Headmaster's Welcome
Headmaster's News, Friday 29th November, 2019
Nov 29, 2019
Friday 29th November, 2019
School News
Parent Power!
Congratulations to the whole Highfield Community for achieving our highest ever position *SIXTH* in the country and *FIRST* in the North West in The Sunday Times Parent Power listings. This is our highest ever position, our second year in the Top Ten and our ninth year in the top thirty. This level of consistency has only been achieved by three other schools in the country. The Sunday Times has also given us permission to use their Top Ten logo.
3M Assembly
Thank you, 3M, for delivering such an eloquent and interesting assembly about The Blitz and the Second World War. You told us about the sequence of events that led up to The Blitz as well as how people prepared for the bombing with Anderson shelters and gas masks. I enjoyed listening to the letters that you had written as evacuees and your performance of the song ‘Run Rabbit Run!’ You certainly knew a great deal of information about the Home Front during the Second World War and your interest in the subject really shone through throughout the assembly. Thank you to Mrs Morrice for organising the assembly and well done, 3M!
1D Assembly
Thank you, 1D, for your heart-warming assembly last Friday all about your families.
The school loved listening to you talk about each member of your family as you told us funny stories and what each person is like. I also really enjoyed the poems and family pictures. Once again, Mrs Davidson delighted the school by including audience participation and a shark mask for Mr Sheppeck and Mr Duke (Daddy sharks!). Well done, 1D, for speaking with such confidence in front of a very large audience.
Firefighters visit Year 2
On Wednesday 20th November, Year 2 were visited by 3 firefighters who came to talk to them about what to do if they had a fire at home and how to make a ‘Fire Plan’.
Here are some of the things they learnt:
You should crawl on the floor when getting away from fire because smoke rises up. Drew
When there’s a fire, go straight out of the door and if you have pets inside, leave them for the firefighters to get. Tabitha
Don’t plug in too many things in one place as it could cause a fire. Toby
Test whether there is a fire behind a door with the back of your hand. Haniyah
If you don’t have a smoke alarm, the fire service will install them for free. Samira
We really enjoyed learning how to keep safe, especially when we were role playing what to do in a fire and some of us got to dress-up as fire fighters!
Children In Need
Thank you to all the children and parents for supporting Children in Need. The children came in an array of weird and wonderful outfits. We raised £232.
Highfield Art on Display in the Community
Please can we say a big thank you to Dr Kulkarni at St Fillans Medical Centre in Penwortham and Dr Ali and Kirin Patel at Guttridge Medical Centre in Preston for allowing us to display our children’s work. The staff and patients were all very impressed with their artwork. Please visit our Facebook pages to see the work on display.
Celebrating Highfield Priory School’s Success
We are looking for banner sites to celebrate our recent success in The Sunday Times and to advertise our next Open Day.
If you have a residential property, a business or a piece of land on a main road that you would be happy for us to use, please could you let the school office know. Thank you for your continued support.
Nursery News
We have been focusing on our physical skills in the past two weeks: jumping, hopping, skipping, running and tip-toeing in our music and movement sessions in the dance studio. It has been great fun!
Technology has also been a focal point; the children have enjoyed hunting for QR codes in the Nursery, scanning them and then identifying the shapes found.
Of course, we have also been getting very messy! We have had numbers in jelly, shaving foam and paint and also teabags and teapots in the water area. Alongside this, we have a new large sand area which allows the children to explore and move in a variety of ways, developing both their core and gross motor skills.
Christmas has come to Nursery! The children have loved decorating the Nursery today, ready for the upcoming festive period. We have our Christmas story book Advent Calendar ready for next week. We can’t wait!
News from the Sports Field
Football
It has been a busy time on the sporting front at Highfield recently. Last week saw the senior teams play two fixtures. In the first set of fixtures, we played our friends from Oakhill College. The afternoon became a round robin tournament and the boys acquitted themselves very capably, showing good team spirit and a great deal of skill.
On Friday, we visited Sale United’s ground to play Forest Park in the ISA Cup (first round). The team was victorious 2 – 0 although it was our poorest performance for a while. We missed a good number of chances and we were not as fluent as usual. Sam and Abdullah were the stand-out players in the game. The highlight of the game was the first goal. It came from Abdullah, a long-range effort that was smashed into the top right corner. I was the referee and was standing behind him when he struck it. It was a thing of beauty!
This week, the Year 4 team played their first serious, competitive game for school. They lost 6-3 in the ISA Cup to a very experienced Grange side. I was really pleased with the attitude that the team displayed. At one point, we fought back from 3 – 1 down to get the score level. We can take our experiences from playing against a well-equipped outfit and work on our weaknesses for our next major tournament in February. This process will start on Wednesday with a game at Rossall.
Football v Rossall
All the boys from Years 4-6 travelled to Rossall on Wednesday. This was the first time we had taken all three year groups out together! I was very pleased with the boys’ organisation, before and after the game, especially Year 4 who were very self-sufficient which really bodes well for fixtures to come. All the matches were competitive with the boys working hard, particularly in defence, competing for every ball. Year 4, once again, impressed by drawing both games 2-2. It was a very enjoyable afternoon for the children and the staff. Thank you to all those parents who helped with the transport of the children.
ISA Swimming Gala
On Saturday 16th November, the ISA Swimming Gala took place in Macclesfield. The level of competition was extremely high with some outstanding swimmers taking part. Out of the 16 schools taking part, Nandini came 4th overall in Breaststroke, 2nd in Butterfly and 7th in Freestyle. Brooke was 9th overall in Backstroke. Well done, girls! Mrs Parsons
Rochdale Swimming Gala
A team of children from Years 4, 5 and 6 took part in a Swimming Gala in Rochdale; for some of our Year 4 swimmers it was their first gala. We gained five 1st places, eight 2nd places and seven 3rd places in events ranging from individual races to the medley relay. Highfield came 2nd overall, well done everyone! Mrs Parsons
Netball v Oakhill by Ayesha
On Wednesday 20th November, 9 excited girls played incredibly well against Oakhill. After a trip on the motorway, full of laughing and singing, we arrived at our destination. Our warm- up was led by Alaia before playing our netball match. There was some excellent shooting from Alaia, Inas, Reya and Talia as well as great performances from everyone. Unfortunately, we lost 3-11. We all enjoyed the delicious refreshments which were generously offered by Oakhill. A huge thank you to Oakhill, Mrs Parsons and Mr Forrest.
Preston Schools’ Indoor Athletics
Last Friday, 18 Year 5s and 6s travelled to UCLAN to take part in the annual Indoor Athletics competition. The children took part in a variety of track and field events, including relays, hurdles, throwing and jumping; competing against 25 other primary schools. The boys started the morning with their track events while the girls completed their field events. After a short lunch break, the boys and girls swapped. There were some great individual performances and some excellent teamwork from the children who all had a fantastic day. Highfield was awarded a special trophy for designing a flag which portrayed Olympic values and spirit. Well done to Hiba, Lucie, Nandini and Sasha who all contributed to the winning design. Well done everybody for a great day of Athletics.
Merits and Awards
Week ending 22.11.19
RB: Abu 1D: The Whole Class 1W: Eliza 2E: Ali 2J: Lily
3M: Heba 4D: Luca 4S: James 5H: Isabelle 5M: Tim 6P: Lucie
Monitor of the week: Alex
High 5 Award: Arianna
Week ending 29.11.19
RB: Mohini 1D: Zarlala 1W: Summer 2E: Johnny 2J: Samira
3M: The Whole Class 4D: Moin 4S: Muhammad 5H: Lameesa 5M: Sara 6P: Ayesha
Monitor of the week: Inas
Reminders
Celebration Assembly
Next Friday is an opportunity for the school to celebrate any of the children’s achievements outside school. If your child has any awards or certificates that they have earned away from school, please could they bring them in early next week in preparation for Friday.
Dates for the Diary
Thursday 5th December – Pre-School Christmas Show
Tuesday 10th December, 2pm – Nativity Wednesday 11th December, 6pm - Nativity
Friday 13th December – Christmas Party Day
Tuesday 17th December, 6pm – Carol Service
Fact of the Fortnight
The composer who sold the most CDs in 2016 was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
Do you have an interesting fact that you would like to share with the school? If so please bring it to Mr Duke next week!
