s see if everyone can bring in one item. FUNDRAISE FOR FREE We need your help! If you shop online, please could you sign up to easyfundraising to support our school? It’s a really easy way to raise money for us – you just use the easyfundraising site to shop online with more than 3,300 well known online stores like Amazon, Argos, John Lewis, ASOS, Booking.com, eBay, Boden, and M&S. When you make a purchase, the retailer sends us a free donation, at no extra cost to you. We want to raise as much as possible, so please visit our new easyfundraising page at https:// www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/ abbeyinfantjuniorsch/ and click ‘support us’. Since October 2018, following these links has raised £400 for our school - all for free clicks!

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS October 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Nine Excellence Through Partnership

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BCM! Victorian inspiration

BACKWARDS ALPHABET Our trip to the Black Country Museum was a very enjoyable and exciting experience. We were able to explore and play with different toys from the Victorian era and even learnt how to compare them to the toys we play with now. 1DP loved playing street games and cheering each other on. We also found out that some people lived in ‘back to back’ houses and had to share their toilet with their neighbours (which was at the bottom of their shared garden)! 1G’s favourite part was when we learnt that some children would get a job just to buy a sweet! They would taste the sweet and then put it in their pocket to save for later! 1V had an eventful time in the Victorian school, where Mr Griffiths made us learn and recite the alphabet… backwards! LEGGING IT On Sunday, Heidi took part in the Race for Life, for Cancer Research. Over the last year Heidi has gained a lot more understanding on what the money can do, after her Nan was diagnosed with cancer, just over a year ago. She wanted to take part in the race after seeing the advert on the tv. She asked lots of questions and was so excited to take part! She set a target of £100 and exceeded this, raising a total of just over £200! She was very emotional on the day but put her all into completing the race and managed it in exactly an hour - with her mom running with her! She is very proud to have raised so much money for such a good cause and cannot wait to take part next year [Ed - Great effort Heidi and we are all proud of you!]

Thanks to Heidi’s mum for the story.

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS November 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Ten Excellence Through Partnership

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Football partnership! Girls’ football.

BLAST On Thursday 14th October, a group of Year 5 & 6 girls travelled to Sandwell Academy to participate in the ‘Girls' Football Partnership Day'. The day was organised by the Sandwell Girls Football Development Lead, hosted by Sandwell Academy and delivered by Sandwell College Girls in partnership with West Bromwich Albion Women's FC. The Sandwell College Girls put on lots of fun football games for the girls to enjoy and they all had a blast! A great way to boost the girls confidence as they now go on to participate in the Girls After School Club after half term! In other football news -The Abbey football team continue their winning streak as they beat Shireland Hall 19-0! WILD & WINDY Year 2 had a blustery visit to Weston-Super-Mare on the windiest day of the year so far. This did not stop them having an amazing day, it just added to the excitement. After a noisy, fun-filled coach journey, the children arrived at the beach. We found a sheltered area where the children built sandcastles with moats: dug holes to fill with sea water; chased seagulls and drew pictures in the sand. Shells were collected and used to decorate them too. During this time the children went off to ride the donkeys; some children were very brave conquering their fears and having a go. Sienna said, " I loved riding the donkeys, it was amazing!" Next the chips arrived for us all to eat (including the seagulls) followed by a scrumptious ice lolly. We all certainly ate enough. We also compared Weston super Mare to Bearwood using our geographical skills. Thanks to Mrs .Johnson for the story. [Ed - thanks to our parent helpers who made the day successful too!]

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS November 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Eleven Excellence Through Partnership

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Barging around! Canal trip.

NARROW BOATS Year three were back on the road this week, visiting the canal narrow boats of Dudley. For many children it was the first time of being on a canal boat, made more exciting by being underground for part of the journey. The canal trip brought to life the role of the ‘Navvy’ who they have been studying. [Navvies were the men who actually built railways and canals. ... The word “navvy” came from the word navigator. By the mid-C19th – the height of railway mania – there were 250,000 navvies throughout the country.] Cleo and Harriet in 3V really enjoyed the trip and learnt a lot through the day. They loved the feeling of the boat and were surprised that the barges managed to get through the narrow space. Thanks to Mrs Vickers for the story. REMEMBRANCE Everyone at Abbey observed a two-minute silence in their classrooms, Thursday 11th November. In an age appropriate way we all took the time to reflect upon the importance of this event. Years two and six have also completed some Art & Design work as a mark of respect.

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk

BB8Y LENS November 2021 Vol 8: Issue No. Twelve Excellence Through Partnership

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B67 5LT At school

GREAT WEEK @ HOME While half of Year 6 were having the time of their life in Plas Gwynant, the rest of Year 6 had a fun- filled, creative week at school. World War Art To commemorate Remembrance Day this year, we have made a display based on World War Art. The children created their own watercolour backgrounds and used Indian ink to create the silhouettes of various people who served in the war. Scarecrows Over the first few days of the week, the children designed and made their own scarecrows. They worked in groups to design a theme for their scarecrow. Plenty of fun was had along with a playground filled with hay, much to Mr Edward’s delight. Forest school During Forest school, with Mr Pogson, the children built their own dens and a fire pit over at the Infants. Mr Pogson built a rope ladder and they all had a go at climbing it. There were plenty of mud pies being made and lots of scavenging for natural materials. All of this happened under the watchful eye of the curious, resident fox. Blackwell Adventure On Thursday, we visited Blackwell Adventure park, where the children experienced some amazing adventurous activities such as: Indoor rock climbing, grass sledging, go-carting, tree- trekking and many children plucked up the courage to ride the giant zip-line. Thanks to Mrs. Falconer for the story.

Have you got a paragraph of good news to share? Write in under 100 words, attach a picture and your story may be published. All submissions to [email protected] or [email protected]

www.abbeyfederation.co.uk