In the sweltering heat on Wednesday afternoon, the children from Year 3 and Year 4 Chatterbooks, along with Mrs. Berry and Mrs van Uffelen, walked to our fabulous local bookshop, Waterstones. Whilst there, they learnt about the day to day running of a bookshop and how the books are laid out within the shop. They were also lucky enough to go behind the scenes and visit the stockroom, where they all helped to unpack brand new books and put them in their rightful place on the shop floor. "We had a great time at Waterstones, sorting out and unpacking books. We learnt about many new authors and books. Everyone loved it! I recommend visiting there." (Alex S. Herons Class)

On Tuesday and Thursday last week, children from KS2 represented our school in District Sports. The children competed against other large schools from within St. Albans in a variety of athletic activities. We are very proud of every child who attended and extremely impressed with how they represented our school. Miss Steventon's daughter has become our chief mascot with the children being great role models to not only her, but other schools by showing great respect, teamwork, excitement and sportsmanship. 

Y2 Chatterbooks were lucky enough to receive an invitation to the CBA in London. This is the only award voted for by children only. They were super excited to meet the authors of the books they had read and voted for in school. They were delighted that their favourite picture book 'I Dare You' by Reese Wykes won an award. It was a great day out. 

World Games

 

Well done to all our students who took part in the World Games hosted by Oaklands College. They all tested their sporting skills and took part in a wide range of sporting activities including synchronised dance, rugby, football, netball and athletics. They represented our school very well and made us proud! 

Big congratulations to Yasin G.! This term Friendship Award was given to Yasin based on a letter we have received from his class friends  Amy Q. and Thomas L.

 

He was nominated and awarded because "he has such a positive attitude, he always thinks of others before himself and he has the biggest smile!" said Amy Q.

Our Choir children had the opportunity to take part in the largest children's choir in the world. They all were singing their hearts out together with the other 7200 children on the night. Young Voices is designed to unify primary school children from across the region, boost their confidence and provide lifelong memories for them and their families. It was an amazing performance and nothing can prepare you for the sound of thousands of children singing together in harmony. We would like to say big thank you to all parents who came and supported their children, to Mrs Moore for doing the extensive admin and a special thank you to Mrs  Wild, Miss Miller for teaching the songs and Mrs Cooper for giving up their time so the children could have such a fabulous experience. Young  Voices 2019....... here we come!

Well done to Max who was awarded this term Friendship Award based on this letter:  

 

Dear Mrs Longhurst,

 

I would like to nominate Max for the friendship award.

 

This term Max has been a fantastic friend to all the other children in the Ospreys. On a daily basis, he gets on well with everyone, includes everyone, is quick to celebrate others' successes and forgive others' mistakes. Most impressively, he has also shown that he will put his friends' happiness before his own.

On one occasion, he risked the possibility of difficult consequences for himself in order to help one of his friends.

On occasions like this when he has shown himself to be an amazing friend, he has been humble and not wanted any fuss to be made about the kindness and courage he has shown.

On top being a fantastic friend, Max is also a great role model for younger children in school being polite, hard-working and positive.

Mandeville and the Ospreys are very proud to have him and I think he would be a really deserving recipient of a friendship award.

Yours sincerely,

Mrs. Lea (on behalf of the Ospreys)

Over the last few weeks, 15 enthusiastic Year Six children have been working really hard with Mrs Berry and staff at Verulamium Museum in preparation for National Museum Takeover Day. On Thursday, some of the children went to speak live on air at Radio Verulam, to promote the event. If you want to hear their interview, visit:  http://www.radioverulam.com/audio-clip/museum-takeover/  You can also tune in next Thursday 23rd November at 11am to hear the rest of the children discuss how the exciting day went. 

“Today was so exciting because we were live on at Radio Verulam.  There were microphones and head phones all over the place. The radio presenter asked us loads of questions about what we were doing at Verulamium Museum and all of us spoke at the radio station.  It was an amazing time.” (Libby and Carrie, Ospreys)

Community Champions

On the 2^nd of November, Y4 pupils Mansi, Patrycja, Daisy and Eszter were given a very special award and became our Community Champions.

Without being asked, they all decided that it would be a good idea to start collecting litter blown into our school‘s Sensory Garden. “We would go out at lunch and break time regularly and see if there was anything to pick up. It made us feel good!” said Mansi.

Well done all and thank you for making our school environment nice and clean!

 

We had a great Sports Week at the end of June. Early Years had their main event on 27 June and were really lucky to avoid the rain until the end. The older school had their main event on 29 June. It was a new format and the children took part in different activities including crawling and skipping.

 

All the children....and teachers enjoyed taking part in the Sporting Week !