www.westgate.hants.sch.uk Phone: 01962 854757

No.131 Autumn Term 2

Learning Together - Achieving Excellence

18th December 2020

Dear Parents/Carers,

Please find below the cross-country results for the

whole school. The completed laps were all added

together and the grand total over the whole of the

Primary Phase is:

1st WATER – 587

2nd EARTH - 515

3rd AIR - 487

4th FIRE - 484

Well done everyone it was a great team effort.

Thank you and have a well-deserved Christmas

break. Mrs Pawsey

We say fond farewells and thank you to Miss

Carter Y6 and Miss Jobson Y1 who are leaving us

today. We wish you both well for the future.

The results of the Bake off are in.

Congratulations! Primary winners are:

Best Christmas cake - Lauren S Y4

Best Gingerbread structure - The Reynolds

brothers

Best Yule Log - Bronwyn S-J Y4

Citizens of the Week Harry R for being helpful to all of the

adults

Albie M for developing his independence

Charlotte for being a thoughtful friend

Marigold for being a fantastic role model

Phoebe K for her enthusiasm in learning

Keira B - for being a great friend to many.

Cameron E, for taking responsibility for

his work and for following instructions

Rohan K for being a kind and caring

friend

Ava W for being a good friend to

everyone

Joe J for the responsible behaviour he

always shows

Nathan H for noticing others on the

playground and trying to help

Oscar M for being a Westgate friend

Eloise, Thomas S, Isla & Jules - for

showing tremendous initiative in creating

rules for a new playground game

involving the whole year group

Freddie R for showing an excellent

understanding of what it means to be a

good friend to others

Learner of the Week

Rowan ~ Indie A-T

Beech ~ Wolf S

Willow ~ Evie B and Archie H

Birch ~ Phoebe H

Elm ~ Rory H, Ben L and Felix A

Pine ~ Csenge B & Edoardo P

Chestnut ~ Tobechi

Larch ~ Jude L

Lime ~ Janki G

Hazel ~ Gwyneth H

Sycamore ~ Toby G & Finn S

Maple ~ Harry K, Holly

www.westgate.hants.sch.uk Phone: 01962 854757

No.131 Autumn Term 2

Learning Together - Achieving Excellence

18th December 2020

Year Group News

Year R

We are so proud of the children in our

Nativity performance. They all chose the

character they wanted to be and enjoyed

acting out the story with their peers. We hope

you all enjoyed seeing it on Tapestry too and

the children have been sharing their songs

and dances with you.

From January, the children will be changing

into PE kits for our PE sessions. Please support

your child by ensuring their PE kit is named

and having a practice changing at home.

Grownups at school will be able to support

with tricky buttons, socks, and tights etc so

please don't worry if your child finds some

elements tricky at the moment.

PE Kit

· Plain shorts sleeved T shirt in designated

house colour (blue - Water, purple - Air, green

- Earth, red - Fire)

· Black shorts plus plain black tracksuit

bottoms

· Sports socks – white

· Trainers (not plimsolls – they do not have

enough grip to be safe outside)

· Named PE bag

Year 1

Please continue to practise the coloured

Common Exception Words with your child, as

well as keep reading at home over the

Christmas Holidays. This will benefit them so

much. Continuing maths fluency such as

counting forward and backwards in 1s, 2s and

10s, finding one more one less of numbers

and number bonds of 10 and 20 would also be

amazing if possible.

Talk to your child about the Christmas when

you were a child. What sort of toys did you

play with? Are they the same or different to

their toys? Do you have any Christmas

traditions that you have continued from

your childhood?

Please talk to your child about: What

they have enjoyed most about Year

1 so far

PSA Spotlight

At the end of a wonderful term

we just wanted to say a Massive

Thank You for all your support

with the PSA Christmas

activities. With your help we

have raised over £15,000 for

Westgate School causes, and

we're still counting. Merry

Christmas!!

www.westgate.hants.sch.uk Phone: 01962 854757

No.131 Autumn Term 2

Learning Together - Achieving Excellence

18th December 2020

Thank you so much again. We wish you a very

happy and safe Christmas.

Year 2

We have had a fantastic week in Year 2 with Christmas singing, party games and lots of festive fun! The children have been very creative in writing poetry, including riddles in History to guess the old and new toys. We even had our own class shop to buy toys and calculate the change. The children loved this! This week's spellings: we have been looking at homophones this week and knowing the difference in meanings sea/see, here/hear, to/two/too, blue/blew, one/won etc. We would like to say a huge thank you to all parents for your support over the last term. You have been overwhelmingly kind and helpful with supporting the children's learning at home as well as arriving with smiles each day to keep us all in high spirits! Thank you. We hope you all have a wonderful festive break. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Year 2 Team

Year 3

We have now finished 'The Iron Man', and our

new text next term will be 'The BFG', by Roald

Dahl. To support your child, please practise

using a Junior Dictionary with them. Why not

have timed races, where they beat their

previous time for finding a word? Use the

dictionary for looking up correct spellings of

words, and for finding the meanings of words

they come across in their reading. Please also

keep reading over the Christmas holidays, and

practicing times tables.

Year 4

A huge well done to all the children for a

fantastic term, in quite unusual

circumstances! Everyone has tried their best

and should be proud of what they have

achieved this term. In readiness for January,

if you could get hold of a copy of

Shackleton's Journey (William Grill) for

English and Guided Reading, that would

Please talk to your child about Being kind this Christmas and

what they can do to help others

Please talk to your child about

different 2d and 3d shapes you

might spot when you're out

and about

Please talk to your child

rivers in our local area, in preparation for the Spring

term

Talk to your child about:

using a dictionary.

www.westgate.hants.sch.uk Phone: 01962 854757

No.131 Autumn Term 2

Learning Together - Achieving Excellence

18th December 2020

support the children's learning as this book

will be used daily in the classroom. Please

also keep up the times tables practice over

the Christmas holiday. We wish you all a safe

and happy Christmas and look forward to

welcoming you back in January 2021!

Year 5

Hazel Lime

We have made it to the end of a very busy

term and we could not be more proud of the

children's hard efforts throughout. We have

loved creating mythical creatures and writing

reports on them, using the 'Mythopedia' book

for inspiration. In maths we ended the week

with Christmas themed maths puzzles and

enjoyed working on them in pairs. In our first

week back after the holidays we will be

learning about negative numbers. Our

Christmas party was full of festive fun,

including a visit from Father Christmas with

some fantastic gifts for the classes! We are

really looking forward to starting our new

topic, Earth and Space, next term. We will be

looking at extreme Earth conditions in

Geography and learning about our Solar

System in Science, as well as using quality

topic-linked texts in our English. It wouldn't

hurt to read the first two texts ahead of the

start of term, which are 'Hidden Figures: The

True Story of Four Black Women and The

Space Race' (picture book edition) by Margot

Lee Shetterly & Laura Freeman, and 'The Race

to Space' by Clive Gifford & Paul Daviz.

Spellings for the first week back are:

exaggerate, excellent and existence.

Year 6

Sycamore Maple

This week has definitely been a busy and

exciting one in Year 6. The week started off

on Monday with our visit to the Upper School

DT department where we learnt to use real

saws and electric drills! We have also

completed our Christmas RE unit about angels

and the children have been incredibly

reflective and thoughtful in their response to

this. We have been blown away by the high

standard of their Beetlepedia home learning

projects and they will be proudly displayed in

Lower School for all to see in the new year.

Lorraine Lee Workshop

19.01.21

HELPING CHILDREN WITH HOME

LEARNING

With such busy lives, it is easy for home

learning to become a pressure for both

parents and children. It can result in

arguments, falling out and lack of

Please talk to your child about

anything they know about space

exploration

.

Please talk to your child about

what the highlights of the

autumn term have been for

them.

www.westgate.hants.sch.uk Phone: 01962 854757

No.131 Autumn Term 2

Learning Together - Achieving Excellence

18th December 2020

learning. Parents end up being too

involved, and children become reliant

on their parent's input. In this session,

parents will get some tips on how to

make the whole thing run more

smoothly and to ensure their children

remain responsible for it.

Here is the Eventbrite link:

https://westgatehomelearning.eventbrite

.co.uk

Wishing all our Westgate families a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. We look forward to seeing you all again on Monday 4th January 2021. Take care and keep safe. Thank you for all your

extremely generous gifts and kind words. Your support is much appreciated and

very thoughtful. Do enjoy participating in the Winter Wonderland Walk! The children will be proud to share their

songs which are winging their way to you. We hope our Christmas video gift to you brings smiles and happiness to you

all.

Kind regards,

Mrs Woodall

Head of Primary Phase