The arts company Every Picture Tells came to work with the Early Years children to produce some art and craft work related to traditional stories. Firstly, the children listened to an alternative version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. A storyboard was used to help to tell the story and afterwards, the children had the opportunity to produce a baby bear picture. To finish off the visit, the children took part in a mini quiz: Guess the traditional story. The children were excellent at the quiz and guessed all the answers correctly! A fabulous time was had by all.

Posted by L.Gillie at 11:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We are extremely proud to announce that the school has achieved the Artsmark Silver award for our high level of provision to the arts. By gaining the Artsmark Silver award, the school has shown it's commitment to the wider development of pupils and teachers and to raising the profile of it's arts provision both within the school and the local community.

The arts cover the four artforms of art, drama, dance and music. Over the last couple of years, we have been developing and increasing the provision we offer to the children through organising a range of activities to enrich and broaden the curriculum, such as visits to arts organisations, artists coming in to school, various competitions, and events within school.

The awards ceremony was held at the Northern Stage in Newcastle and it was a fun filled event, with music and dance performances from various schools around the North East. Heather Seymour and Adam McIntyre accompanied Miss Gillie and Mr Malik to collect the award and to celebrate the achievement.

Thank you to all of the staff and pupils at Wardley for their hard work and dedication to the arts.

Posted by L.Gillie at 05:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Year 4/5 football team were joint winners of the Felling Schools Year 5 Football tournament. Having qualified for the finals last winter, the team competed with Oakfield, South Street and Harlow Green for the trophy.

In the opening match, Karl Young scored a great goal to give the team a one-nil win against Harlow Green. We then had two goalless draws with Oakfield and South Street. After all the matches were played, the team finished first, level on points and goal difference with Oakfield Primary.

Mr Scott and Mr Evans were extremely pleased with the children’s efforts. Mr Scott was particularly delighted with captain Aidan Willis, who showed great pace, strength and maturity in defence. He also identified goalkeeper Nathan Barnes for special praise, as he kept three clean sheets. He was also outstanding on the rare occasion he was called upon to make a save. The children have been fantastic all season and will hopefully continue to progress next year.

The teaching staff at Wardley would like to thank the parents for their continued support. Without their lifts to the competition, the children would not be able to participate in so many events.

Posted by B.Evans at 08:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After half term, there will be a one option meal system which we will trial for the six weeks leading up to Easter.

Spring Menu

Continue reading "School Dinner Menu" »

Posted by M.Malik at 11:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The staff and children have taken part in an exciting festive project to design and make their own professionally finished Christmas card. Each year group has chosen a different theme, designed their work and then sent it away to be professionally made. Along with their design on the front, the card also featured each child's full name and school name on the back. The school has made a small sum of money from this project which will be spent on further developing the arts provision within school.

Posted by L.Gillie at 10:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wardley 2 v Brandling 1
Ryan Elstob
Karl Young

Man of the Match: Cameron Scott

Wardley's Year 5/6 football team had a winning start to the season. Wardley dominated the game and could have won by a larger margin. The team started nervously, as many players were making their debuts for the school team, but as the first half drew to a close, Wardley's dominance eventually paid off. Ryan Elstob opened the scoring with a simple tap-in. Excellent defending from Aidan Willis and Cameron Scott throughout the game ensured that Brandling only had two shots on target throughout the match. In the second half, Wardley created many chances and finally second half substitute Karl Young scored from close range after some excellent work down the left by Callum McPherson. Mr Scott and Mr Evans were delighted with the first performance of the season and hope to continue the good form in the next match.

Posted by B.Evans at 08:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Key Stage One and Foundation Stage children have enjoyed a fantastic arts themed week based around the continent of Africa.

The week was planned and designed in order to enable the children to gain an insight into different cultures and customs of the African people. The children learned about the geography of the continent, foods, animals, clothing and jewellery, music, singing and dance, as well as the different forms of African artwork.

Read on to find out more about our visiting artists for the week, see more photos and find out more about the types of activities that took place.

Continue reading "African Arts Week- A Huge Success!" »

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After six months of hard work, the Year six pupils finally staged their performance of Disney’s Jungle book at Heworth Grange in the summer term and it was an outstanding performance from the children, who put all their effort into the show.

Read on to find out more details and see more spectacular photos.

Continue reading "Wardley’s production of Jungle Book at Heworth Grange- absoloutely out of this world!" »

Posted by L.Gillie at 03:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Over the past few months the Year Four pupils have been attending Miss Gillie’s drama Club. They used the traditional story of Jack and the Beanstalk and adapted it to a modern version called Jill and the Beanstalk. The children learned a rap and a dance as well as the acting out of the script.

Jill and the Beanstalk was designed to provide the children with a moral dilemma regarding stealing and family issues.

Alongside learning drama conventions, the children also made a backdrop for the set of the stage. This involved painting Jill's garden and the giant's castle. Various props were also made for the play.

The play was then performed to the whole school and teaching staff. A very enjoyable time was had by all!

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over the past half term a small group of Reception class pupils have been attending Miss Gillie’s drama Club. They used the traditional story The Gingerbread Man to develop their role-play skills and confidence in speaking and listening.

The children also developed their creative skills by painting a back drop designed for the set of the performance. The backdrop set included the Little old lady and Little old man's kitchen and the countryside that the Gingerbread man ran through.

The play was then performed to Foundation Stage and Key Stage One pupils and teaching staff. Well done to the children for a fantastic performance!

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wardley Primary School has been working in partnership with Heworth Grange Comprehensive School Arts College staff to develop the skills of some of our pupils here at Wardley.

Mrs Park, the art teacher at Heworth, came in one morning per week for six weeks, to work with our gifted and talented artists from Nursery to Year Six. The children looked at and discussed artwork by Henri Matisse, as a stimulus. The children did still life sketches, painted; sponge printed and did collages of various fruit and vegetables, for a Healthy Eating Display now situated in the dining hall.

Mrs Park also worked with all of the Year Two pupils in order to support the children with their transition from the Infants to the Juniors, by producing artwork to be displayed in the Junior Hall. The children looked at multicultural art and used aboriginal style techniques to re-create a map of Wardley.

Thank you to the children and to Mrs Park for their hard work producing the wonderful displays.

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Year 3 and 4 enjoyed multicultural arts week by looking at and studying Japan. The children studied the geographical and historical aspects of Japan as well as focusing on Japanese customs and culture, through art. The pupils tried Japanese writing, made fans and designed kimonos. This artwork is very attractively displayed in the Junior hall.

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Several visits to Laing Art Gallery have been organised throughout this year. Year 1/2, 3/4 and 5 have all been on visits to Laing Art Gallery to develop their artistic skills.

Year 1/2 and 3/4 have been to see an exhibition called Work, Rest and Play at the gallery. The exhibition has a series of artworks by famous artists on the theme of Work, Rest and Play. This visit involved the children looking at and analysing the works of art, hearing stories from a storyteller, developing collage techniques and making props and using them in drama performances.

Year 1/2 photos below:

Year 3/4 photos below:

Year 5 worked on The Bard Take One Picture project in January(further details of which are posted on this website in the Year 5 section).

Everyone had a fantastic time and more visits will be planned for next academic year.

Posted by L.Gillie at 03:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over the past three months, the school has been collecting Sainsburys Active Kids Vouchers. We have collected more than 9000 vouchers. This is a brilliant response. Thankyou to all those children and parents who brought in the vouchers. Your support is invaluable. We will use the vouchers to purchase:
*A basketball net.
*Playground storage unit.
*Hockey sticks and balls.
*CD player.
*Target nets.

Posted by B.Evans at 12:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wardley recently hosted its second hugely successful art exhibition.
The event involved every single child in the school creating their own piece of artwork to display in the exhibition. This allowed all of our budding young artists to showcase their artistic and creative flair!

The children created their art work on a canvas using a variety of different media- paint, chalks, crayons, etc. This was then framed and displayed in the junior hall over the two days that the exhibition ran for.

Parents were invited in order to view and potentially purchase their children’s artwork. The event proved to be hugely successful in terms of celebrating children’s artistic achievements and raising money for the school's art fund.
An enjoyable time was had by all!

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A questionnaire was provided to parents and carers to find out what their feelings were about the educational experience provided at Wardley Primary.

Continue reading "How do you feel about the school?" »

Posted by M.Malik at 02:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wardley Primary School has had their School Travel Plan authorised by the DSCF and will receive a substantial grant that will enable the school to purchase a cycle storage unit so that pupils will be able to cycle to school. More details about this to follow.

Posted by B.Evans at 08:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mr Shackleton and Mr Evans have tried to bring a bit of Brazil to Wardley. A small selection of children from Year Two up to Year Six have been fine tuning their soccer skills with a Brazilian game called Futebol de Salão.

Futebol de Salão is a 5-a-side version of football of South American origin that is played with a smaller (size 2), heavier (465g) ball that has virtually no bounce (10%). The game became very popular in Brazil where players such as Pele, Rivelino, Zico right through to Juninho, Ronaldo and Rivaldo were brought up first playing Futebol de Salão before moving on to conventional football.

Each week, the children have used Heworth Comprehensive School’s facilities. They have been learning new tricks to help them get the ball into the air and to beat players. The children have made masses of progress over the summer term and it is hoped the club shall continue next year. To celebrate the end of the club's first year, a presentation ceremony took place. The children were awarded certificates depending on how many moves and tricks they had acquired of the course of the club.

Here are a few pictures of some of the Gold certificate winners, who could demonstrate all the tricks they had gained whilst at the club.

Posted by B.Evans at 08:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The annual Key Stage One Wardley Sports Day was held on Wednesday 11th July 2007. A fantastic time was had by the children, parents and all staff. There were seven different races: Running, Skipping, Hopping, Jumping, Quoits Balance, Bean Bag Balance and Through the hoop. After the seven competitive races, the Red team came out winners. It was an extremely close competition with the Red team only taking the lead with two races to go. The children were all very enthusiastic and brilliantly behaved.
1. Red 28 points
2. Yellow 23 points
3. Green 22 points
4. Blue 11 points

Red team captain presented with the trophy by Mr Malik.

Once the team event had finished, we held races for the fastest boy and girl runners in each year group.

Winner of girl year one race: Casey Bencito
Winner of boy year one race: Oliver Barnett
Winner of girl year two race: Rachel Bushell
Winner of boy year two race: Drew Hodgson

Posted by B.Evans at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In early July, the Year One and Two classes carried out a presentation of their fruit and vegetables topic. The aim of the presentation was to show to the parents how fruit and vegetables are an important part of a balanced diet and how fruit and vegetables can be great fun. The children sang a healthy eating song and then acted out a drama based on characters from a balanced diet, for example, Terri Tomato and Barry Burger. The children then took on the roles of teachers and led the parents through a series of activities. These included:
*Sorting packed lunch items into healthy and unhealthy.
*Creating a fruit salad that appeals to children.
*Creating a piece of fruit and vegetable art.
*Blind folded exotic fruit tasting.

This a piece of vegetable art work created by one of the parents.

This is one of the parent's designs for a fruit salad that would be appealling to a young child.

One of the children with their mum showing off their art work.

Two children checking whether the parents have sorted the healthy and unhealthy together.

Posted by B.Evans at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wardley had three different nominations for the Gateshead Young Sports Achievers Awards 2007. The Year 5/6 Kwik Cricket team were nominated after another successful season, where they retained the Gateshead Schools Kwik Cricket trophy for a third year in a row. Two individual nomination were made. Kaley Kennedy was nominated for her positive attitude and commitment to P.E and athletics club. Jessica Kirtley was nominated for her excellent all round sporting ability.

The awards ceremony took place at Gateshead Leisure Centre, with hundreds of young people from all across Gateshead in attendance. Unfortunately, the final awards went to children from other schools. We remain extremely proud of the wonderful sporting achievements of the nominated children at Wardley and hope to have even more nominations at the awards ceremony next year.

Posted by B.Evans at 03:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

For the third year in a row, Wardley have been crowned the Year 5/6 Gateshead Schools ASDA Kwik Cricket champions. It is a wonderful achievement for the team, and the pupils and staff at Wardley are all extremely proud of the cricketers.

The festival was held at our local club, Felling. Wardley took both an 'A' and a 'B' team. The 'B' team performed admirably winning 3 out of the 4 matches. Unfortunately, this was not quite enough to lead them through to the semi-finals. The 'A' team won their group and the semi-final quite comfortably, with four comprehensive victories. The final was a tight affair but excellent bowling from the whole team saw the Wardley ‘A’ side home.

Mr Evans was delighted with the victory as it was a just reward for the children’s hard work in training throughout the cold, wet winter months in preparation for the tournament. The next stage of the competition is the regional finals, which will be held at the test match arena, The Riverside at Chester Le Street.

Posted by B.Evans at 06:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Wardley Primary School children are to take part in the ‘The Walk to School Week’ on the 21th-25th May 2007.

Walk to School has been developed by Gateshead Council to encourage adults and children to discover some of the benefits of walking to and from school in order to reduce our reliance on the car. This initiative provides an excellent opportunity to promote road safety awareness as well as encouraging healthier, fitter lifestyles for all.

It is hoped that as many children as possible will walk to and from school. Throughout the week, the children shall record how they travelled to and from school. They shall also complete some activities linked to the safety and benefits of walking to school.

Walking to School is a great way for you to “do your bit� to help improve the environment, in the same way as recycling your bottles or turning off lights. We want to encourage everyone to consider how they travel to school, and try walking to school for a week. Who knows, you might just find it is quicker, healthier and less stressful!

To find out more about the Walk to School week, you can visit www.walktoschool.org.uk or to read about the Wardley School Travel Plan click here

Posted by B.Evans at 03:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

From the data collected by the Year 6 children for the school travel plan, it was found that upto 70 cars can be parked outside school at the end of the school day. As there are so many cars, it led to 38% to be parked illegally. All the children and staff at Wardley found this to be a startling number. To tackle this problem, we have decided to try and reduce the number of cars parked outside school to make Wardley a safer, less congested and polluted place for all in the local community.

Continue reading "Have you thought of car sharing?" »

Posted by B.Evans at 07:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The whole of Year 2 travelled up to Heworth Comprehensive School to attend a multi skills sporting festival. The festival comprised of the children using their running, jumping, catching, kicking, throwing and balancing skills. All the children were very excited as it was the first time they had all represented the school in a competitive event. The Wardley children were split into four teams and competed with eight other teams from Whitemere, Bill Quay and Lingey House. Out of the twelve teams, we finished 2nd, 4th, 8th and 12th. The children throughly enjoyed the event and their behaviour was a credit to the school. With the event being such a success, it will hopefully become a permament addition to the sporting calender.

Posted by B.Evans at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Year One and Two have been learning all about the Easter story. Throughout the week, the children developed a greater understanding of the events that occurred in the last week leading up to Jesus’ death and resurrection. The focus was predominately on role-play and drama.

We began the week by re-enacting Palm Sunday. Each of the children made a giant palm leaf and waved them as Jesus rode into Jerusalem on the donkey.

As Jesus rode in, we sang ‘We have a King who rides a Donkey.’

The following day, we studied the events of the last supper. We broke and shared the bread and wine (blackcurrant juice) and washed each other’s feet, just as Jesus’ did with his disciples.

Finally, we read the final part of the Easter story and discussed the symbols that remind us of Easter. This led us to produce an Easter card using either religious or non-religious symbols.

All the children visited Priory Court to give the elderly residents the card that they had made. This helped the children understand that Easter is a time of celebration for Christians in the wider community.

Posted by B.Evans at 09:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

To coincide with the Easter celebrations at Wardley, we ran a whole school competition for the second year running. Every child in the school took part in the competition, which involved the design and decoration of a hard boiled egg.
The children were encouraged to use their own creativity and imagination when designing and making their egg and we had a wide selection of ideas. These included: animals, cartoon characters, birds, insects and people.
Also back by popular demand was a staff egg competition: Miss Gardner’s Grouch won, followed by Mr Shackleton and Mr Arthur’s joint chicken and egg design.
There was a 1st place and two runner up prizes per year group, which was a delicious chocolate egg-Mmm!
Well done to everyone at Wardley Primary for taking part!

Posted by L.Gillie at 04:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wardley 3 v St Albans 0
Jakk Smith x 2
John James

Wardley returned to form with a comfortable win against St Albans. Some excellent football was played in the first half, with Wardley racing to a 2-0 lead. John James opened the scoring with a long range effort carefully placed into the net. Jakk Smith continued his excellent goalscoring record with another two goals.

Mr Scott and Mr Evans were particularly pleased with the clean sheet and commended Callum Burns on the great energy and skills he showed throughout the match.

Man of Match
Callum Burns

Posted by B.Evans at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Northumbria in Bloom
Children’s Painting Competition

Gateshead Council is once again hosting the above competition. Year's One, three and four took part this year. Year One could paint a flower from any chosen month and we chose to paint pansies, which flower in July. Year's three and four were restricted to the months of March, July or November.

The children painted Poppies to coincide with November Remembrance Day and also Cornflowers, which flower in July. Judging will take place at Saltwell Park on Saturday 17th March 2007 at 11am. The winning entries will feature in the next Northumbria in Bloom Calendar.

Good luck to those pupils who entered!

Posted by L.Gillie at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Laing Art Gallery
Take one Picture: North, South, East, West project
The Bard by John Martin

Year Five pupils have recently taken part in the Take one Picture: North, South, East, West project at the Laing Art Gallery.

Continue reading "Laing Art Gallery- Take One Picture project" »

Posted by L.Gillie at 09:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We were delighted to find out today that Amy Porthouse has won the Theatre Royal Poster Competition in the Reception to Year 2 category. Amy has been awarded a £30 cash prize plus two tickets to see the Jack and the Beanstalk pantomime. She will also get to meet the star studded cast after the show.

A big thank you to Miss Forster, who worked with the artists to complete their designs.

Congratulations Amy.

Posted by B.Evans at 03:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Rhys Prudhoe, aged 7, has finished as a runner up in the Gateshead Indoor Market Christmas Art Competition. Rhys designed a penguin Christmas picture at Mrs Atkinson’s Art and Design Club. The presentation of the prizes were held at Gateshead indoor market on Saturday 2nd December 2006. Alan Robson of Metro FM, presented the awards. A good day was had by all. Rhys and his Dad were very enthusiastic in joining in with the entertainment. This led to many CDs being won for guessing the correct song and TV programme. Much to Miss Gillie’s delight, she won a chocolate advent calendar. (She insists she later passed this onto Rhys!)

Well done to Rhys. We at Wardley hope he continues to work on many more creative projects in the future.

Posted by B.Evans at 02:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

To celebrate the launch of the 2006 Christmas Stamp issued this month, the Royal Mail have given pupils in the north of England the chance to win a computer or digital camera for their school. The stamps, which feature traditional Christmas images, are the 40th set of Christmas Stamps issued in the UK. They depict a snowman, Father Christmas, a reindeer and a Christmas tree.

Year Three and Four children took part in this wonderful art and design competition. Unfortunately, only one design was allowed to be chosen for the whole school. It was a difficult decision with so many excellent creations. After much deliberation, the design chosen was by Emily Terry. (See chosen design above)

We await the results with much interest and thank all those children who took part.

Miss Gillie (Art Co-ordinator)

Posted by B.Evans at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Friends of the Theatre Royal are holding their annual art competition. The children have been asked to design a poster relating to their Christmas Pantomime ‘Jack and the Beanstalk.’ The winners receive a cash prize and two tickets to the performance. In addition, the best designs are displayed in the foyer during the panto season. The reception class entered this competition. The four chosen designs for entry were by Josie Ball, Amy Porthouse, Louis Ciaraldi and James Stevenson. (See designs above)

Thank you to those children for their efforts and good luck.

Miss Gillie (Art Co-ordinator)

Posted by B.Evans at 01:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Over the past three months, the school has been collecting Tesco Sport For Schools Vouchers. We have collected more than 5900 vouchers. This is a brilliant response. Thankyou to all those children and parents who brought in the vouchers. Your support is invaluable. We will use the vouchers to purchase:
*Rugby balls.
*Dance ribbons.
*Tennis balls.
*Netball bibs.

Posted by B.Evans at 12:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

At today's staff meeting, Peter Bolger (Gateshead Grid for Learning Manager) will deliver a hands-on session, demonstrating the school's website. Colleagues will have the opportunity to publish to the site and gain an overview of the site functionality and potential creative uses within the classroom.

Posted by Melody at 09:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)