Sports Day 2016

Despite the horrendous weather over the weekend and through Monday, we held out and made a late decision about Sports Day. The Sun dance I completed on the field worked its magic and Sports Day went ahead as planned!

Our now familiar carousel of activities got underway for KS2 in the early morning sunshine and was completed with great enthusiasm for nearly 2 hours. Whilst the sun came and went as it pleased, the children continued to show their Sports Day skills with the house relay races and the Year group Sprint Champion races finishing off the morning in style.

Although a picnic lunch was enjoyed by all, it was soon time to get back to work!

In the afternoon KS1 and Yr R completed their roundabout of activities, again showing all their sporting prowess in a range of activities. The KS1 Sprint champion races finishing off the day, watched by parents and the rest of the school.

In: 4th Place was 2014 winners' Britannia (548points) ; 3rd place - last years winners' Adonia (568 points); 2nd place Azura (579 points) and in 1st place

Ventura!! (614 points)

Explorers War Dances

In PE we are EXPLORING dances from different parts of the world. Last week we learned the fearsome Maori Haka from New Zealand, and this week we had a go creating our own war dances for our Houses.

Here are the results:

Inter House Sports cup gets underway

The first round of the Oakwood Inter-House Sports cup got underway today as Y6 competed in a Quicksticks Hockey tournament on the school playground. With 50 points up for grabs for the winning house all house captains were anxious to make a good start to the years competitions.

The results were as follows;

Match 1 Arcadia  1 v 2  Oceana                            Match 4 Oriana  5 v 3  Arcadia

Match 2 Aurora  0 v 5  Oriana                                Match 5 Arcadia  5 v 0  Aurora

Match 3 Oceana  6 v 0  Aurora                              Match 6 Oriana  3 v 5  Oceana

That means 4th place = Aurora, 3rd place = Arcadia, 2nd place = Oriana and winners were Oceana!! (In blue)

Top scorers for the tournament; Ben H -7, Jack B - 6, Dylan H - 5.

Next week Y4 will complete the second round as they go head to head in a 5 a side football tournament. So keep a look out for those results!

House Captains are here!

After a lengthy selection process, which included application forms, speeches and a whole school electronic voting system, we finally have our 2013-14 House and Vice Captains.




They have already been fantastic ambassadors for the school by showing round parents of prospective 2014 Year R children.

We are very proud of them!

Our Last Few Days...

We've had a very exciting last few days of the summer term...

Firstly, we were wowed by Oakwood's Got Talent and all the acts from every year group - and especially a surprise act making use of Miss Patchett's dressing up box. It's a bit blurry, but see if you can work out who it is...!



We also had our final Celebration Assembly at which we paid tribute to our Sports Personality of the Year, our House Point Winners, our 100% Attenders, our winning sports teams and our nine Pupils of the Year.

Here are Oscar and Sam guarding the trophies!



And we also said a temporary goodbye to Mrs Latto, as she starts her maternity leave! We wish her well!

The House Cup

This year, the House Cup is awarded to...

Aurora!

This is the first time they have won it since 2008!

This year, they have also "done the double" by winning Sports Day too!

Many congratulations to them!

A Super Sticky Sweaty Sports Morning!

Monday was, perhaps, the hottest day of the year so far but, prepared with sun cream, hats and lots to drink, we all went up to the Oakwood field for our Sports Morning!

We held a round robin competition, where all children compete in all events to earn points for their house.

We then held House Relays which add to the final scores.

This year, Aurora triumphed with 438 points!



We then had individual sprint races for our elite runners, identified in their PE lessons.

We finished off with a picnic for family and friends on the field. A really fantastic day!

Special thanks to

• Mr Ackland for his faultless organisation
• TMC for their helpT
• The wonderful pupils from Oasis Academy Lord's Hill

...who all worked really hard to make it a success!

Remember it's Sports Morning 2013 tomorrow!

Remember tomorrow, Monday 8th July, is the last ever Oakwood Junior School Sports Morning!

We hope to get under way just after 10:15am if all is well. It's predicted to be another scorching day so please make sure your child

• puts on sun cream at home
• comes to school with their water bottle
• brings (AND WEARS!) a hat

If you child is particularly sensitive to the sun, longer slevees/longer shorts will offer better protection.

Children can come to school in their PE kit bearing their house colours;
Arcadia = Green
Oriana = Red
Oceana = Blue
Aurora = Yellow

Don't forget that parents/grandparents and friends are welcome to stay after the morning's competition for a picnic on the field - but remember to bring the food!

 

Stationery Shop Launch

Today saw the launch of Oakwood Junior School's brand new stationery shop, organised and run by the School Council.

Not only can pupils replace lost or damaged school items such as handwriting pens and whiteboard pens, but they can also choose from a range of colourful and interesting stationery items at very reasonable prices!

Items are priced from 10p up to £1.70 and come with a free name label if requested.

We will be running our second stationery shop next Tuesday. Have a look at some of the stock we are selling:

House Captains' Assembly

The House Captains did their first assembly this morning and set out to challenge the teachers to see if they knew the Rights Respecting Schools' Articles.

Their knowledge was good, but the House Captains told the story of a young girl in another part of the world who had been denied the right to an education and been punished for asking.

House Captains will be leading an assembly every half term.



The Vice Captains launched their poster competition to encourage people to be on time for school. We want to reduce the number of late minutes from 1182 this half term to less than 600 next half term, and then see if we can reduce it even further. Vice Captains will blog about the winner next half term.

House UNICEF Quiz

Yesterday, the Houses gathered in the hall for a whole school quiz about the environment and global warming. This was to help us become global citizens and raise awareness of some of the articles we have been learning about, as we work towards UNICEF's Rights Respecting Schools Award.

A great time was had by all and many congratulations to Arcadia - our winners!

Mrs Latto will be giving house points to any children who can tell her which articles were linked to yesterday's quiz (hint: there was more than one!)

House Captain Hustings

We have had a very busy and democratic week at Oakwood this week! On Wednesday, the four House Captain Candidates from each House presented their speeches to their House members.

 

After impressing their Houses with persuasive speeches, all that was left was to hope that the votes reflected their hard work.

On Thursday morning, everyone in the school attended the polling station, manned by our newly appointed "House Champions". An 'X' in the box and their fate was sealed!

Watch this space for election results very soon...

 

(P.S. A big THANK YOU to Mrs Dimaiolo for organising the polling station!)

Arcadia Cleans Up!

Arcadia was awarded the Oakwood Junior School House Cup in our special Celebration Assembly this morning!

On 30,500 House Points, they were a mere 950 ahead of Oriana, which is a really tight win - after all, 117,250 were awarded in total this academic year!

Congratulations to Arcadia, who have made it a double this year, winning the Sports Day Trophy as well!

Celebrating Our Houses!

Our Houses in Oakwood Junior School are named after four of the P&O Liners which sail from Southampton:

• Arcadia
• Aurora
• Oceana
• Oriana

Last night, all of our "House Liners" were in Southampton, along with Adonia, Ventura and Azura, to celebrate the 175th Anniversay of P&O. Despite the drizzle, it was a really impressive sight.

Mr and Mrs Handley Garland and Mr Barrett were all there and took some photos of the "convoy" down Southampton Water.

World Sports Day

We joined in with the Olympic World Sport Day today!




House teams joined volunteers from TMC and Oasis Academy on a very sunny field for our annual Sports Day, which this year took place on the London 2012 World Sport Day!

Have a look at our video of the day and see if you can spot yourself!



We also commemorated London 2012 by forming the Houses and the Staff into the Five Olympic Rings! We think it was quite successful! What do you think?



(You can click on the photo for a really BIG version to try and spot yourself!)

It was a very close run thing, with only 36 points separating the teams, but Arcadia beat Aurora by just 8 points, making it the first time they have won the Sports Day Trophy in over five years!

Well done, Arcadia!

Greetings Mr Mayor!

A big Thank You to Mr Mayor (or to give him his official title: The Right Worshipful The Mayor of Southampton, Councillor Terry Matthews.)

Mr Mayor joined us for Celebration Assembly this morning to give award certificates and badges. He also had a guided tour of the school and saw the video of our Young Voices Performance at the O₂ last week.



The Mayor told us about the history of his role in Southampton. He is the 789th Mayor, the first one being way back in 1217 - you can even read who was the first!

Thanks also to Alan, the Town Sergeant, whose job today was to be the Mayor's chauffeur!

Your change changes lives...

Not a lot to read in this blog, because the House Captains have explained what we did - just have a listen...

Part of something special...

We were very privileged to be invited to unveil the new Memorial Walls next to the Cenotaph in Southampton city centre this morning.

Our House Captains represented the school after we took part in the fund-raising by the Youth Parliament.

The new glass panels replace the roll of honour on the existing Portland stone Cenotaph in Watts Park which has been eroded.



House Captains, along with representatives from several other schools in the city, stayed for the Remembrance Service at 11am and took part in the two minutes' silence.

Children back in school also observed the two minutes' silence, and talked about the significance of the poppy.

You can catch a glimpse of our House Captains on BBC South Today...



...and they are also on the main photo on the Southampton City Council website Memorial Walls page.

Our Young Leaders!

We had special assembly when sixteen Year 6 children put themselves forward as House Captain candidates. This is a very prestigious position in Oakwood, as there are lots of responsibilities and challenges ahead for anyone who wants to take on this role. Four candidates for each house put forward their reasons for wanting to be a House Captain, explained the skills and attributes they thought would make them effective in the role and also suggested how they might be able to help improve the school during their tenure.

 

The assembly was also attended by Southampton City Councillor Keith Morrell, who was very impressed with the hustings and said he was relived that none of the candidates was up against him in the city council elections. He was convinced they were of such high quality they would give him a run for his money! We'll be announcing which children were elected as House Captains and Vice House Captains soon.

House Day!

We recently held another successful House Day.

Each of the houses - Arcadia, Aurora, Oceana and Oriana - met together as a team to complete each activity.

In the Year 3 base, the Houses had to work together as a team to solve 3 levels of maths puzzles.




In the Year 4 base, the children got active with a skipping competition!



The Year 5 teachers tested general knowledge skills with a quiz.



If you want to know what the Year 6 base did, be sure to check out what they did with their pens and a few random shapes...!

We all earned lots of House Points, and Arcadia and Oceana were joint winners for the day! More importantly, we had fun and worked brilliantly in our House teams.