Last term , we were pleased to support Darlington Rotary Club by bringing books we no longer read into school. These reading books were donated to the national charity – Just Be A Child. The charity will provide a library in the village of Vingujini. The books are packed in boxes and put into a 40ft shipping container; this will be is shipped to Kenya and transported to the village. When it is unloaded, windows are cut out of the sides of the container, a door put in at the end and shelves fitted inside.
The charity works with communities in Kenya to establish an area for learning activities and sports days, and provides a library in a container, which comes with books, learning and arts and crafts materials.
Everyone at school was eager to help and we received hundreds of books which were brought into school by the children. Jack and Amber (who are two of our Rota Kids) organised the collection before Christmas with the help of Mrs Davison .
The books were quarantined over the holiday and handed to Mr Little who supports our Rota Kids in school. We were worried they all wouldn’t fit in his car.
Mr Little was thrilled with the amount we collected and was incredibly grateful.
Last term, many classes discussed different jobs at Christmas and we even entered their national competition where you had to draw a job that gets very busy during this period. Mrs Davison was thrilled when Primary Futures contacted her to say that a Reid Street pupil had submitted a winning entry. They said: “Over ten days, we received hundreds of brilliant entries from children across the country for our Festive Futures drawing competition. It was tough, but we selected three winners that really captured the spirit of festive jobs”.
We were thrilled that Adele, 9, won for her varied illustrations showing a range of important festive jobs. She received prizes posted directly from some of the volunteers featured in our festive videos, including some goodies from the Buckingham Palace gift shop!
Today, Year 6 had the privilege of spending the day with Alex Dewar. Alex came in to school to talk to the children about resilience, determination and the many benefits of being physically active.
Alex talked to the children about his life as an army warrant officer before his life dramatically changed following a brain haemorrhage several years ago, where he was only given a 2% chance of survival. Alex explained how over the course of two years, he had to learn how to speak, walk and feed himself. We were all in awe of the determination and resilience Alex spoke about. Alex not only made a full recovery, but was also selected to represent Great Britain in the Invictus Games where he won several medals – including Gold. During the day, we took part in workshops about creative writing, resilience and team building.
As a year group, we are all now trying to be more resilient in everything we do.
Throughout the year, we work closely with Primary Futures looking at different careers and raising aspirations for our children. This term, many classes discussed different jobs at Christmas. We even entered their national competition where you had to draw a job that gets very busy during the festive season. We had over 200 entries.
In class, we completed the ‘What’s My Line? Festive Special’. The KS1 and KS2 videos took a peek behind the scenes of some of the jobs involved in creating festive magic and Christmas cheer. The children listened to the volunteers provide clues for them to guess their job before their big reveal.
With the help of Burgundy the Elf, we heard from a range of people who shared their festive jobs. These jobs included: growing Christmas trees, supporting people experiencing homelessness, designing Christmas wrapping papers and cooking the Christmas turkey for the Royal Family!
Key stage 1 had to guess these jobs and careers: Christmas decorator, theatre worker and the chef at Buckingham Palace, and a mystery guest from the North Pole! Year 1 were very good at guessing.
Key stage 2 had to guess these jobs and careers: a brand manager for Christmas wrapping company, a craftsman at Buckingham Palace, a Christmas tree farmer and decoration shopkeeper, and a Crisis Christmas centre worker supporting people facing homelessness.
Y4 and Y5 got into the Christmas spirit and made some fabulous guesses.
The children drew pictures of different jobs that gets very busy during the festive season and we sent our entries in.
As we know 2020 has been a tough year for all of us. However, some of our families have found it a little harder than others during the pandemic. So we are thrilled with the kindness we have received from many people/organisations and companies.
To begin with, we applied to Mission Christmas (a national campaign) and they donated 120 gifts to school. These filled two cars when we went to collect! Also, Councillor Lee dropped off over 60 Christmas gifts – these included gift bags and boxes filled with a range of goodies. It seemed everyone wanted to spread a little Christmas cheer.
We were so grateful to one parent who kindly organised a raffle and donated over £200 to the school fund as she knew we had missed out on the Christmas fair (due to the pandemic and social distancing) which is a massive fundraiser for school. We couldn’t believe her kindness and generosity.
Also, we received a donation of £60 from a local company TCS. A parent who works there said they had decided to send the money to a school and asked us to help families with any emergency supplies they may need or just to help families have a better Christmas. Again, we were so moved by this kind offer.
As always, we have continued to work with Food for Thought who have supported many of our families with food. We can’t wait until we can have Food for Thought back on the playground and watch you all queuing together to collect some pasta or tins again!
As well as receiving all this goodwill, we at Reid Street are always willing to share some kindness and help others less fortunate than ourselves. This year, a set amount of money from the school fund was given to each class (£30) and they could choose how they wanted to spend it on helping others. Most classes chose to put their money together as a year group and discussed and then voted on the different presents they wished to purchase, some linked to our Global Goals campaign.
Mrs Perry re-wrote and produced our first Charity song based on a previous song the choir usually sing – I can Feel the Magic Now – with the school choir. The song details our purchases for people less fortunate. Below, are the words for you to sing along and to see and hear the performance click here.
I CAN FEEL THE MAGIC NOW
Reception have chosen to give trees for life and a goat,
A vegetable garden to provide for all.
We’ll send our gifts to those in need.
Year one have chosen seeds, trees for life and honey bees,
Emergency water and a net to protect.
We’ll send our gifts to those in need.
This year our lives have been different
We want to give to those in need
Reid Street are donating big pie money
To send gifts to charities
Year two adopted a tiger and a hedgehog
Year three chose toilets and dark chocolate coins
We’ll send our gifts to those in need.
Year four gave gifts of play and fabulous football
A happy queen bee and lots more
We’ll send our gifts to those in need.
This year our lives have been different
We want to give to those in need
Reid Street are donating big pie money
To send gifts to charities
Year five gave gifts of safer water for families
A chicken, pig, a goat and lots of growing seeds
We’ll send our gifts to those in need.
Year six gave piles of poo, period packs and a goat
water and food for a family of four
We’re proud to go to Reid Street School
This year our lives have been different
We want to give to those in need
Reid Street are donating big pie money
To send gifts to charities
This year our lives have been different
We want to give to those in need
Reid Street are donating big pie money
To send gifts to charities
We are currently spreading kindness to Kenya by collecting old books that will be shipped in a container to create a library for many families to benefit from. There is still time to donate any books you may have.
Once again, I’d just like to thank you all for your continued support and as a staff we count our blessings daily to teach such fabulous children. You all know if you need any help or support, we are always here to help.
The Mayor of Darlington, Councillor Chris McEwan, wished to bring Darlington together in the run up to Christmas by encouraging as many people as possible to sing a socially distanced carol. Reid Street were invited to record our children singing ‘Oh Little Town of Bethlehem’. We then sent our recording off to Darlington Council where it will be edited and a final compilation will be put together. On Thursday 17 December 2020, the final video will be shared with the people of Darlington to bring everyone together in this very surreal and unprecedented year. Due to Covid restrictions we were unable to have the whole school singing together but we were able to use children from year 4 and 6 who demonstrated a passion for singing, to record the song whilst maintaining social distance. Please click here to listen to the recording on the schools website. There are also other Christmas songs that year groups have been performing to celebrate Christmas at Reid Street available to listen to on the website.
Merry Christmas
Our Victorian Christmas celebrations have been a wonderful way to celebrate the end of a very busy term.
We have learnt all about how the Victorians started many of the Christmas traditions we still follow today – although some of them have changed a bit over time, such as using electrical or battery powered lights on our trees instead of real candles.
We enjoyed making our own peg dolls from wooden pegs and scraps of fabric, felt and wool. Victorian girls and boys will have asked Father Christmas for very different toys to what the children in Year 1 might have asked for this year – peg dolls, spinning tops and jack in the box were all very popular gifts back then, and children would be very happy to receive an orange in their stocking!
We have had so much fun immersing ourselves into the traditional celebrations. Our classroom looks and smells amazing – it is decorated with fresh pine, eucalyptus and holly branches, from which we have hung pine cones and baked orange slices studded with star anise and cloves. The holly ‘kindness’ garland made by the children was the perfect finishing touch.
The children have made their own ‘gilded’ walnuts, tree candles and paper tree decorations. They also each decorated a ginger biscuit, but they didn’t last long enough to get hung up!
On party day, we played some traditional Victorian parlour games including ‘Searching in the Dark’, ‘The Sculptor’ and ‘Say Cheese’.
Many thanks to Preston Park for providing the wonderful workshop resources which kick-started our Victorian Christmas.
Here at Reid Street our staff and pupils have worked very hard to give you a very festive feeling. Even the Grinch would have a lovely warm Christmassy glow after watching the following videos.
Reception – Click Here
Year One – Click Here
Year Two – Click Here
Year Three – Click Here
Year Four – Click Here
Year Five – Click Here
Year Six – Click Here
O Little Town – Click Here
Choir Magic – Click Here
A Christmas Wish – Click Here
Everyone at Reid Street Primary School would like to wish you a very Happy Christmas and a peaceful New Year.
