Latest News

Goodbye and thank you

Thu 31 Mar 2022 Amanda Hopwood

Today the children said a fond farewell to Mr Mitchell our Chair of Governors. He has been a governor at The Grange for 14 years. He has given his time selflessly to the improvement of the school. He is now retiring. The Year 6 children ran an assembly where they thanked him for his time, presented him with a book of messages. The whole school sang for him - "With a Little Help form my Friends" and "lean on me."

The following images are a taster of the children's messages., including a very realistic drawing of Mr Mitchell. He will be greatly missed,. The Chair of Governors role will be co- chaired by Jon Legg and Jamie Sinclair experienced governors.

Girls Football

Wed 23 Mar 2022 Jenny Burr

After two longs years on no competitive inter-school competitions (due to COVID) nine year 5 and 6 girls finally attended a football tournament at the County Ground on Wednesday 23^rd March. They competed in eight games against seven other local teams. The matches may only have been 12 minutes long, but in blazing sunshine and 20 plus degrees heat, they felt a lot longer!

The team played really well and improved throughout the tournament as they found their natural positions. The girls valiantly defended and Emily the keeper made some amazing saves, at one point tipping one shot over the crossbar!

We had a number of attempts at goal with Summer and Lucy proving to be determined forwards. From a piercing run, Lucy scored a great goal.

Rhianna and Isla grew in confidence as the afternoon wore on and made some important tackles. ‘Fancy-feet’ Leen was solid in both defence and mid-field and showed her excellent timing and passing skills. Liliana and Lucy worked hard in defensive positions. Mary showed her adaptability playing in various positions, depending on the opposition’s strengths.

Well done to the whole team who were a credit to the school.

Global Citizenship and RE Day

Thu 17 Mar 2022 Amanda Hopwood

Friday 17^th March marked Global Citizenship and RE day. Our learning for the day focused on what it meant to be a ‘Global Citizen’ and the children reflected on how we can all be responsible for the world around us. Each class then also spent time looking at charities who work to inspire global citizenship as well as role models including Lenny Henry, creator of Comic Relief, and Bob Geldof, organiser of Live Aid.

RE day also coincided with Comic Relief; the children came to school wearing non-uniform in exchange for a donation for Comic Relief. Further money was raised by the competition ‘Guess the number of sweets in the jar’ as well as the raffling of two amazing cakes made by Mrs Curd. Children from the whole school were entered into the ‘red’ raffle and children had the opportunity to win some Red Nose Day merchandise as the prizes.

During the afternoon, children had the opportunity to take part in ‘Grange Aid’ singing live with Sam Lewis. This was a wonderful opportunity for the children to let their hair down and sing and dance together.

Year 3 Trip to Cambridge

Sun 13 Mar 2022 Jenny Burr

Well who would have known that the Egyptians mummified not only people, but also cats and birds and baby alligators! Who would have known, that different canopic pots were used for different parts of the internal organs to be stored in, each with their own animal-god head! And who knew that having a snake on your head would protect you in the afterlife!

Today, Year 3 proved to be excellent historians. They asked superb questions and observed the artefacts so carefully that they spotted things the curator had missed. We found that a statue of a cat God still had a jewel in its eye socket!

We met 3000 year old Ramesses III (well his granite coffin) and looked carefully at all the elaborate carvings, including his headdress, goddess protectors and his crook and whip.

The children also had the opportunity to explore the rest of the museum and enjoyed finding all the highlights on their worksheet. The armoury room was very popular with its many suits of armour (for knights and horses) along with guns, jousting poles and lots and lots of swords!

After lunch, we headed a short distance to the botanic gardens to look for signs of spring. The daffodils, crocuses and snow drops were blooming! We talked about and sketched some flowers paying attention to the stamens, filaments anthers. (Of course the children also had a good run around in the grass maze and hid under enormous trees!)

A huge thank you to our adult helpers. You are essential to these trips.

The children were great and we all had a fabulous day.

Year 3 visit Library

Wed 09 Mar 2022 Jenny Burr

As part of our World Book Day Celebrations, Year 3 visited Letchworth Library today to hear all about what they have to offer. The children were impeccably behaved and listened intently to the librarians. They found out lots of facts such as: it’s free to join, you can download books and audio books, you can take up to 30 books out (not advisable as you’ll need a trolley!) and they host free events throughout the year. The children had the opportunity to then look through some books and explore both the fiction and non-fiction areas. Many children looked for books by their favourite authors, others tried to find information books on our current and upcoming topics. It was a worthwhile visit. Thank you to the adult helpers who walked with us to town. We couldn’t do it without you!

World Book Day 2022

Fri 04 Mar 2022 Amanda Hopwood

This year was an extra special celebration as it marked 25 years celebrating World Book Day.

As part of this celebration, each class hosted their own World Book Day Party where there was lots of book chat, refreshments, playing reading games and music (MC Grammar’s brilliant World Book Day song will definitely be on the playlist!)

World Book Day is a wonderful opportunity to fundraise for those who do not have the same great reading resources that we have. In the UK, nearly 400,000 children don’t have a book of their own. Having access to books and developing a love of reading for pleasure is vital for a child’s future. World Book Day and their associated charities have the vision to see more children, from all backgrounds, developing a life-long habit of reading for pleasure and benefitting from the improved life chances this brings them. Pupils brought in a £1 donation to help get book tokens and books to children across the UK and Ireland.

This year, the dress up theme was ‘Story Protagonists’ where children come into school dressed as their favourite leading characters. We also has a World Book Day book swap. This created a real sense of a school reading community.

As a final ‘token’ of celebration, each child received a £1 World Book Day token.