Summer Term Issue 38: 18th July 2025
Flourishing in the love of God, love of life, love of learning
Dear Families,
As we reach the end of another academic year, I want to take a moment to reflect on what a truly special year it has been.
We began the year with a successful Ofsted inspection, which recognised the fantastic learning and personal development that takes place in our school every single day. Towards the end of the year, our glowing SIAMS report celebrated the strength of our community spirit and how warmly it shines through everything we do. Between these two markers, there has been so much to be proud of from the achievements of our children to the dedication of our staff, the commitment from our governors and the unwavering support of our families.
Our school is a special place because of the love, passion, and aspiration that each and every one of you brings. I want to thank you all for being such a valuable part of our community, and to extend a heartfelt thank you to our incredible staff team for their inspiring hard work and enthusiasm every day.
This week marked a big milestone for our Year 6 children, who wowed us with their amazing performances of Shrek and led a beautiful leavers’ service in church yesterday. To our Year 6 leavers: You are all uniquely brilliant. Go forward into your next adventure with pride, bravery, kindness, and above all, be yourself. Let your light shine.
And now, all that’s left is to wish you a joyful, restful summer break. We look forward to welcoming everyone back on Wednesday 3rd September for the start of a brand new school year.
P.S. Don’t forget to collect any bikes, scooters, and lost property before the holidays!
Have a wonderful summer,
Alli
Upcoming Diary Dates
Reception
This week in Reception we have been reflecting on all the amazing learning we have done over the year, and all the wonderful adventures we have had together: Forest School, Polar Express Day (Ooooh! pyjamas and hot chocolate!), Christmas Jumper Day, Pirates, The wonderful, mysterious Dragon Eggs, Sports Day, Super Hero Day… the exciting World Book Day dressing- up parade. Spring cleaning the church, learning all about numbers, learning to read! FANTASTIC! We are so proud of all the children, in their learning, and in their personal development. We can certainly say that they have truly all flourished in Reception! We would also like to thank all the wonderful parents for their help with reading and practising phonics at home every evening- and for your support with all our lovely Forest School outings. We couldn’t do it without you!
Finally thank you for all your generous cards and gifts, it has been a joy for us to support your children this year!
Year 1
Last week, Year 1 went to the Dulwich Picture Gallery to see their artwork up in a real gallery! The children were able to spot the pieces they created and explore the artwork. We are incredibly proud of everything they have produced, not just for this exhibit but for the whole of Year 1! They have blown us away with their resilience and hard work. Their creativity has been amazing and we know they will they will be just as amazing in Year 2! Have a lovely summer!
Year 2
We were really excited this week to have welcomed parents to our Great Fire of London Exhibit. The children were so proud of their work and we were incredibly proud of them! Thank you to all those who could squeeze time out of busy weeks to pop by.
Year 3
This week in science, children explored how different frequencies change over distance. We used instruments and set recordings for the different distances which allowed us to record data. In doing so, we then created a line graph which showed us some fascinating results. We established that lower frequency sounds travel further than high frequency sound. Amazing research teams!
We would both as teachers, also like to express our huge thanks towards the year 3 parents and caregivers. Over the past year, or even two, you have been fantastically kind and supportive, which we value hugely. We wish you a wonderful summer break!
Year 4
As we wrap up the school year, we wanted to share a final weekly roundup from year 4 2024-2025. In Geography, we have been exploring maps in more detail. The children focused on map keys and how they help us understand maps better. To put their learning into practice, the children had a go at designing their very own parks – each one creative and unique! As the year draws to a close, Mrs Hare and Miss Evans would like to extend a huge thank you to all the children for their incredible hard work and enthusiasm. They have achieved so much this year, and we are so proud of them – from Young Voices to tackling the Multiplication Tables Check (MTC), they’ve shown great determination and growth.
Finally, a heartfelt thank you to you, the parents and carers, for your continued support. We truly couldn’t do it without you. Have a safe, restful summer break – and we look forward to seeing everyone again in September!
Year 5
In the last full week of the year, we were lucky to have some guest students from Dulwich College hold an engineering workshop for us. The children had to design and build a spaghetti bridge in teams using their collaboration skills and knowledge of forces. Impressively, four out of the five bridges held up the heavy bottles of water placed on them! The children also took part in an intra-school athletics competition – jumping, speed bouncing, long jump, ball catching and of course relay running! The results are in… and our school was crowned the champions out of 20 schools! Wow!
Year 6
This week, Year 6 represented SJSC with pride, passion, and perseverance at the highly anticipated Intra-School Athletics Competition led by the brilliant Coach Wilson.
Children took part in a range of challenging events. The competition was fierce, with teams from 21 schools giving their all—but Team SJSC rose to the occasion with outstanding teamwork, determination, and sportsmanship.
We’re incredibly proud to share that SJSC came out on top, securing first place in the overall competition! This fantastic result reflects the effort and enthusiasm the children have shown in their weekly PE sessions and their commitment to improving their athletic skills.
Hearing Resource Base
We’ve had a fantastic year in the Hearing Resource Base. The children have had lots of opportunities to develop their skills including being theatre producers, forest school leaders, deaf awareness advocates and much more! We wish everyone a lovely summer holiday and look forward to many more exciting projects next year!
Don’t forget, the Tesco Stronger Starts scheme is still running. If you shop at any of the following stores over the summer, we’d be really grateful if you could vote for our BSL project. 😊
You can vote for us in these stores:
Surrey Quays Extra SE16 7LL
Bermondsey Express Express SE16 4BA
Peckham High Street Express Express SE15 5BS
East Dulwich Express SE22 9BD
Peckham Express SE5 7EJ
Southwark Walworth Road Express Express SE17 1JE
Peckham Rye Lane Express SE15 4UR
Queens Road Peckham Express SE15 2ND
Bermondsey Park Express SE16 3RP
Camberwell Express SE17 2NF
Camberwell North Road Express SE5 0RW
Marine Wharf, Deptford Express SE16 7UD
To vote, you will need to make a purchase within store of any value. You will receive one token per transaction and it's not necessary to purchase a carrier bag in order to receive a token. You can then use your token to cast your vote.
Music this week…
Wow! What a wonderful few weeks of musical activity at St John’s and St Clement’s it has been. From African Drumming and Samba performances to Year 3’s Beethoven Showcase. Not forgetting the Year 6 Production which was incredible and the Year 2s singing about The Great Fire of London. The choir sang beautifully last week to parents and all of this before The Year 6 Leaver’s Service has happened (at the time of typing)! I think you will all agree that singing is a strength in our school and I am proud of all the enthusiasm and effort that I see the children put into their productions and performances. The Samba and African Drumming teachers have all commented on the children’s rhythmic abilities and have cited us as one of the best primary schools that they work with (hooray!). Thank you parents and carers for all your support in attending these events. It is lovely for the children to have an audience to perform in front of.
To mark the end of term, we have been playing musical games in our lessons this week including Musical Detective in KS1 and clapping games in Year 3. We have also been using the iPads to look at some music specific apps including Musyc and Chrome Music Lab which the children have really enjoyed exploring. These are free to download if you want to use them at home with your children.
I am including this week, a video of the Year 4 children performing one of their songs from The Magic Flute. The children are in character as Papegeno, the Bird Catcher, Prince Tamino or the Queen of the Night’s servants.
For those of you who are interested, there is an Organ Recital happening at St John’s Church on Saturday 19th July at 11am. I have been told that this would be suitable for children as it will last approx 40 mins and has some animal themed pieces! Admission is free.
News from the Art Studio…
This week in the Art studio Year 1 celebrated the end of the year by making themselves medals using fabrics and decorations. They all wore them proudly.
ECO Team
A huge thank you to our amazing Eco Team and Sally who have achieved The Eco Schools Award for their environmental work this year.
Amazing!!!
Values Award
Every half term we have a special ceremony celebrating children who have demonstrated our school values.
Well done to our values awards winners!
During our awards ceremony we also celebrated our Reading Champions, Sports Day Champions, and netball teams. Well done to all awards winners- we are all incredibly proud of you!
International Evening - September 2025
Looking ahead to next year we are already planning International Evening. We would love to celebrate all our families an the diversity of cultures that make our school community great. As well as bringing a dish we would love to hear your stories, traditions, look at photos and invite people in to share.
There will be more information about this event in September, but in the meantime save the date: Friday 26th September 3:30-5.
See you next week!