Summer Term Issue 35: 27th June 2025
Flourishing in the love of God, love of life, love of learning
Dear Families,
Thank you so much to everyone who joined us for the school fair over the weekend—it was a fantastic event, full of joy and a wonderful sense of community. A heartfelt thank you to our amazing PTFA for their dedication, time, and passion. Events like these wouldn’t be possible without their incredible support.
Next week we have our OPAL Stay and Play sessions inviting parents to come into school and join in playtime, getting an insight to the creative play that takes place everyday. Wednesday is for years 3, 4, 5, and 6. Friday is for years 1 and 2 - both sessions are from 9:15-10.
As we approach the final few weeks of term, our thoughts begin to turn to transitions and preparations for September. It was a real pleasure to welcome our new Reception children for a stay and play session this morning—we’re so excited to have them join our school.
For our current children, you will receive a letter next Friday (4th July) with details of your child’s new class and teacher for the next academic year. This will be followed by a transition session on Tuesday 8th July, giving children the chance to spend time with their new teacher. End-of-year reports will be sent home on Friday 11th July.
We hope you’ve already marked your calendars for our end-of-year events, but here’s a quick reminder:
Monday 7th July – Sports Week kicks off with a fun run at Peckham Rye Park
Wednesday 9th July – Reception Sports Day at Goose Green, starting at 9:45am
Thursday 10th July – Years 1-6 Sports Day at Alleyn’s, starting at 10:30am
Tuesday 15th July 2pm (Y6 only) - Shrek Production
Wednesday 16th July 10am (Y6 only) - Shrek Production
Thursday 17th July – End-of-Year Service at St John’s Church
Looking ahead to September, we will be electing a new parent governor to join our governing body. If this is something you might be interested in, please don’t hesitate to get in touch or speak to one of our current governors to learn more. We’ll be sending out more information about the role and the election process in an email next week.
Wishing you all a lovely weekend!
Alli
Upcoming Diary Dates
This week in Reception we have been learning about our own superpowers, inspired by Super Milly and the Super School Day by Stephanie Clarkson. Super Milly handled all the everyday disasters she meets by being Super Kind, A Super Good Friend, Super Clever, Super Funny and Super Brave. We worked out how we could use our own innate powers for good too. On Thursday we had several parents come in and talk about their jobs, or email us in pictures and videos, which was so interesting! Thank you for inspiring us! Later that day we drew and wrote about what we want to be when we grow up! Speaking of growing… our caterpillars have hatched from their cocoons- transformed into butterflies, so we have set them free.
Next week it is Superhero day on Tuesday, so don’t forget you can make a donation of £5 for the workshop via the Trips section on Arbor. Himid have their last Forest School session next Thursday. Volunteers welcome.
Reception
Year 1
Last Friday the Year 1s really impressed the adults with how wonderful they were at Dulwich Picture Gallery. They explored different mediums including crayon, charcoal and pens. We had a go at drawing things we could see, hear and feel and tried some leaf rubbings.
We also started a new book ‘Yeti and the Bird’. The children discovered some footprints in the classroom but we didn’t know who’s they were!
Next week, we will be looking at time- o’ clock and half past on an analogue clock. It would really support your child to introduce this to them.
Year 2
To celebrate the end of Key Stage 1, our Year 2 children enjoyed a wonderful day out at the beautiful Botany Bay! The trip was a huge success, with perfect weather, calm seas, and even the seagulls behaved themselves!
The children had an amazing time splashing in the shallows, building epic sandcastles, playing football on the sand, and exploring the beach in search of the most interesting shells. It was a joyful way to mark the end of an exciting year, filled with laughter, sunshine, and sandy toes.
A big thank you to all the staff and helpers who made the day so special. What a brilliant way to celebrate all the hard work and achievements of our fantastic Year 2s!
Year 3
In Year 3, children have been exploring different religions, including Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity, to learn about their core beliefs and values. Through our learning and class discussions, they discovered that although each religion has its own traditions, they all share the important message of treating others with kindness and respect. A key realisation was that all three religions encourage people to treat their neighbours as they would like to be treated. To reflect their learning, the children drew pictures and wrote about how they could show these shared values in their own lives—such as helping others, being honest, and showing compassion—demonstrating their understanding of the common principles that unite these faiths. Brilliant work!
Year 4
What a busy and exciting week it’s been in Year Four! Our young writers have been hard at work crafting their own imaginative retellings of The Selfish Giant. To bring their stories to life, we used AI tools to generate eye-catching front covers based on their beautifully descriptive introductions.
In maths, we kicked off a brand-new unit on symmetry. The children explored lines of symmetry in shapes using mirrors, helping them to visualise and deepen their understanding in a fun and hands-on way.
Year 5
This week, alongside going on two amazing school trips, year 5 have been busy interviewing each other in the style of news reporters. Their task was to investigate what Christian beliefs are about life and death. They also held mature discussions surrounding this topic to deepen their understanding.
Year 6
This week, Year 6 have been diving into the exciting world of programming! In a hands-on computing lesson full of logic, laughter, and a few unexpected turns, we were challenged to create instructions to guide a character through a maze.
Using coding, we explored how to plan precise sequences, debug errors, and think like real computer scientists. The classroom buzzed with teamwork and determination as we tested, tweaked, and triumphed over increasingly tricky mazes.
It was fantastic to see problem-solving skills in action—and even better to hear the cheers when the code led to success!
Music this week…
This week in music Children in KS1 were participating in a Relaxed Performance of the Wizard of Oz performed by musicians from the CBSO (City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra). Each character was represented by a piece of music played by a specific instrument and there were opportunities for the children to join in with the participation song, play untuned percussion and dance in time with the scarves.
On Wednesday, children in Year 5 went to The Royal Festival Hall to participate in The London Philharmonic’s Bright Sparks Concert which was based on Igor Stravinsky’s Petrushka. It was a wonderful opportunity for the children to see a live Orchestra and to bring to life the music we have spent the last few weeks learning about.
Wednesday afternoon was Year 6’s opportunity to share what they have been learning in African Drumming over the last few months with the wonderful Pauline and Sandra. It was fantastic to see the children so focused and working together. A very Big Well Done to all the Year 6 children.
News from the Art Studio…
Last week in the Art studio Year used their sketchbook drawing of Kawaii style cupcakes to create cupcakes out of clay. This week Year 4 have painted their cupcakes using bright colours and simple patterns. Next week we will decorate them with googly eyes and sparkles.
ECO Team
We were visited this week by The London Children's Flower Society who came to judge their Summer Competition.
The judge commented " It was a great pleasure to experience a very special environment where both plants and children to flourish together".
We have been awarded 2 gold certificates one for the whole school and the other for our gardening club.
Well done everyone for getting stuck into the school garden and thank you to Sally who gets us all enthusiastic about nature.
Hearing Resource Base
Tesco Stronger Starts
The Hearing Resource Base is proud to announce that our British Sign Language course for parents and carers of deaf children has been selected to be part of the Tesco Stronger Starts scheme as a community project. Through this scheme we will be awarded a grant to help fund our BSL project to support language development in the home.
The size of the grant is dependent on a customer vote. The scheme gives community projects like ours grants of up to £1,500. Tesco customers will be able vote in various local stores from the first week in July until the end of September to decide how much funding we are awarded, so please support us next time you shop at Tesco!
You will be able to 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.
So, if you are shopping in one of these stores, we would be really grateful if you would place your token in our voting box. Every vote counts!
You can find more information about the scheme here: https://www.tescoplc.com/strongerstarts
Thank you for your continued support!
Friends of SJSC
A huge THANK YOU to everyone who made our Summer Fair a success last weekend. We couldn’t do it without the organisers, stall volunteers, donations, tidy-uppers and of course everyone who came and spent money and enjoyed the wonderful day. We are still counting all those tokens, but looks like it will be another RECORD BREAKING fair - we’ll let you know how much was raised ASAP!
A special well done to the Kids Craft Stall Crafters: Molly and Toby (Yr2), Josie (Yr3), Alice and Ellie (Yr4), Marnie, Iris, Rickie Lee and Ruby (Yr5) and all their friends who helped on the day, their stall made an incredible £612 for the school!
Star of the week
Well done to this week’s stars - children who have demonstrated our school values in wonderful ways.
See you next week!