Firstly, another big ‘thank you’ to the Millfields community for the many generous donations to the food bank collection before the holiday. The Hackney Food Bank asked us to keep the donations until the first week back as that is a time when they are always in need, so after delivering that, we are now collecting again. If you have any tins, or packets of food, including UHT milk or washing powder and toiletries, please drop them in the basket in the main office from Monday.

Thank you to all the parents and carers in Y2 and Y3 who attended the Maths Whizz workshop with Keli, our Maths Lead on Wednesday. I hope you found it useful, and thank you, as always, for your feedback. There are lots of workshops for parents and carers over the course of this term, so please have a look at the list and call the office to book a place. On Monday 20th, we have our resident CAMHS worker running a repeat session of the very popular workshop from last term, ‘Supporting children to develop self-esteem’, please book in today if you would like to attend.

This week children in Y1, Y3 and Y5 enjoyed lots of additional learning opportunities to enrich their curriculum, including trips, workshops and special visitors to the school. Y1 visited Sutton House as part of their Humanities topic, Time Machine’. They took part in a one-hour workshop that invited them into the Sutton House imaginary time machine, where they met occupants of Sutton House from the last 500 years and had the chance to explore how education, travel and communication have changed over time, comparing and contrasting Hackney in 1535, 1635, 1745 and 1985. The children loved telling me about Hackney in the past when they came back!

Y3 visited the Verulamium Museum in St Albans as part of their History topic on the Romans. The children learned lots and really enjoyed dressing up and looking at and touching Roman artefacts. The staff at the museum were extremely complimentary about the children’s knowledge, their enthusiasm and their behaviour! Well done Y3! Year 5 were very lucky with the weather as they visited the seaside town of Whitstable, in Kent as part of their Geography work on coastal erosion and sea defences, as well as Art work on Turner’s landscapes. These visits really do support the children’s understanding and bringing learning to life.

Teachers have also been preparing for our ‘Creative Week’ sessions during the week beginning 27th January. Thank you to the parents and carers who have volunteered to come in to help. Please call the main office to offer your services or email Judyann, our Art lead on jplatts@millfields.hackey.sch.uk. The children will all be doing creative sessions and producing class and individual art /models based on ‘Art in the Natural World’ and will be an exploration of art and nature, that will be on display and shared at our ‘Creative Night’ scheduled for Monday 3rd February. There will be ticketed sessions between 4pm-7pm, so please buy your tickets from the main office. Adults £1 and accompanied children are free. There are a limited number of tickets, so please buy early to avoid disappointment. As part of the evening celebrations, we are also selling food – lots of the delicious food that your children eat every lunchtime will be on sale. If you could donate any cakes to sell that would also be appreciated. There will be also be drinks on sale during the event. We would love to see you all there.

We are always encouraging the children to wear coats, gloves etc. at playtime and would like you to reinforce this at home please, especially as I read that the weather is set to get much colder towards the end of January… we might even get some snow!

Have a good weekend. Best Wishes, Jane

Happy New Year’ and welcome back to all our children and families. The children have returned well-rested and have been very busy this week. All classes have been talking about their new topics and doing initial pre-assessment activities to make sure that the learning is matched to the needs and interests, and so that challenge and support is considered for all the children in the class. Year 6, Year 2 and Reception classes have also been out on their WOW trips that help to launch the excitement and enquiry about their new learning this term. Year 6 visited Kew Gardens and took part in the “Rainforests: People and Plants” workshop. Y2 took part in a session called ‘A visit with Miss Nightingale’ at the Florence Nightingale Museum, as part of their English and topic work and Reception classes visited the Science Museum to find out more about the planets and space as part of their knowledge and understanding of the world work.

Also this week, the staff have been getting ready for Creative Week which starts on Monday 27^th January. The theme for this year is ‘Art in the Natural World’. The staff have been preparing resources and looking at ideas for the week of activities that are linked to their current Science and Humanities work. They have also been discussing the whole school evening event that will showcase this work that is scheduled to take place on Monday 3^rd February. If you are a creative or artistic parent, grandparent, aunty or uncle who is an artist, sculptor, ceramicist or just an art enthusiast that would like to come in to support us during Creative Week, please contact Judyann Platts: jplatts@millfields.hackney.sch.uk.

Lots of our parent engagement activities start next week-’Come Dine with Us’ and Parent Workshop sessions have already been advertised in the Mag and emailed out for this term. Please call the main office to book a place at any of our events.

As many of you will already know, we work very hard at prioritising pupil, staff and the whole community well-being. The well-being and mental health of pupils and staff is something that we have been working on over the last 2 years, and along with already embedded school-led initiatives and the Hackney WAMHS Project (Well-being and Mental health in Schools), we now have many resources, systems and structures in place that support, guide and nurture the Millfields community. At the beginning of December, the school had a visit from an assessor from the Well-Being Award for Schools that is linked with the National Children’s Bureau.

As a result, we are delighted to announce that we successfully achieved the award that recognises and celebrates all the work we do in this area for the pupils, for example, encouraging pupil voice and pupil participation, ‘listening’, providing safe spaces, providing therapeutic interventions and for staff in terms of their well-being -reducing workload and creating and maintaining an ethos that promotes positive mental health. The full report can be found in the Mental Health and Well Being area of the school website or via this link: http://www.millfields.hackney.sch.uk/index.php?page=mental-health-wellbeing

Well done and thank you to all the children, staff, parents and friends of the school who helped us achieve this award, but a special thanks to Debi who is our Well-being and Mental Health Lead, for all the hours spent gathering all the evidence together.

Please remember that school starts at 8:45am. If you arrive after this time and the main doors are shut, then your child is marked as late and will need to enter the school via the side door known as the ‘late gate’. Also, please remember to send your children to school with a warm coat, hat and gloves that have their name on them! The new yellow lost property box is filling up again already!

Have a good weekend. Best Wishes, Jane

Happy New Year to all the Millfields community. I hope you all had a good break, and that the children are rested and refreshed, and getting ready to start the new term.

School starts for all children in Nursery to Year 6 on Monday 6th January at 8.45am. I look forward to seeing you all then.

Best Wishes for a happy, healthy and successful 2020.

Jane

Firstly, well done to an amazing cycle event for our Cycle Team last Friday - they won 11 outof 12 medals on offer and have managed to make up lots of points to make it very close at the top of the league!

A huge ‘thank you’ to the whole school community who have been collecting food donations for the Hackney Food Bank over this term. We also made up a lovely hamper for Acorn Lodge who were delighted that we had thought of them. We have also raised an amazing amount of money for various charities and good causes over the last few weeks. The choir have been singing around London and raised lots of money that will make a huge difference for the Clapton Drop-in, St Joseph’s Hospice, The Project Trust and Shelter. We also collected more than £300 for the St James Church roof appeal, as well as money towards lots of smaller school projects and charities. Today we have, so far, raised more than £150 by wearing our Christmas jumpers! You are such a generous community and it is very much appreciated, especially at this time of year and for your continued support.

The choir have been bringing festive cheer to lots of organisations including Acorn Lodge,Homerton Hospital and commuters at Hackney Central and outside Hackney Town Hall. The concerts from Y1-Y6 have been fantastic and we also had out best ever Evening choir and instrumentalist concert on Wednesday. The musicians were amazing and we were also treated to some lovely pieces from our ex-pupils Aisling and Esme. Thank you to Roz and the amazing music team –Tom, Simeon, Lawrence, Jon, James, Jenny, Celia and Jack, whohave been relentless in their musical adventures over the last few weeks!

Yesterday was London Day – a day when all the children go out to visit a museum or gallery in London to find out more about our amazing city! Reception enjoyed a day out at the Tate Modern or Transport Museum, Y1 visited the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green. Y2 went to explore HMS Belfast; Year 3 had fun at the V&A Museum ,Year 4 visited the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, Year 5 went to the Museum of London at Docklands and 2 Year 6 classes visited the Imperial war Museum, while Turing class went to the Army Museum. They all enjoyed their day out and had lots of stories to tell me on their return.

Finally, this is the last Mag of the calendar year, so if I do not see you, I hope that you have a restful holiday and enjoy Christmas if you celebrate.

Just a reminder that school starts back for children on Monday 6th January 2019.

Best Wishes, Jane

REMINDER: Last day of term is Friday 20th December –school closes at 1pm.

Firstly, a huge ‘thank you’ to all the parents and carers for organising the amazing Christmas Fair last Friday! A special mention to Fionnola, and the PSA committee who worked tirelessly before, during and after the event – the fair raised an amazing £3,012.10. Thank you to you all for coming and making it a great community event.

We have had another busy week, taking part in and watching the three Y2 Class Nativity performances, enjoying the whole school pantomime on Monday, showing Dutch visitors around our wonderful school on Tuesday and Thursday, and the amazing Children’s Centre Nativity on Wednesday.

The singing, actions and costumes in Y2 Nativity were all fantastic, and what was so lovely to see was all of the children joining in and enjoying themselves. A huge ‘thank you’ to all the Y2 staff, and Roz and the music team –Tom, Jenny and Jon. Next week, there are the class concerts that are all taking place in St James Church at Clapton. Please make sure that you have read messages about what your child will need to wear for those performances. Please check the website and texts for specific days and times –hoping to see you all there! The evening performance with choir and instrumentalists, as well as bands on is Wednesday 18th December at 6:30pm in St James Church. It is always a very festive event, so please try to come along if you can.

The teachers and I have  also thoroughly enjoyed looking at all the homework projects this week, particularly Y2 work on Africa, Y1 work on family trees, Y6 work on the Victorians, and Y4 work on Egyptians. Thank you to all the families who have worked with their children to produce such outstanding work! Well done everyone! There will be an opportunity for you to see all this fantastic work next week at our Homework Exhibition that is taking place on Wednesday 18th December at 3pm-3.45pm in the middle hall.

Thank you to all the families who have been donating food and other items to our Food Bank Collection. If you have any more tins or packets of food, toiletries, washing powder or Christmas treats, then please bring to our collection point in the main office before the end of Wednesday next week.

Next week will be equally busy with concerts, London Day on Thursday and Christmas Jumper day (raising money for Save the Children) on Friday. Please note that we are encouraging you not to buy new jumpers but to swap with friends, and/or design your own! Also, the choir will be singing at various venues next week and taking donations for Clapton Community Drop-in at the Round Chapel, St Joseph’s Hospice and Shelter.

Today's Christmas Lunch was a great success, and all the children made eco-hats to reinforce our commitment to recycling and reducing waste. There were some great creations and we will be sharing the photos next week.

A reminder that there is no Enrichment or After-school Club on Friday 2oth December as the whole school closes at 1pm.

Finally, congratulations to all of the brilliant children who won the treat for ‘Always Good’ this half term. Have a good weekend. Best Wishes, Jane

Have a good weekend. Best wishes, Jane

Christmas started at Millfields this week with various choirs singing their hearts out at various places around Hackney and London. On Monday, they sang outside Hackney Central, on Wednesday, they sang in a choir competition at Westfield Shepherds Bush, and yesterday, they sang outside Tesco on Morning Lane and then outside Homerton Hospital. We have collected lots of money for various charities and the school funds. Well done to all the choir members –there are so many these days that we have to split them in to groups for the different events!

And news just in, we were runners-up in the choir competition -the judges loved the enthusiasm of the singers, as well as the range of different and original songs that Millfields sang compared to other school choirs! Well done everyone!  You have helped win £200 for the school music department! Thanks to Roz and Tom for organising and singing their way around London! There are more choir events next week, so please make sure you look out for us!

This morning, we had a fantastic concert in Early Years –the Nursery and Reception classes were amazing. They made brilliant hats, sang beautifully and had some great dance moves too! Thank you to all the staff in EYFS and the Music Team. Well done!

Next week, the Y2 Nativity performances are taking place at St James church, the dates are inside this Mag and on the school website. We hope that you had the dates in good time so that you will be able to come and join in the singing and celebrations. Tickets are required for this event -£2 from main Reception.

Well done to our Y5 and Y6 chess players who went to the Chess Masters tournament at Olympia on Tuesday. This is an amazing event and we are lucky to get tickets every year to watch and participate. Congratulations to all of the children who took part but a special mention to Leo and Gabriel who won a silver and bronze medal respectively. This is the first time we have won medals so big congratulations! Thanks to Mehmet for organising and to our Chess tutor, James for his excellent teaching!

Yesterday, we held our very first Grandparents Tea party which was a huge hit! The grandparents who came along with their grandchildren were treated to afternoon tea with sandwiches, cakes, biscuits and scones with their tea and juice. We were also treated to some live music from our Violin tutor, Cecilia. The feedback was brilliant with one grandma asking if we could do this every Thursday! We will have to see about that! There will definitely be another in the Spring term to celebrate the massive contribution that grandparents make to the families at Millfields!

Finally, today is the Christmas Fair. Thank you to all the parents and carers who are helping out as I write this. It looks to be another busy afternoon, so please come along and support us! I hear Santa may be here too! More news on this next week.

Have a good weekend. Hope this rain stops! Best Wishes, Jane

All of the children in Y1 -Y6 have been doing the first term assessments in reading, Maths and writing this week. The children have all tried really hard and put in lots of effort, so the results of these assessments will help the teachers to plan for the next term's work and see what needs to be reinforced and enhanced as a class and for individuals. Please ask your children about the assessments and see what they can tell you!

Millfields staff and children have also been getting ready for the end of term Christmas and Winter celebrations that start next week with the EYFS Concert on Friday 6th December at 9:30am and 10:30am. This year we will be selling tickets for £1 to ensure that it is not overcrowded in the bottom hall. Please buy them from the main office. You should have seen the dates of the Y2 Nativity performances and the dates and times of the Winter Concerts, so we do hope that you will be joining us at one or two events over the next few weeks. Please support your child at home by helping them to learn the lines of their class songs so they are ready for their performance. Check Marvellous Me for your class to find out what their songs are and that they need to wear on the day.

There are lots of choir events coming up too, so please check the letters that have been given out to ensure you have noted the event that your child is taking part in. The choir will be singing at various venues including Westfield, outside Hackney Town Hall, outside Morning Lane Tesco, Homerton Hospital, as well as venues in the city, and will be collecting for various charities including Shelter, Round Chapel Clapton Community Drop-in project and St Joseph's Hospice. The first choir event is this afternoon at the Round Chapel Christmas Fair that starts at 4pm -Millfields choir are first on!

Thank you to the parents who completed the online parent surveys last week as part of general feedback and about well-being and mental health. We have had around 130 responses so far and we are currently going through the results and comments to analyse questions and respond fully to any specific comments – this will be emailed out to parents in due course.

Thank you also to all the families who have been donating to the Food bank collection. Please continue to bring in tins and packets of food as well as washing powder, shampoo, shower gel, toothpaste and other toiletries. The collections will be donated to local homeless shelters and organisations as well as the Hackney Food Bank.

Finally, we will be collecting donations for the Christmas Fair from Monday - books, old toys, tombola prizes, bottles of water or wine, so please bring in to collectors who will be in the playground before and after school. The Christmas Fair is next Friday 6th December from 2.15pm— see the poster inside the Mag.

Have a good weekend. Best wishes, Jane