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December Sporting Success

In the growing dark on Monday after school, four intrepid teams did battle on the St Matthew’s hallowed turf. The ‘field of dreams’ it may not have been, but the showing from our young boys was an excellent display of character. Having played away from home twice recently at the recent Merton tournaments, the year 5 and 6 boys team came back with the very position that no one wants to finish – 4th place! To rub salt into the wound, they were put there in part, thanks to Bishop Gilpin who beat us twice on the day. Revenge is a dish best served cold, and I’m sure the team will be itching to get into the tag rugby tournament for the spring term.

Having missed out on winning the cluster tournament to Sacred Heart on penalties, it was round two back at home for a football friendly that resembled a game of hide and seek by the time it finished. In test cricket, the umpires bring light meters. The science coordinator informs me that no such equipment exists in this school.

To the games themselves. St Matthew’s year 6 team, like many of your Christmas holidays, got off to a flying start with a 5-0 thrashing of their Sacred Heart counterparts. The boys played magnificently, Tarran Williams continually finding space and with more time on his hands to shoot than Big Ben. The year 5 team struggled to gain a foothold in their game. The score was close at half time but Sacred Heart ran away 5-2 winners.

The half time oranges brought a welcome break and with a little shuffling of the teams we began two new games with years 5 & 6 on both pitches. Some sloppy play in defence and ricochets reminiscent of a pin ball machine saw St Matthew’s behind early on. Our reporter couldn’t see, but could hear Mr Peck rallying his troops for the second half. It may have been something along the lines of:

 

‘Follow your spirit, and upon this charge

Cry ‘God for Harry, England, and Saint George!’

 

This they did (without the crying) and battled back to draw 1-1. The other sides had a similarly close game, Sacred Heart emerging 3-2 winners.

Many thanks must go to the parents for daring to come out and support in the bleak mid-winter. They cheered magnificently and provided the tea for the boys. Perhaps next time Mr Peck could organise some hot drinks for the parents? It would do him good to learn to make a decent cuppa! That’s it for the sport this term. Look out on the PE notice board for the upcoming events in the Spring term.

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November Sporting Success

If the idea of having to deal with your child’s filthy kit from the field fills you with dread, then perhaps hockey could be for you (and your child). Our school appears to be full of hockey players and a select few took the short walk with Mrs Carroll in November down to the mud-free 4G pitch at Ryanes Park High for the Merton Quicksticks Hockey finals.

We travelled light, just 6 intrepid players, 3 girls and 3 boys for balance, and a steely determination to bring back a trophy to our already over-crowded cabinet. Placed in a tough group, the children swept all competition aside in a devastating morning of glorious goals. As well as having clean kit, there were clean sheets as well from the team. Merton Park were dispatched, 5-0; Dundonald went down 3-0; West Wimbledon managed to hold parity with us, in a 2-2 draw. But then it was back to winning ways, Holy Trinity well-beaten 4-0 and finally Hatfeild losing 3-0. Nearly everyone was getting on the score sheet, Annabel Jordan proving deadlier than a shark in front of goal.

Then came the dreaded lunch break. If you’re enjoying a day out at Lords, or the Oval, this would be something to look forward to. Sadly though for the teachers, the bar was closed and all momentum from the morning generally stops in the afternoon.

That all said the quarter final was easy enough; St Matthew’s coming out 4-1 winners against Morden Primary. Next, came the reigning champions, Bishop Gilpin, in the semi-finals. Sadly there were no parallels with England’s world cup semi-final and last year’s champions overcame us 2-0, in a very close encounter. We would have to go again in the 3rd place play-off which the team did magnificently to win 4-1 against Wimbledon Park and finish on a deserved high.

A special mention should go to Joel in the team. Despite not scoring any goals (some feat when you consider the team scored 25 in total) he must have saved dozens in a brilliant display of defence throughout the tournament. More to come in the Spring term when we will look to defend the three titles won in last year’s Quickstart competition.

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No cutting corners in Year 5!

No getting around Year 5, we have the measure of area and perimeter!

As you can see Year 5 have been putting their maths skills to the test this week.

And on Tuesday we found our Christmas spirit and started spreading joy in every ‘area’ of the school!

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Year 3 and 4 Visit Royal Festival Hall

Year 3 and 4 were delighted to be invited to The Royal Festival Hall this week, to sing carols and enjoy some Christmas fun! Harry and Edward from Year 3 told us that the organ had 7866 pipes!

Some favourite carols from the day were: ‘Ding Dong Merrily On High’ and ‘Winter Fantasy’ .

Ding Dong Merrily on High:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJbRURK3zWo

Winter Fantasy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5JtmKRu4yU

 

 

Next week we are performing in Carols by Candlelight at the KS2 Church Service, so you can hear our wonderful carol singing in action!

Year 4 🙂

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Year 6 Visit The National Gallery

As you know, our topic this term has been Ancient Greece – specifically The Adventures of Odysseus by Hugh Lupton. Therefore, we jumped at the chance to go to the National Gallery last week where we would be able to see two paintings that were based on Homer’s adventure: Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus and Penelope and the Suitors.

We were lucky to have a very informative talk by Nick (one of the gallery guides) who gave us an insight into the mysteries behind the paintings and expand our knowledge of the story even more.

As well as the informative tour, we also had our own challenge for the day. Miss Manhire had given us a list of artists, paintings and other interesting things to find in and around the gallery.  Here are some of the fantastic things we found:

‘Anyone seen my lion?’

Mosaic

The Judgement of Paris

A London scene

Mrs Sullivan’s group

A portrait of someone our age (this boy is 11)

Van Gogh

and a present from Norway to England!

It was such a good day and a member of the public even told Miss Manhire how brilliant gallery visitors we were.

Year 6 😉

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The Annual Maple Class Storytelling Festival

A wonderful morning was had by the Year 6’s last week at the Annual Storytelling Competition. Heats had whittled the finalists down to three and we were ready to enjoy a fun-filled morning of Greek tales, Greek food and Greek music. Well done to finalists Helena and Henrietta. A special congratulations to Ollie, our Maple Class Storytelling Champion 2019.

If you particularly enjoyed any of the food, then this is some of what we ate (perhaps you could try it at home.)

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Sound Construction

This week, Year Five and Six were incredibly lucky to welcome Sonoro Choir and Organisers of the Wimbledon International Music Festival to St Matthew’s. We were unsure how the day would unfold when we were told that we were being visited by a group of classical singers and artists but it turned out to be an unforgettable day. The morning began by listening to the group perform a classical piece of music. This is a video of Sonoro performing it here.

The choir then guided us through a variety of warm up techniques before we joined them in singing a beautiful version of ‘Bridge over Troubled Water.’ We were also very lucky to hear each of the choir members sing a solo during the morning. Jeff started by singing Maria from West Side Story, Nina then sung  a piece from the opera  Madame Butterfly and finally Jo sung a very moving piece from Gianni Schicchi. You can see another version of it here.

 

The afternoon session was lead by a lovely lady called Helen. We used art straws to create the bridges we had been singing about in the morning.

    

A thoroughly great day was had by all and we look forward to welcoming Helen back next week for a follow up art session.

Thank you Sonoro and Merton Music Foundation.

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October Sporting Success

Despite the recent wet weather, a number of children have been showing off their sporting prowess and representing the school in
various different sports in the last few weeks.

A strong team of 25 runners from KS2 took to Morden Recreation ground to tackle a cross country course; an old favourite at
schools. This one is harder than in days gone by as the course is entirely open so no trees or bushes to hide behind! The children
were a real credit to the school and nearly all finished in the top 20 in each race. Timo and Nelson were outstanding, coming 2nd
and 8th in their respective races.

We have enjoyed some success on the football pitch as well. Our year 4s drew one game and won 3 in a recent Raynes Park
festival. A special mention must go to Bradley on his excellent captaincy.

Year 5 and 6 hosted two teams from Hollymount in a friendly after school last week. One team won 6-4 and another lost 5-1 after battling back from 4-0 down at half time. Clearly the defense had all gone on holiday! Thank you to the parents who organised the half time oranges and tea for the children. Our
visitors were warmly welcomed and it was much appreciated.

Last of all, our netball squad traveled to The Joseph Hood Recreation Ground yesterday for the Raynes Park Netball Cluster Tournament. After winning all 5 games in the group and not conceding a single goal, the team progressed to the final against Merton Park. This was a tightly fought contest and the final score was a disappointing 2-1 to Merton Park. Spirits were still high though as the St Matthews team will go through to the borough finals at the beginning of November.   A special  thank you to Sarah Bell who gives up her time to coach the netball squad and was a great support yesterday. The team captain Helena said, “It was a great day, we played so well and I was very proud of the team. I am looking forward to borough finals and doing the best we can.”

For the Merton School Sports write up, see the link below.

http://www.mertonssp.org.uk/news/raynes-park-hi-5-netball-competition

Look out next month for how the Netball team get on in the borough finals, as well as how the Year Five and Six team do in the Quicksticks Hockey and Football competitions.

 

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Another exciting week done!

Another exciting week done! This week we  have learnt about how the Moon orbits the Earth, what it’s like to go on a pilgrimage, how to be newspaper reporters, visited Wimbledon High School (so many fun experiments) and investigated how our shadows move and change throughout the day.

As part of our learning about Earth and Space we have been researching the artist Peter Thorpe and admiring some of his abstract space art. He is well known for painting rockets and began his rocket paintings in the 1980s as a way to use paint that he would have otherwise thrown away.

So inspired we were by his creativity that we decided to create our own…what a fun (and messy) process this was. Some of our masterpieces are below.

 

Have a great weekend!

Miss Dyer and Year Five