This afternoon, ten girls from upper school represented NJS in a netball tournament at the Laurel Academy. Across six fixtures against other schools in the Doncaster area, the girls performed well winning two games but not securing enough points to progress to the final.

For the majority of the team, it was a competitive debut in a netball team but there was great experience to hand with the likes of Olivia, Peggy, Dolly and Autumn. Standout performers include Lottie, who performed well in the final third of the court, and Katie who was fierce in the centre role, playmaking and interception passes. For both girls, it was their first time playing netball. Well done to all the girls for all their effort this afternoon, it was a pleasure to see!

This week, 5CC put their creative minds to the test and began crafting their rainforest animal soft toys. This follows a sequence of lessons where the children have conducted market research on existing soft toys before redrafting designs of their own soft toy. Using a variety of stitches to attach details and sew their fabric together, it is brilliant to see their designs come to life!

On Thursday 27th November, Year 5 will be unveiling their soft toys and rainforest stories to the Year 2 children of Norton Infant School. Both projects will hopefully spread the message of looking after our environment, including its plants and animals.

To kick off Maths Week England 2025, Year 5 enjoyed working in pairs to solve MWE’s New York puzzle. After watching a short video, the children thrust into action counting squares, sharing systematic ways to go about solving this task.

Following our recent learning about square numbers, several groups noticed a pattern when they had found the number of walks on the 5 by 5 grid.

This term, our Year 5 pupils have been hard at work on their summer learning expedition, At the Coalface, exploring the fascinating geography, rich history, and powerful musical heritage of mining.

Today, they proudly showcased their learning in a special presentation to Year 4. This was a fantastic practice run ahead of their full Presentation of Learning for parents and carers on Thursday 17th July

The Year 5 children took real ownership of their audience’s experience by designing a series of engaging activities for Year 4 to get involved in. From investigating how mining shaped local settlements to trying out creative tasks linked to mining life, Year 4 were thoroughly engrossed.

A highlight of the afternoon was the moving performance of Year 5’s own mining poems inspired by the Aberfan disaster, accompanied beautifully on the glockenspiel. Their thoughtful words and music captured the emotion of this historical tragedy and demonstrated how deeply they have engaged with the topic.

We are incredibly proud of Year 5 for their hard work, creativity and leadership. We look forward to seeing them share their learning once again tomorrow afternoon at the Askers Miners Welfare. Well done, Year 5!

On Thursday 22nd May, we had a brilliant visit from Doncaster Rovers Football Club, who came into school to talk to the children about the importance of resilience, belief and setting goals.

Fresh from winning the 2024/2025 league title, the team shared their journey with the pupils – how they dealt with setbacks, worked hard together and stayed focused to achieve their goal of becoming champions. The key message was clear: believe in yourself, keep going even when it’s tough and never stop aiming high.

A huge thank you to Doncaster Rovers for taking the time to visit us and share such a powerful message with our school. What an experience for the children – learning about resilience from real-life champions of League 2!