Bute Bulletin 608

Dear Parents,

It has been another busy and somewhat challenging week having to contend with Covid-19 related issues. We are looking forward to the return of most of Year 3 next week and a huge well done to the girls and teachers for slipping into Remote Learning so seamlessly. It was so lovely to see their faces in our whole school assembly this morning and even hear a few little singing voices coming through.

We were very proud of our girls during our Remembrance Day Ceremony and particularly our Performing Arts Ambassadors, who read In Flanders Field with such decorum, and the Art Ambassadors who created and laid a beautiful handmade wreath during the ceremony. We were lucky enough to have a professional trumpet player to sound The Last Post.

This week we celebrated Maths Week England and the girls in 4W topped off the week with a marvellous mathematical masterpiece in their class assembly! Please see a video clip here.

We were disappointed not to see Year 5 parents in person at our curriculum evening and supper party this week. However, I hope parents found the online version informative.

A huge “thank you” to the new Uniform Sales Team and all the parents who helped put on an ad-hoc uniform sale this week in response to high demand, and raised a staggering £2000 for the HC Charities at the same time.

I just wanted to give a couple of reminders regarding packed lunches next week on Thursday 18th November, and Fun Day Friday linked to our Christmas Fair donations on Friday 19th November. Please do read the emails sent every Thursday.

Wishing you a very happy weekend

Sian

This week’s Whole School and Year Group Letters:

• Y5 Parents Independent Schools Show Flyer
• ALL PARENTS: Uniform and Fun Day Friday Information
• LS Trip to Lyric Theatre
• MS/US Christmas Pantomime – The Lyric
• COVID Outbreak Management plan

Please log into our Parent Hub regularly for letters and forms to complete.

CLARION CALL

Christmas Decorations

As we’re gradually getting into the Christmas spirit, we would like to let the parents of new girls know of a lovely tradition that takes place at Bute House every year. All new girls are invited to bring in a Christmas decoration which they can hang on our Christmas tree. This decoration then stays at school and the girls hang it each year until they move on to secondary school. Please make sure that this is clearly labelled with their name.

Year 1 & 2 Homework (Seesaw)

Mr Behrooz and Mrs Howard have posted new homework menus for this half term full of interesting tasks to complement the work that your daughters are doing in class. The home learning tasks are short, fun activities which have been carefully designed by your daughter’s teacher to reinforce what she is learning in school. Please aim to do one activity each week, the weekly spelling task as well as reading daily with them.

Thank you for your continued support and we look forward to seeing their submissions on Seesaw!

Year 5 Writing

This week in Year 5 English lessons, the students finished reading The Princess’ Blankets, by Carol Ann Duffy. Inspired by the story, the girls have been writing their own alternative versions, putting into practice all of the literary devices they have learnt about so far this year. Brilliant work Year 5!

Learning Powers in Year 1

Year 1 have been using their Emerald (persistence & reflectiveness) and Topaz (flexibility & collaboration) Learning Powers to solve Barvember questions this week. Working with a partner, they have used cubes to help visualise the problems before solving them. We were really impressed that the girls were able to build the models and choose the correct operation to find the solution.  Well done Year 1!

Year 3 Online Learning

As you know, all our Y3 pupils had to stay at home for part of this week.

However, they were still all smiles during their online learning. They did a fantastic job using their Learning Powers and we are so proud of them! We are looking forward to being back in school and in the classroom on Monday.

4W Class Assembly

This Friday, our Maths Week England Assembly was led by the girls in 4W. It seemed very fitting that our Maths assembly fell on a date with a palindromic number – 12/11/21! The girls shared some highlights of the fantastic maths activities that have been taking place across the school and performed the wonderful maths story, The Lion’s Share. As the girls said, the story contained lots of maths…and lots of cake! They loved how the story involved doubling, halving, fractions, measure and time and thought it would be the perfect story to share this week.

Year 6 Science

Year 6 have been continuing looking at our bodies in more detail and understanding its intricacies. This week the girls got hands on with the organs involved in the respiratory system. They explored the heart and its chambers, as well as the lungs, with one girl describing them “like touching a squishy!”.

Tootoot

We have recently gone live with our new pupil voice and safeguarding programme Tootoot.

Girls from years 3 to 6 have access to this via a unique username and login. Tootoot is helping us, as staff, to address concerns even quicker, and allows pupils to voice things that may be worrying them, in a format that is easier, and gives them more confidence. Girls can access Tootoot by clicking on the parent area of the school website. Here, the girls will be prompted to log in, and once in, they can type their concern. Mrs Fildes and myself will then be notified, and we can take appropriate action quickly. As Tootoot is a web based platform, the girls can access it on any device, both in and outside of school.

For more information please click on this link where a short video explains how Tootoot can make it easier for your daughter to express her worries.

Mr Roberts (E-Safety coordinator)

Maths Week England

It has been an exciting week at Bute House as we have been enjoying Maths Week England. The aim of the week is to share in the joy of mathematics and that has certainly been happening across our school. Here are some highlights:

Lower School

In Reception, the girls enjoyed finding symmetry in nature and even created some of their own beautiful, symmetrical butterflies. The girls in Year 1 have been working hard to solve some Barvember problems using bar models, and Year 2 enjoyed a reasoning challenge where they had to explain to their partner using only Base 10. Some partners were particularly sceptical and challenged each other to give deeper, clearer explanations.

Middle School

Despite being at home, Year 3 joined in the fun by looking at some interesting photographs and asking “What’s the Maths in that?”

Year 4 took their Maths lesson outside to use their estimation and measuring skills. The girls estimated how long it would take to run 1 kilometre.  Estimates ranged from 5-20 minutes.  Using the trundle wheels, they measured the playground and found it to be 25m in length. They then went on to take turns to run 25m until they had covered 1km. It turns out that Year 4 can run 1km in 4 minutes and 30 seconds!

Upper School

Year 5 took part in The Bullion Heist, an interactive escape room. They used their Maths skills to solve a range of problems, working their way through the adventure and ultimately collecting the correct numbers to unlock the stolen bullions! On Friday, some girls in Year 5 and 6 also took part in the Primary Maths Challenge. The challenge is designed to encourage enthusiasm, boost confidence in mathematics and show the different way questions can be asked. Well done to all the girls who took part!

What a fantastic week!

Year 3 New Science Unit – Light and Shadows

This week, Year 3 started their new Science unit ‘Light and Shadow’. In their Science lesson, the girls learnt about the nature of white light and investigated how light rays are refracted through different surfaces. Light travels and bounces off surfaces into our eyes. More specifically, when light travels from air through water, glass or anything that lets light through, it gets bent. This is called refraction.

Nibbles Story

Inspired by our Learning Powers Assembly last week, the girls went on to write a story or a poem featuring Nibbles and how he used his Sapphire Power. Here is a selection of some of their wonderful work.

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