This term in Pre-Reception and Reception Class we have been working around the topic of ‘Food’. This has included thinking about a healthy diet, finding out about where our food comes from and discussing our likes and dislikes. We have done lots of cooking and we have explored several different books with a food theme. However, not everything has gone to plan!

The trouble began when we started to look at the story of Supertato – a potato on a mission to save his vegetable friends from his enemy ‘The Evil Pea’ who had escaped from the freezer. Supertato sent us a letter explaining that his friends were in trouble and could we help him by making models of himself to deter The Evil Pea. We agreed and made some fantastic Supertato models.

The next day we received another letter from Supertato thanking us for our models but warning us that The Evil Pea was still on the loose. Could we help to spot him and if we did could we return him to the freezer? We did find The Evil Pea, and his friends, stuck in some jelly. We decided it would be kind to rescue the peas from the jelly before returning them to the freezer but we weren’t sure which tool to use to recover them with. We tried paper straws, plastic straws, pipe cleaners and our very best fine motor skills before agreeing that the best tool for the job was the lollypop sticks. We safely recovered all the peas from the jelly and returned them to the freezer. Supertato was delighted and said we were ‘The Superhero Children of La Garenne’!

After the incident with The Evil Pea we hoped life in our class would settle down and get back to normal…but, just a few days later, disaster struck again!

We started to explore the story of The Gingerbread Man. Finding out about the characters, sequencing the events, reading recipes and making our own decorative gingerbread men. The day after we made our gingerbread men we discovered that they had all run away! We didn’t know where to look to find them so we wrote some missing posters describing each gingerbread man and went around school asking people to look out for them.

Day by day more and more of the gingerbread men were discovered. These are some of the places they were found; in the trophy cabinet in Beau Site, in Danielle’s bag, in a desk in Jenny’s Class, in Alison’s Class and even on the ski slopes!

We were so grateful to everyone for finding our cheeky gingerbread men that we wrote lots of thank you cards and delivered them around school.

Thank you everyone for your help. We think you are all Superheroes too!

World Book Day is a celebration of authors, illustrators, books and (most importantly) it`s a celebration of reading. Over 100 countries get involved each year and this is the 21st year there has been a World Book Day. On 1st March 2018, children of all ages will come together to appreciate reading.

There are some great online stories that your child can listen to at home http://www.worldbookday.com/storytime-online/

Oxford Owls is a fabulous website which parents can sign up to for free, there are lots of ebooks, as well as games and top tips for parents and students www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home

Here are some of our students and staff talking about their favourite books.

Jane Waterman - Academic Administrator

Snow flower and the secret fan - by Lisa See

In a little under four weeks the children will be on their school Easter holidays. When they return it is time to prepare for the school trips abroad for Years 5-9. The children will be visiting a variety of countries including the USA and Portugal to name but a few. It is also important that the families read the information provided and make sure that all items of clothing requested are included for the return from the Easter holidays.

What an interesting weekend we had! The weather went from cold to freezing and we had to change the activities scheduled for the day on Sunday. When doing so, I allowed the Junior car designing club to continue their projects. One of the students came to see me to tell me that he had designed his own website during the two hours! I had a look and it was excellent! Very proud of him and what he has achieved! Why not have a look at what he did. https://squid5614.wixsite.com/project-e/about

In the year 2000, February 21st was named by the United Nations as the International Mother Language Day. On this day, schools and other organisations all over the world celebrate the multitude of diverse languages that are such an important part of our global society. English and French are very much the working languages of La Garenne, but the members of our school community speak a wide range of other Languages.

It is part of our Mission as a school to develop global citizenship in our students. Celebrating the enormous diversity of world languages is part of this, and being able to communicate effectively is one of the keys to international mindedness. Consequently, here at La Garenne we have been raising awareness of the importance of mother Languages. In Tuesday’s assembly the younger students shared common phrases with the rest of the group, spoken in their Mother language. Everyone had great fun trying to repeat the phrases, with some achieving this more successfully than others! They all then participated enthusiastically in a quiz about world languages. In the Junior classes, the students discussed International Mother Language Day in class, and participated in a language-themed quiz.

At La Garenne, we promote English and French, as these are our languages of instruction. Furthermore, many of our students come to the school specifically to consolidate their abilities in these two languages for further study. However, as part of an international education it is important to appreciate and cultivate mother languages. We have guidelines for when and under what circumstances students may speak in their first language. For the International Mother Language Day the students were authorised to speak in any language as long as they were not in the classroom. It was refreshing to see how well they adapted to this situation. No one was excluded, as the students naturally spoke in English if anyone present did not speak their language. At the same time, when small groups of one particular nationality were together, it was evident that they enjoyed conversing in their mother language.

Overall it was a successful, informative and enjoyable day and we are looking forward to celebrating more international days of this kind as the year progresses.