Christmas activities give Juniors the festive feeling
Pupils from Nursery to Year Six had an amazing time as they threw themselves into a range of Christmas-themed activities!
Christmas Wishes
On the first day of December, families of pupils from all Junior School year groups were invited in for the annual Christmas Wishes event. Parents and grandparents joined the children in their classroom to write a wish on a tag, grab a mince pie and a drink and welcome in the festive season.
Once the wishes were written down, the children hung them on the tree in their classroom or on the tree in the reception.
Elf Day
Early Years pupils had a sackful of fun as they took part in Elf Day.
In Nursery, the boys and girls joined in with elf races, baked chocolate crispy puddings and made reindeer food ready for Rudolph and all his friends. The busy day was finished with a cup of hot chocolate and a biscuit. Fun was had by all!
Reception children had a fabulous day helping in Santa’s grotto. They made paper elf bags, a pine cone Christmas tree and a Christmas wreath!
Nativities
Reception and Nursery children thoroughly enjoyed performing ‘The Twinkly Nativity’ to family, friends and governors.
They acted out the famous Nativity story and sang lots of catchy songs. The pupils did amazingly well and made the teachers very proud!
‘Don’t Be Afraid’ was the Key Stage 1 Nativity this year and the children thoroughly enjoyed their big moment on stage as they danced and sang beautifully.
Taz The Entertainer
The hilarious Taz The Entertainer spent a day in the Junior School during the last week of the Autumn term and he had the pupils, as well as the staff, in stiches with his side-splitting antics!
During his one-hour sets he got the whole audience involved as he performed magic tricks and took a peek at Santa’s naughty and nice list! The visit was kindly funded by the Stopfordian Parents’ Association (SPA).
Pantomime
All of the Junior School pupils made their way to the Main Hall in the Senior School to watch Altru’s wonderful performance of ‘Pinocchio’.
The beautiful 60-minute show was magical and Christmassy, funny and poignant and featured puppetry and live music.
Thanks to the SPA for funding the visit.
Father Christmas
Key Stage 1 children could hardly contain their excitement as Father Christmas dropped in to see them all!
The girls and boys had so many questions to ask and were delighted to hear that the elves’ favourite chocolate was white chocolate!
The visit could not be complete, of course, without the children reminding Santa of some of the items on their Christmas lists – just in case he had forgotten!
Christmas Crafts
On the penultimate day of term, Key Stage 2 pupils enjoyed some festive crafts.
Children in Year 3 enjoyed creating snowmen by filling fluffy, white socks with rice whilst Year 4 children created angels and elves using upside-down cups and pipe cleaners.
Year 5 made 3D Christmas cards, as well as decorating Christmas bags to fill with presents.
Year 6 also enjoyed decorating Christmas bags and made reindeers out of pine cones and gonks with lots of sparkly paper.
Christmas Tree Festival
From 29th November to 3rd December, the Nursery took part in the Christmas Tree Festival at St George’s Church.
Their tree was called ‘Winter in the Woods’ and the decorations that they made were inspired by all of the activities they have undertaken whilst scouring our wild garden.
The children made salt dough ‘baubles’ decorated with star anise, cloves and pumpkin seeds (from their Autumn pumpkins), weaved with natural resources from the garden to make small Christmas trees and painted pictures of hibernating hedgehogs and sleepy squirrels.
SPA Christmas Fair
One month ahead of the big day, the SPA held their annual Christmas Fair.
It was great to see such a big crowd attending as they perused the stalls, started their Christmas shopping, sampled some food and drink and visited Santa’s grotto.
Thank you to all of the stallholders and to the individuals and businesses that donated items for the stalls and prizes for the raffle.
A final huge festive thank you to everyone who volunteered to help with the event.
