Blog

A Sporty Summer Term!

Parents at Oakridge School know when the Summer term has started because of the HUGE number of sporting tournaments and festivals the school sign up to! There is a lot of ferrying of children around but it is definitely all worth it. Taking part in rounders matches, dodgeball tournaments and many other activities does wonders for the children’s confidence.

Yesterday, children from year 5 and 6 spent the afternoon at Thomas Keble Secondary School, where a rounder’s festival had been organised with Bussage, Chalford Hill and Eastcombe schools. Sadly, only Oakridge school turned up as the other three all cancelled at the last minute. This is a great example of the level of commitment and effort the staff and parents at Oakridge school put in to make sure our children are given the best possible opportunities.

It was a lovely afternoon, spent in the sunshine watching the year 9 children from Thomas Keble help teach the younger children from Oakridge how to fine tune their throwing, catching and ball hitting skills. It was particularly nice to see some old Oakridge faces that had left the school only a few years ago. They are clearly thriving at Thomas Keble and it’s nice to think that Oakridge school played its part in helping to educate and shape these youngsters.

Mr Price, the sports teacher at Thomas Keble school, was very impressed with our Oakridge kids and handed out a few sweets at the end to all the teams!

Electronics Workshop

Last week, students in class 2 enjoyed an electronics workshop for the morning, designing and programming robots to follow instructions.

They were given a brief demo about the activity before being split into teams.

The team who managed to tell the robot what to do the best would go through to the finals in Malvern, which take place next week!

The winning team included Casper, Wren and Elin. They are all very excited about the finals and we wish them lots of luck ahead of next week!

Worship Assembly May 2023

At the end of last term, the children enjoyed sharing the work they had produced over the past few months with their parents at the school’s Worship Assembly.

The assembly takes place at the end of each term. It is an opportunity for the children to proudly show off all the great things they have been learning about. It’s a good opportunity for parents to get involved, have an informal chat to teachers and catch up with other parents too.

Class 1 showed everyone some beautiful drawings of their trip to the steam engine museum, (above) while class 2 showed off their large scale field study drawings of insects they had studied while on a field trip to the local nature reserve, Strawberry Banks, just a short stroll from the school.

At the end of each assembly, certificates of achievement are handed to many of the students.

May Revels

We had a fantastic day on Saturday at May Revels - Oakridge School’s annual fundraising event. The children and parents could not have asked for more on a gloriously warm day as people from the village and surrounding Stroud poured onto the green, which doubles up as the school’s playground.

We started off with crowning our new May Queen, which is a tradition the children really enjoy. This year’s May queen was Eeva, who, being the oldest girl in her year, was chosen.

Shortly after, the children put on their dancing shoes and, with the help of Ballyhoo dancers, valiantly danced around their maypole. Following on from this was a vibrant Caribbean dance, where the entire school wriggled and showed off their moves to Wul Up.

A first for the Revels this year was the dance display by Ballyhoo Dance company, who dazzled the crowd with performances from children from different aged groups.

It was a busy day with lots going on. The schedule was packed full of fun, family activities.

Cranham orchestra also attended, they provided the perfect sound track to a blissful afternoon.

Craft and food stalls were busy, as were the book, plant and cake stalls…

There was plenty of opportunity to win prizes and enjoy go-karting and jumping on the bouncy castle, plus cheese rolling and welly wanging.

The whole day was very busy, with crowds gathering to enjoy ice creams and cream teas.

We ended the afternoon with our raffle and a (rather competitive) tug-of-war. Well done to everyone!

The King's Coronation!

Last Friday the children were so excited to celebrate the King’s Coronation by holding a fun filled bake off in school!

Preparations had been underway all week. First, the children were split into four teams. Together, they then had to come up with a unique idea for their cake design, one that they thought would win the competition! Next, they were sent home with a list of cake ingredients and decorations they needed to bring in.

Thursday was cake making day! The children all had great fun working together to whip up a delicious treat! It was lovely to see the children’s imaginations in full swing as the plans they had spent all week drawing up on paper were brought to life using yummy fruits and icing!

Finally, the big day arrived and the children were treated to a surprise guest! Judging was overseen by King Charles himself, aka, Head of Governor’s, Tim Pritchard-Thompson!

There were 4 categories - most unique idea, most crumbly, most representative of the Royal Family and, of course, the tastiest! It was a tough decision.

The overall winner went to this cake, which King Charles thought was the best tasting and the best looking…

…and there were tears of joy from the winning team!

Finally, after a lengthy judging process, the cakes were cut and handed out to parents, grandparents and carers, who had all been invited along for the afternoon! There were a lot of full tummies by the time everyone left at the end of the day!