Brill Church Of England School

Whole School Blog

27th February 2023

Autumn's House Point Winners - Bernwode!

Bernwode spent the afternoon at the newly refurbished park in Brill as a recognition of their hard work and commitment towards earning the most house points in the Autumn Term! Children collect house points for showing our school values of Hope, Honesty, Courage and Compassion. Although it was a very delayed celebration, it was well worth it and the children had a great time!

I wonder who will be Spring term's house point winners?!?

World Religion Day February 10^th 2023

From Noah’s Ark to Japanese fried rice offerings, from beautiful mosque inspired Islamic tiles to Tibetan dancing, from Buddhist forest school art to Jewish Kosher food, from reimagined Khanda mosaics to Hindu Gods and SO much more…… All this has opened our eyes to how religions link us together across the world. We have learnt to celebrate our differences and respect each other’s beliefs while still having lots of fun.

Brill School’s World Religion Day has been a brilliant success thanks to the impeccable behaviour and enthusiasm of all the children and the hard work of all the staff. What a fantastic way to end the half term!

Brill Church of England School

Children In Need

Children came dressed in their own clothes and spots to promote ‘Children In Need’, the school raised a total of £260, thank you to everyone who donated.

Christmas Jumper Day

It was lovely to see all the children in their festive jumpers on Friday 9th December, Christmas joy ran through the school. The school raised a total of £155.10, which will be donated to ‘Save The Children’. Thank you to everyone who donated.

BMX Growth Mindset Workshop

The PTA have funded the recent visit to school by the BMX, Skate & Scoot Academy! Mike Mullen, academy founder and BMX champion, treated all the children to a motivational assembly and trick display followed by a workshop for years 5 and 6.

Mike's approach is, “designed to empower children by role-modelling a growth mindset approach and encouraging children to stretch their comfort zones. Children are taught to self motivate, close the 'I Can't Door' and use positive self talk.” He taught the children to keep on 'Flearning' (to learn by failing).

Mike's display wowed the children and even some of the teachers got involved with the tricks (ask your children!). The day seemed to be enjoyed by everyone and Mrs White described it as 'incredibly inspiring... phenomenal'!

The BMX, Skate and Scoot Academy with hopefully be returning to school next year... watch this space.

Our Jubilee Celebrations

On Wednesday 25th June the whole school celebrated the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. The whole school were off timetable for the day and took part in creative activities that enriched and celebrated the whole curriculum. This included designing and making crowns, historical activities, cookery tasks and much more. Each class took part in planting an oak tree in the school grounds to mark this memorable day and recognised that it is their responsibility to look after and care for the trees for their time at Brill.

We were amazed by the efforts of the children’s costumes and the buzz in the school was fantastic. A truly memorable day!

Click on the images below to see them more clearly.

Recovery Curriculum

Our focus this term on the children's return to school has been to ensure that they have re-established their love for learning and have felt safe and happy at school, all of which will make them more effective learners. We want to make sure that the children do not hear that they are ‘The lost generation’. We agreed with a view shared by the British Psychological Society that ‘…..the notion that children need to catch up or are 'behind' at school due to the pandemic reinforces the idea that children have 'one shot' at their education and puts them under even more pressure to perform academically after what has been a challenging and unprecedented time for everyone.’

We were heartened by the comments of the recently appointed Education Recovery Commissioner Sir Kevan Collins: “We have to be bold and ambitious,” he said. “The recovery needs to be long term, sustained and far reaching. Catch-up is not the language I’m using. It’s much more about recovery over time. Catch-up is part of it but that is not going to be enough.”

We agree and believe that children need to recover not catch up. They need nurture, laughter, play and meaningful, exciting experiences. We know that learning starts with curiosity which starts with feeling safe. If we focus on that in the first instance, we are certain that the rest will come.

Please click here to watch a short video from Mrs Oliver and Miss Butler who have been leading on our recovery curriculum. This will give you a flavour of the work that they have been doing to support pupils and staff across the school.

Year 6 Play

Year 5 and 6 amazed us all this week with their stunning Wizard of Oz show. In just 5 weeks, the children learnt dozens of dances, made props, painted the set, created stunning costumes, learnt hundreds of lines and built (and then re-built) the stage! The result was a high-class show full of beautiful singing, dancing, great characters and fun. With Year 5 supporting with their wonderful chorus singing, the performances to both the school and parents were truly magical. We're so proud of all the children involved, and incredibly grateful to all the adults who helped ensure it was a success: Mr Dickson, Mrs Worthington, Mrs Ellis, Mr Horton (and his tech assistant Oliver!), Mr Birt, Jenny Davis, Mrs Wilkinson and all the staff who helped backstage. One of the key themes of the Wizard of Oz is the power of friendship. Year 6 are a shining example of how even in the toughest of times, they can rely on each other and pull off something truly amazing!

Meet our new Vicar

We are very excited to be introducing Brill's new vicar, Gemma Beesley. We already have lots of exciting plans for September to link with the church and to further develop SIAMS at Brill school with the support of Gemma. We are very excited to develop this relationship with the school community and pupils. Click here to view a welcome video of Gemma introducing herself.

Swap Day

On Monday all year groups visited their new teachers for swap morning. The buzz and excitement was felt throughout the school and what a brilliant morning we had! It was lovely for the children to become familiar with their new classroom and get to know the teachers. There was circle times, creative activities, playing and lots of chatting! All teachers are very much looking forward to meeting their new classes in September.

We were very impressed with how well the children transitioned and embraced the experiences in their new class. Both the staff and children have reported how much they enjoyed this session and we plan to offer other opportunities for the children to meet their new teacher prior to the Summer holidays.

Click on the gallery below to see photos of the children across the school.

Sports Week

Opening Ceremony

We were very lucky to have XYZ music at school on Friday morning to perform a concert to the whole school. The children interacted in the concert and it started our race day off with a bang!

The concert was followed by a performance from the winning dancers of Monday's dance competition. Rushbed were the winning team on Monday and therefore a group of Year 3 and Year 6 children performed dances that they'd choreographed to the whole school, they were incredible! Well done to both groups who represented Rushbed wonderfully.

Year 6 - Rushbed

Year 3

Year R

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

Year 6

Eco School's Silver Award

Mrs Keeping and her Eco Councillors (with the support of children across the school) have achieved the Eco School's Silver Award. We are very proud of the children at Brill School and hugely grateful of Mrs Keeping's passion and drive in this area of the curriculum.

This month's value is 'Action' and the children have been considering how their small actions can have a BIG impact. We would like to share with you a video that we have put together which shows the work the children have been doing recently on 'Biodiversity'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAt1ofCDFRk&list=UU4GeT47oGL-FOktY8Ju8qTA&index=2

Whole School Assemblies

It was such a pleasure to deliver a whole school assembly face to face for the first time in a very long time last Friday 11th June. The whole school congregated outside, sitting in their paired year group bubbles to celebrate our 'Stars of the Week' and to collate our house points. The assembly finished with an opportunity for the children to reflect on what had been their most enjoyable experience back at school.

There is something very special about congregating as a whole school and listening to the many success across the year groups. We were very proud of all of the children who demonstrated our value of respect beautifully throughout the assembly.

Stars of the Week

Elizabeth (Y1), Maisy (Y2), Isabel (Y3), Grace (Y4), Gabriel (Y5), Harriet (Y6)